Karen E. McNamara, Helene Jacot Des Combes. Planning for Community Relocations Due to Climate Change in Fiji[J]. International Journal of Disaster Risk Science, 2015, 6(3): 315-319. doi: 10.1007/s13753-015-0065-2
Citation: Karen E. McNamara, Helene Jacot Des Combes. Planning for Community Relocations Due to Climate Change in Fiji[J]. International Journal of Disaster Risk Science, 2015, 6(3): 315-319. doi: 10.1007/s13753-015-0065-2

Planning for Community Relocations Due to Climate Change in Fiji

doi: 10.1007/s13753-015-0065-2
  • Available Online: 2021-04-26
  • As a consequence of the impacts of climate change, some households and entire communities across the Pacific are making the complex and challenging decision to leave their homelands and relocate to new environments that can sustain their livelihoods. This short article charts how the residents of Vunidogoloa village in Fiji relocated in early 2014 to reduce their vulnerability to encroaching sea level and inundation events that regularly devastated the community. As a consequence of the Vunidogoloa relocation, this article also explores how the Fiji Government is planning for similar resettlement transitions, including vulnerability and adaptation assessments to develop a list of potential community relocations and the development of national relocation guidelines. This study draws from key informant interviews (n = 8) with government officials, as well as representatives from intergovernmental and local nongovernmental organizations, who are involved in the relocation issue. Given the speed at which these national, top-down initiatives are being forged and especially in light of the absence of any mention of relocation in Fiji’s 2012 climate change policy, careful and inclusive engagement across all scales and stakeholders, including communities “earmarked” for relocation, is paramount.
  • loading
  • Adger, N., and J. Barnett. 2005. Compensation for climate change must meet needs (Correspondence). Nature 436(7049): 328.
    Asthana, R. 1996. Involuntary resettlement: Survey of international experience. Economic and Political Weekly 31(24): 1468–1475.
    Barnett, J., and N. Adger. 2003. Climate dangers and atoll countries. Climatic Change 61(3): 321–337.
    Barnett, J., and J. Campbell. 2010. Climate change and small island states: Power, knowledge and the South Pacific. London: Earthscan.
    Black, R., S.R.G. Bennett, S.M. Thomas, and J.R. Beddington. 2011. Climate change: Migration as adaptation. Nature 478(7370): 447–449.
    Bronen, R. 2011. Climate-induced community relocations: Creating an adaptive governance framework based in human rights doctrine. N.Y.U. Review of Law and Social Change 35(2): 101–148.
    Cernea, M. 1997. The risks and reconstruction model for resettling displaced populations. World Development 25(10): 1569–1587.
    Dunn, K.M. 2005. Interviewing. In Qualitative research methods in human geography, 2nd edn, ed. I. Hay, 79–105. Melbourne: Oxford University Press.
    Felli, R., and N. Castree. 2012. Neoliberalising adaptation to environmental change: Foresight or foreclosure? Environment and Planning A 44(1): 1–4.
    Hugo, G. 1996. Environmental concerns and international migration. International Migration Review 30(1): 105–131.
    McAdam, J. 2015. Lessons from planned relocation and resettlement in the past. Forced Migration Review 49: 30–32.
    McNamara, K.E., and C. Gibson. 2009. “We do not want to leave our land”: Pacific ambassadors at the United Nations resist the category of climate refugees. Geoforum 40(3): 475–483.
    Mortreux, C., and J. Barnett. 2009. Climate change, migration and adaptation in Funafuti, Tuvalu. Global Environmental Change 19: 105–112.
    Mimura, N., L. Nurse, R.F. McLean, J. Agard, L. Briguglio, P. Lefale, R. Payet, and G. Sem. 2007. Small Islands. In Contribution of Working Group Ⅱ to the fourth assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, 2007, ed. M.L. Parry, O.F. Canziani, J.P. Palutikof, P.J. van der Linden, and C.E. Hanson, 687–716. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
    Nurse, L.A., R.F. McLean, J. Agard, L.P. Briguglio, V. Duvat-Magnan, N. Pelesikoti, E. Tompkins, and A. Webb. 2014. Small Islands. In Contribution of Working Group Ⅱ to the fifth assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, ed. V.R. Barros, C.B. Field, D.J. Dokken, M.D. Mastrandrea, K.J. Mach, T.E. Bilir, M. Chatterjee, K.L. Ebi, et al., 1613–1654. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
    Pacific Conference of Churches. 2012. The ‘Bula Bulletin’ (April–May 2012). Suva: Pacific Conference of Churches.
    Scudder, T.T. 2012. The future of large dams: ‘Dealing with social, environmental, institutional and political costs’. London: Earthscan.
    Warner, K., C. Ehrhart, A. Sherbinin, S. de Adamo, and T. Chai-Onn. 2009. In search of shelter: Mapping the effects of climate change on human migration and displacement. A policy paper prepared for the 2009 Climate Negotiations. Bonn: United Nations University, CARE and CIESIN-Columbia University.
  • 加载中

Catalog

    通讯作者: 陈斌, bchen63@163.com
    • 1. 

      沈阳化工大学材料科学与工程学院 沈阳 110142

    1. 本站搜索
    2. 百度学术搜索
    3. 万方数据库搜索
    4. CNKI搜索

    Article Metrics

    Article views (46) PDF downloads(0) Cited by()
    Proportional views
    Related

    /

    DownLoad:  Full-Size Img  PowerPoint
    Return
    Return