Building climate resilience: Managing the social impacts of climate change
In my last article, I unpacked how climate change is reshaping daily life — closing schools, straining housing, isolating vulnerable people, and compounding disadvantage. These are the human interfaces with climate change.
In 2025, we understand the environmental threats well—we’ve been hearing about them for a solid 20 years (it’s hard to believe it’s been 20 years that I’ve been directly in this space and knew what was coming…).
Yet despite this long-standing awareness, the social impacts still don’t receive the same urgency or investment as the environmental ones.
Put another way, too often, “resilience” still means infrastructure. That needs to change.
To build true climate resilience, we need to get three things right: what we invest in, who we centre, and how we plan and deliver.
That means:
Treating social infrastructure as climate infrastructure — investing in the spaces that support daily life and become lifelines during crisis.
Embedding equity at the core of every adaptation plan — ensuring those most at risk are prioritised, not overlooked.
Shifting from reactive recovery to proactive, place-based action — enabling communities to lead with the local knowledge, relationships and readiness they already have.
Three shifts we need to make to build community resilience to climate change
1. Recognise social infrastructure as essential climate infrastructure
Social infrastructure—community centres, libraries, clinics, aged care homes, volunteer networks—still sits on the margins of adaptation plans.
But in crisis, these places hold communities together. They offer shelter, power, cooling, and connection. Without them, even the most engineered cities are vulnerable.
The City of Sydney now treats social infrastructure as a core resilience asset. Victoria’s adaptation planning is moving in the same direction, investing in climate-ready housing and healthcare for at-risk groups.
The James Martin Institute’s 2025 report found that connected communities—with trusted relationships and shared spaces—are more resilient. But short-term funding cycles often miss the organisations best placed to lead this work.
What needs to happen
1. Retrofit community facilities as resilience hubs - These spaces already serve as social anchors. With backup power, cooling, and accessible design, they can double as trusted hubs in crisis.
2. Fund long-term community development - Short-term grants and post-disaster relief don’t build resilience. Ongoing support for local leadership, programs, and networks is essential.
3. Integrate social infrastructure into resilience frameworks - Community assets must be prioritised alongside energy, transport, and water—and funded accordingly.
4. Climate-proof social and affordable housing - Many vulnerable people live in climate-exposed housing. Upgrades to insulation, cooling, and energy access are critical.
5. Track social resilience, not just physical outcomes - Measure what matters—engagement, networks, and equity impacts—not just infrastructure delivered.
2. Put equity at the core of climate adaptation
Climate change doesn’t hit evenly - it impacts our vulnerable community members more acutely. Think of renters without air-conditioning, people unable to evacuate with mobility issues, and communities without access to emergency information.
Yet those most exposed are often the last to be included in adaptation planning.
Equity can’t be an afterthought—it must guide every decision.
Toronto’s Climate Equity Lens evaluates every project by who benefits and who’s left out. Sydney’s strategy includes similar outcomes, but most jurisdictions around Australia haven’t caught up with this type of climate change social resilience planning.
What needs to happen:
1. Start with those most at risk - Renters, First Nations peoples, migrants, people with disability, and low-income households face higher exposure and fewer resources. Planning must centre on their needs.
2. Fund resilience upgrades for renters - Most adaptation funding still favours homeowners. Renters need protections, and landlords need incentives to retrofit safely.
3. Embed lived experience in design and delivery - Those closest to the risk should help design the response, and be included in governance.
4. Support grassroots equity initiatives - Organisations serving vulnerable communities need access to funding, not just token engagement.
5. Apply an equity lens to adaptation approvals - Major projects should be assessed for who gains, who’s excluded, and whether inequalities are addressed.
3. Shift from reactive recovery to proactive, place-based adaptation
Resilience isn’t built after disaster. It’s built in advance—through relationships, capabilities, and support systems.
Australia still tends to over-invest in recovery and under-invest in preparation.
Our National Climate Resilience and Adaptation Strategy 2021–2025 calls for shared responsibility, guided by science, local partnerships, and sound governance.
But adaptation isn’t just about technical planning. It must be rooted in community—led locally, built slowly, and designed with the people who live there.
Community resilience is the ability of people and places to adapt, stay connected, and recover—together—when disruption hits. It’s built through trust, access to services, and strong relationships. With these in place, recovery is faster and fairer.
Recent research supports this shift: transformative, community-led approaches that address systemic vulnerability work better than one-size-fits-all risk models.
What needs to happen:
1. Mandate climate risk assessments that include social vulnerability - Real planning must consider both environmental hazards and who is most at risk.
2. Fund local adaptation projects—designed and led by communities - From cooling plans to food systems and emergency response, these are faster, cheaper, and more trusted.
3. Make community leadership central to adaptation - Not just consulted—but resourced, embedded, and leading.
4. Invest in slow resilience - Building trust, leadership and networks takes time. Funding and policy cycles need to match.
5. Normalise local processes that combine climate, culture and care - The most effective adaptation is built in from the beginning—not added once the risks have arrived.
Resilience starts - and ends - with people
Climate adaptation has matured. We've mapped the hazards, modelled the risk, and committed to action. But resilience will fail—politically, socially, and practically—if it overlooks people.
We don’t just need stronger infrastructure - we need stronger communities that are connected, well-supported and ready. Communities that can adapt through disruption—not just recover from it.
This means:
Long-term investment in social infrastructure
Community-led, proactive adaptation
Equity embedded from the start
Embedding social resilience in climate policy isn’t just good planning—it’s essential risk management.
The challenge now, in 2025, is to move from acknowledgment to action. That means placing social resilience at the heart of planning, funding, and governance—not as an add-on, but as core business.
Because resilient places depend on the people who live in them—and the systems that help them adapt.
Want to explore how to embed social resilience into your project or strategy? Reach out to Liesl Codrington, Director Vaere Social, for a conversation (liesl@vaeresocial.au).
