Session Description
This session will explore the social and cultural impacts of climate change on low-lying countries and islands, such as the Asia Pacific and Caribbean, and how impact assessment policy and practice needs to adapt to better serve the needs of affected peoples.
Low-lying countries around the world face particular risks from climate change, with rising sea levels putting pressure on social wellbeing, intergenerational futures, the daily lives and livelihoods of coastal and island peoples, and on the adaptive capacity of poorly-resourced governments to maintain essential services such as roads, housing, health and fresh water.
The consequences include climate-induced migration, reduced climate resilience, costly emergency management and disaster responses, cumulative impacts on ecosystem services, lost cultural heritage and spiritual connections, food insecurity, and pressures on traditional and regional governance and decision-making structures.
The social and cultural consequences extend to issues of distributive equity and environmental justice: or the obligations of industrialised and developed countries towards those less developed countries bearing the brunt of climate change, as outlined by the International Court of Justice advisory opinion in 2025. The UN General Assembly has recognised the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment as a human right, which is a precondition for the enjoyment of other rights: to life, health, an adequate standard of living, access to water, food and housing, but how do countries assert their legal rights to such standards?
Session Summary
The session will use inclusive approaches such as storytelling to draw on the wisdom of cultural knowledge to understand how low-lying countries are experiencing climate change and to find collaborative solutions for the future. The session will showcase innovative approaches to SIA that respect different knowledge types.
Proposed By
Social Impact Assessment
Session Chair
Kathy Witt
The University of Queensland
Australia