Summary

The convergence of geophysical and economic forces that continuously influence environmental quality in the coastal zone presents a grand challenge for resource and environmental economists. To inform climate adaptation policy and identify pathways to sustainability, economists must draw from different lines of inquiry, including nonmarket valuation, quasi-experimental analyses, common-pool resource theory, and spatial-dynamic modeling of coupled coastal-economic systems. Theoretical and empirical contributions in valuing coastal amenities and risks help examine the economic impact of climate change on coastal communities and provide a key input to inform policy analysis. Co-evolution of community demographics, adaptation decisions, and the physical coastline can result in unintended consequences, like climate-induced migration, that impacts community composition after natural disasters. Positive and normative models of coupled coastline systems conceptualize the feedbacks between physical coastline dynamics and local community decisions as a dynamic geoeconomic resource management problem. There is a pressing need for interdisciplinary research across natural and social sciences to better understand climate adaptation and coastal resilience.