Policies need to promote more open and scientific narration of climate change impacts, taking into account their complexity and long-term uncertainty, in order to enhance urban health preparedness and resilience.

For the attention of: City officers, urban leaders, professions and communities concerned with urban health preparedness and resilience

The problem: In Chinese cities, government narrations of climate change impacts tend to be much more behind actual scientific research of climate change;

Information about climate change impacts is hard to encounter; citizens know little about, are largely unprepared, but are highly exposed to life-threatening climate change impacts.

What we did: We analysed the narratives of climate change impacts in relevant policy-making arenas and products of the government in Guangzhou, China, a city highly vulnerable facing climate change, in order to understand why the urban health sectors are inactive, and what can be done to improve.

What our study adds:

  • Empirical understanding of climate change-urban health governance challenges
  • An unconventional perspective to approach the research of the climate change-urban health nexus
  • A novel approach to improve the narration of climate change impacts and hence with the potential to improve urban health governance in Guangzhou

Implications for city policy and practice: City policy and practice need to:

  • take greater consideration of the complexity and uncertainty of climate change impacts and their consequences on health
  •  respond to public health governance with greater sense of urgency
  • deliver greater information transparency regarding climate change impacts narration in order to enhance urban health preparedness and resilience

Links to other resources and support:

Open access box chapter – Resilience Management for Healthy Cities in a Changing Climate

Original qualitative research – A narrative model for exploring climate change engagement among young community leaders

Full research article: Narrating the impacts of climate change for urban health governance in Guangzhou, China

Authors: Jieling Liu (@JielingLiu)

Editor: Marcus Grant