Research approach and preliminary analysis of a comparative sttudy on multi-level learning: The case of European climate change adaptation projects

This report is one of the outputs of the Marie Curie funded research project ‘Knowledge transfer for climate change adaptation (KNOW2ADAPT)’ (see CORDIS for more information). This project ran in the period between January 2014 and April 2017. This final report is published in March 2018 when the project was formally finalized but publications still in progress. This report explains how cases were selected, how data were collected and initially analysed using software for Qualitative Comparative Analyses (QCA). QCA is a method to systemically compare cases. It is especially suitable for analysing an intermediate number of cases. The actual application of QCA is an iterative process that may involve adding or dropping cases and/or potentially relevant conditions. The results that are presented in this report are preliminary. Please refer to forthcoming scientific publications in case you are interested in the final results and implications of this project. Up-to-date information about this project can be found on ResearchGate. This report builds upon two previous reports: (1) an inception report that presents the empirical, theoretical and conceptual basis of the research (Vinke-de Kruijf, 2015a); and (2) a research report that presents the results of a pilot case study as well as the assessment framework that is used in this report (Vinke-de Kruijf, 2015b). More information can be found in a scientific article that presents and tests our preliminary research framework in a pilot case study (Vinke-de Kruijf & Pahl-Wostl, 2016).