• Energy Research

Environmental peacebuilding investigates mutually reinforcing relationships between environmental sustainability and peacebuilding. However, environmental peacebuilding research and practice frequently neglect to explicitly take account of power relations and inequities. This is despite other fields of research highlighting the centrality of power relations in the environment and in conflict. We reviewed the environmental peacebuilding literature for i) descriptions of contextual power dynamics and ii) explicit discussion of addressing power in environmental peacebuilding interventions. Just over half of included articles contained at least one of these, meaning that nearly half of articles did not discuss or engage with power or inequity in either the environmental/conflict context or the intervention process. Where articles did engage with power, there was a tendency to draw from narrow conceptualisations of power as control over others and over natural resources. We discuss these results in the context of broader debates around conceptualising power, and highlight the value of a relational approach to power for environmental peacebuilding. Finally, we propose a framework to recentre power in environmental peacebuilding interventions. We illustrate the ways that all interventions engage with power to some extent, regardless of whether they explicitly set out to do so. We argue that reaching the ‘virtuous cycle’ of mutually reinforcing positive peace and environmental sustainability requires active transformation of power relations.

Abstract Climate change adaptation responses are being developed and delivered in many parts of the world in the absence of detailed knowledge of their effects on public health. Here we present the results of a systematic review of peer-reviewed literature reporting the effects on health of climate change adaptation responses in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). The review used the ‘Global Adaptation Mapping Initiative’ database (comprising 1682 publications related to climate change adaptation responses) that was constructed through systematic literature searches in Scopus, Web of Science and Google Scholar (2013–2020). For this study, further screening was performed to identify studies from LMICs reporting the effects on human health of climate change adaptation responses. Studies were categorised by study design and data were extracted on geographic region, population under investigation, type of adaptation response and reported health effects. The review identified 99 studies (1117 reported outcomes), reporting evidence from 66 LMICs. Only two studies were ex ante formal evaluations of climate change adaptation responses. Papers reported adaptation responses related to flooding, rainfall, drought and extreme heat, predominantly through behaviour change, and infrastructural and technological improvements. Reported (direct and intermediate) health outcomes included reduction in infectious disease incidence, improved access to water/sanitation and improved food security. All-cause mortality was rarely reported, and no papers were identified reporting on maternal and child health. Reported maladaptations were predominantly related to widening of inequalities and unforeseen co-harms. Reporting and publication-bias seems likely with only 3.5% of all 1117 health outcomes reported to be negative. Our review identified some evidence that climate change adaptation responses may have benefits for human health but the overall paucity of evidence is concerning and represents a major missed opportunity for learning. There is an urgent need for greater focus on the funding, design, evaluation and standardised reporting of the effects on health of climate change adaptation responses to enable evidence-based policy action.

Amid the surge in research on mobility and migration in the context of environmental change, little research has focused on the experiences of people for whom travel is cyclical and a part of daily, weekly, or seasonal life. For Inuit in Arctic North America, the land is the heart of cultural and community life. Disruption to time spent on the land is reported to impact the emotional health and well-being of individuals and communities. There is concern that environmental change is creating barriers to safe travel, constituting a creeping disaster. We systematically review and evaluate the literature for discussion of barriers to travel for Inuit in Arctic North America, using an approach from the field of disaster anthropology to identify root causes of constraints to mobility. We identify root causes of risk and barriers to time spent on the land. These emerge from historic and contemporary colonial policy and inequality, as opposed to environmental hazards per se, impacting people’s mobility in profound ways and enacting a form of slow violence. These results suggest a need to understand the underlying processes and institutions that put people at risk.