Methods are disclosed for authorization to adaptively control access to a resource in a resource hierarchy. At least one role for a principal is retrieved from the resource hierarchy or a first cache based on whether the at east one role was previously retrieved from the resource hierarchy. A policy is retrieved from the resource hierarchy or a second cache based on whether the policy was previously retrieved from the resource hierarchy. The policy is evaluated based on the at least one role and a determination on whether to grant the principal access to the resource is made based on the evaluation of the policy.