Science for implementation: the roles, experiences, and perceptions of practitioners involved in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

In the climate change arena, the assessments of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), while not policy prescriptive, are important for informing international negotiations and the decisions of policy and practice communities. Since 2015, when the Paris Agreement was adopted, there has been an increasing demand for climate action and calls for the inclusion of a broader base of stakeholders in global assessments. We use publicly available information on IPCC authors, and the results of a survey ( n = 29) and interviews ( n = 17) with authors who apply science in practice (practitioners), to examine their roles, experiences, and challenges in the IPCC’s Fifth Assessment. The results show that while practitioners form only a very small proportion of authors, they contribute real-world experience, including the translation of academic language into meaningful messages for decision-makers. Although familiar with working at the interface of science and practice, study participants described barriers to their participation and shared several recommendations for improving the relevance, uptake, and timeliness of IPCC assessments, and practitioner participation. Our findings indicate that IPCC assessments provide an evidence base to support action on climate change, and due to their skill set, practitioners are often able to make contributions that allow for greater accessibility by decision-makers. Graphical Abstract