2.3. Research Questions
Recognition, participation and epistemic dimensions of justice are a crucial component of understanding what is normally glossed over in official resilience and adaptation policy documents and is not captured by distributional studies of flooding: the why and how specific social groups may be more or less affected by coastal flooding. This pilot study advances a set of research questions aimed at capturing procedural dimensions as they unfold on the ground and in alternative community planning documents in East Harlem, New York City. The overall study question is:
- How can public deliberation around coastal flooding in East Harlem be conceived of from a procedural justice perspective?
In order to answer this question I ask:
- How are local conceptions of environmental justice tied to coastal flooding in the way community groups describe vulnerability and resilience responses?
- What are the instruments of policy deliberation in place around issues of coastal flooding?
- What are community groups' perceived hindrances in accessing these instruments?
- What types of knowledges are produced, used and shared around coastal flooding among community groups?