Traditional, indigenous and local knowledge for climate adaptation: trends, themes and governance implications (2000–2025)

Climate adaptation increasingly requires knowledge systems that are place-based, practice-ready and legitimate to the communities most exposed to risk. This review synthesises how Traditional Knowledge (TK), Indigenous Knowledge (IK) and Local Knowledge (LK) have been studied and mobilised in climate-change research from 2000 to 2025. Using a curated SCI/SSCI corpus of 1693 articles, we combine evidence mapping, keyword analysis, LDA topic modelling and harmonised country coding. Publication volume expanded sharply after 2015, indicating a shift from peripheral recognition of TK/IK/LK toward a mainstream adaptation evidence field. Topic modelling identifies five thematic clusters: biodiversity/forest and plant resource management, food-health-governance nexus and resilient systems, climate perceptions, weather variability and livelihood impacts, social-ecological management, coastal/marine systems and environmental change, and agricultural adaptation strategies, vulnerability and resilience. The evidence base is geographically concentrated, led by Canada (167), the United States (133), India (93), Australia (58) and China (47), but country profiles differ substantially across TK, IK and LK. Methods are dominated by qualitative, participatory and governance-oriented designs, while systematic reviews, modelling and scenario approaches are growing. Urban-related studies remain limited (169 articles; 9.98% of the corpus), with the highest share in LK research (12.4%). Overall, the field has shifted from observing climate impacts to governing and implementing adaptation. We argue that TK/IK/LK should be treated not as generic local information, but as plural evidence and adaptive capacity requiring clear classification, co-production, rights-aware safeguards, and evaluation metrics that can support climate-resilient development without undermining knowledge sovereignty.