Vulnerability is a component of risk, but also an important focus independently. Vulnerability in this report is defined as the propensity or predisposition to be adversely affected. It encompasses a variety of concepts and elements, including sensitivity or susceptibility to harm and lack of capacity to cope and adapt . Over the past several decades, approaches to analysing and assessing vulnerability have evolved. An early emphasis on top- down, biophysical evaluation of vulnerability included-and often started with-exposure to climate hazards in assessing vulnerability. From this starting point, attention to bottom-up, social and contextual determinants of vulnerability, which often differ, has emerged, although this approach is incompletely applied or integrated across contexts . Vulnerability is now widely understood to differ within communities and across societies, also changing through time . In the WGII AR6, assessment of the vulnerability of people and ecosystems encompasses the differing approaches that exist within the literature, both critiquing and harmonising them based on available evidence. In this context, exposure is defined as the presence of people; livelihoods; species or ecosystems; environmental functions, services, and resources; infrastructure; or economic, social, or cultural assets in places and settings that could be adversely affected . Potentially affected places and settings can be defined geographically, as well as more dynamically, for example through transmission or interconnections through markets or flows of people.
IPCC
Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability
IPCC Report