This book chapter explores how policies and policy-making perform to support climate change adaptation. It is part of the book: Adapting to Climate Change in Europe: Exploring Sustainable Pathways - From Local Measures to Wider Policies which is a scientific synthesis of a four-year project on adaptation activities in Europe (BASE). This book aims at ensuring sustainable solutions in adaptation to climate change. This chapter reflects on different tools which can support decision making for climate adaptation and that have been presented in other chapters of the book. It also discusses how current adaptation measures operate to enhance the capacity to respond to climate change impacts in a coherent manner across sectors. Ecologic Institute's Jenny Tröltzsch and Katriona McGlade contributed to this chapter.

The chapter draws on a database of tools that were developed as part of the project: Bottom-Up Adaptation Strategies for a Sustainable Europe (BASE) to support climate change adaptation. It also draws on an analysis of EU, national, and sectoral adaptation policy-making to document:

1. the mix of tools that have been used to develop adaptation policy in the EU, national policy contexts, and a number of different contexts;
2. the policy challenges of delivering climate change adaptation specifically related to autonomous and planned adaptation, public–private decision-making, bottom-up adaptation policy-making, and policy implementation; and
3. the extent to which adaptation has been mainstreamed in key sectoral polices in the EU from the supranational to the local level.