Floods as a window of opportunity: When and why extreme events trigger adaptation

Sungju Han, Jan Sodoge , Maysaa Abdelmajid, Larisa Tarasova, Mariana Madruga de Brito

Disasters can open windows of opportunity for climate adaptation—moments when heightened public attention makes it possible to advance policies and measures that would otherwise struggle to gain traction. Yet whether and how floods shape public adaptation discourse remains unclear. Here, we quantify how flood severity influences media coverage on 12 adaptation measures across 274 German districts from 2000–2020, using 625,813 news articles and daily streamflow observations from 1,238 gauging stations. Through two-way fixed-effects models, we find that floods significantly increase adaptation coverage across all hazard severity levels, with extreme floods producing 26 times the effect of minor ones. However, this coverage is selective: structural measures (e.g., dikes, dams) and warning systems dominate, while financial and nature-based solutions receive proportionally less coverage, particularly during severe events. In general, post-flood discourse follows a three-phase cycle: an immediate increase in coverage to structural measures, a gradual shift toward financial recovery, and a return to baseline within 8 to 12 weeks. However, repeated floods alter this pattern. With successive events occurring in the same district or neighboring districts, discourse becomes more diverse and shifts beyond structural responses, with greater attention to financial preparedness measures. This suggests a learning process in which societies move from reliance on single solutions toward a broader portfolio of adaptation options. Together, our results demonstrate that floods create windows of attention in news media. Yet, these are systematically biased, potentially narrowing the range of adaptation options considered in the public debate.