Population matters for climate change. Incorporating population dynamics into research, policymaking, and advocacy around climate change is critical for understanding the trajectory of global greenhouse gas emissions and developing and implementing adaptation plans, and thus to global and national efforts to curtail this threat. The papers compiled in this volume attempt to broaden and deepen understanding across a wide range of population-climate change linkages. They provide a substantive and methodological guide to the current state of knowledge on issues such as population growth and size and emissions, population vulnerability and adaptation, migration and urbanization, and the data and analytical needs for the next stages of policy-relevant research.

Population issues have historically been an important focal point in the debate about global environmental change in policy and research circles. In the last 15 years, climate change has risen to the top of the international environmental agenda. Unfortunately, this has coincided with population issues fading in the discussion. This has meant that the links between population dynamics and climate change are often ignored, resulting in incomplete assessments of the causes and consequences of climate change. Where population issues have remained at the forefront, attention has been limited to population size and growth.