Can we learn from the past? Four hundred years of changes in adaptation to floods and droughts: Measuring the vulnerability in two Hispanic cities

Abstract

In a context of increasingly severe weather disasters around the globe, planning strategies are critical. The study of vulnerability to climate risks reveals the failures of current social models to adapt to a changing environment due to heterogeneous cultural, economic, political and historical developments. Any discussion regarding vulnerability to climate risks requires knowing how societies have faced natural disasters in the past. We propose the Perceptual Index for Changes in Climate Risk (PICCR). The PICCR is an index that groups several social indicators into four factors that summarize the evolution of both vulnerability and adaptation to floods and droughts. We compute the evolution of the PICCR and its main factor in two similar medium-sized Hispanic cities (Murcia in Spain and Mendoza in Argentina) from the 17th century to the present time. The results show that, over the last four centuries, hazard perception has improved, vulnerability remains high and adaptation strategies have improved, but not as much as current technology allows.