Link to Session Platform

Chairs(s):

Erin Friedman, 

; ,

Description:

Interlinking climate risk reduction with sustainable development goals (SDGs) is a primary, but conflicted goal for international climate policies and actions (Robinson and Shine 2018; Nerini et al. 2019; Robinson et al. 2021; Thomas et al. 2021). Who is driving policy and actions, whose knowledge and values count and who gets to benefit, underscore these climate politics and hinder meaningful implementation of these measures. It appears on the surface that socially just motivations are driving climate financing and development institutions’ harnessing of private financing from nations that are the biggest contributors to climate change to support climate adaptation interventions in developing countries (Bracking and Leffel 2021). At the same time, a contradiction exists where these interventions appear largely separated from addressing social-economic inequalities that are driving vulnerability for marginalized populations (Ericksen et al. 2021; Mikulewicz 2019; Quealy and Yates 2021; Smith and Rhiney 2016; Thomas et al. 2019). Geographers have found that these interventions focus heavily on technical-economic approaches such as socio-economic restructuring, infrastructure development, and market-based solutions (e.g., Ojha et al. 2015) — bringing with it, techno-managerial ideologies to govern over human-environment interactions (Mills-Novoa et al. 2020: p.91) .

To challenge the thinking of these dominant frameworks, this panel seeks to explore how equity and justice can inform the design and implementation of climate actions. We invite panelists from a wide range of perspectives that can address what options do we have for ‘just’ development, what actions can local actors take to build/create/nurture climate resilient communities, and how should climate policies and actions be assessed?

References
Bracking, S., & Leffel, B. (2021). Climate finance governance: Fit for purpose?. Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change, 12(4), e709.
Eriksen, S., Schipper, E. L. F., Scoville-Simonds, M., Vincent, K., Adam, H. N., Brooks, N., ... & West, J. J. (2021). Adaptation interventions and their effect on vulnerability in developing countries: Help, hindrance or irrelevance?. World Development, 141, 105383.
Mikulewicz, M. (2019). Thwarting adaptation’s potential? A critique of resilience and climate-resilient development. Geoforum, 104, 267-282.
Mills-Novoa, M., Boelens, R., Hoogesteger, J., & Vos, J. (2020). Governmentalities, hydrosocial territories & recognition politics: The making of objects and subjects for climate change adaptation in Ecuador. Geoforum, 115, 90-101.
Nerini, F. F., Sovacool, B., Hughes, N., Cozzi, L., Cosgrave, E., Howells, M., ... & Milligan, B. (2019). Connecting climate action with other Sustainable Development Goals. Nature Sustainability, 2(8), 674-680.
Ojha, H. R., Ghimire, S., Pain, A., Nightingale, A., Khatri, D. B., & Dhungana, H. (2016). Policy without politics: Technocratic control of climate change adaptation policy making in Nepal. Climate Policy, 16(4), 415-433.
Quealy, H. M., & Yates, J. S. (2021). Situated adaptation: Tackling the production of vulnerability through transformative action in Sri Lanka’s Dry Zone. Global Environmental Change, 71, 102374.
Robinson, M., & Shine, T. (2018). Achieving a climate justice pathway to 1.5 C. Nature Climate Change, 8(7), 564-569.
Robinson, S. A., Carlson, D. A., Messer, A., Maunus, L., Bouton, E., & Roberts, J. T. (2021). Climate compatible development in practice. Development in Practice, 1-11.
Smith, R. A. J., & Rhiney, K. (2016). Climate (in) justice, vulnerability and livelihoods in the Caribbean: The case of the indigenous Caribs in northeastern St. Vincent. Geoforum, 73, 22-31.
Thomas, K., Hardy, R. D., Lazrus, H., Mendez, M., Orlove, B., Rivera‐Collazo, I., ... & Winthrop, R. (2019). Explaining differential vulnerability to climate change: A social science review. Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change, 10(2), e565.
Thomas, A., Theokritoff, E., Lesnikowski, A., Reckien, D., Jagannathan, K., Cremades, R., ... & Bowen, K. (2021). Global evidence of constraints and limits to human adaptation. Regional environmental change, 21(3), 1-15.

Non-Presenting Participants Agenda