Water Supplier Decisions & Institutional Change During Transitions - Focus Groups

This research investigates the influence of
institutions on the selection of adaptive actions by local public service providers (drinking water utilities) as they seek to respond to climatic stressors. Focus
groups were conducted with high-level managers and supervisors from mid-sized
drinking water utilities in the USA during Summer 2023. Participants were
presented with a description of hypothesized institutional dependencies and
asked how each of those institutional dependencies affect them and whether other institutional dependencies exist.
This discussion was followed by a realistic, yet hypothetical, scenario which
described a utility deciding between two potential adaptive actions after a
flood event. Once the scenario was presented, participants were asked to
deliberate how, if at all, each of the hypothesized institutional dependencies
would affect selection and implementation of each of the two potential adaptive
actions. Participants were also asked to describe any additional factors that
would influence the implementation of the two potential adaptive actions. <br>