Usteq: integrating indigenous knowledge and social and physical sciences to coproduce knowledge and support community-based adaptation

ABSTRACT

The Arctic is in the midst of unprecedented and accelerating environmental change and will not return, for the foreseeable future, to a reliably frozen climate of recent past decades. Climate-forced population displacement, including community relocation, will be one of the greatest climate adaptation challenges for Alaska Native communities and the tribal, state and federal governing entities responsible for protecting community residents and providing technical assistance and resources. A new governance framework, based in human rights principles, must be created that can allow institutions to shift their efforts from protecting people in the places where they live to creating a relocation process when environmental and social thresholds are surpassed. Determining which communities are most likely to encounter displacement will require a sophisticated assessment of a community's ecosystem vulnerability to climate change, as well as the vulnerability and adaptive capacity of its social, economic and political structures. In Alaska, understanding the rate of environmental change through the integration of indigenous knowledge with physical and social science is essential. The article describes how this coproduction of knowledge is the foundation for this new governance framework and for transformational climate adaptation in Alaska.

KEYWORDS:

• Alaska Native
• Indigenous knowledge
• coastal retreat
• coproduction of knowledge
• community-based adaptation
• community relocation
• climate-forced displacement

Acknowledgements

This publication would not have been possible without the hard work of Patricia Cochran, the Alaska Native Science Commission and the Alaska Native communities with whom we are working: Atmautluak Native Village, Native Village of Bill Moore’s Slough, Chevak Traditional Council, Chinik Eskimo Community, Native Village of Elim, Native Village of Eyak, Native Village of Hamilton, Native Village of Kivalina, Kotlik Traditional Council, Native Village of Kwigillingok, Native Village of Nelson Lagoon, Native Village of Nunapitchuk, Native Village of Kwinhagak, Native Village of Port Heiden, Native Village of Shishmaref, Teller Traditional Council, Mary’s Igloo Traditional Council, and the Native Village of Unalakleet. We are also appreciative of the funding from NSF EAGER #1645868, Climate Justice Resilience Fund and Unitarian Universalist Service Committee which made this work possible.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 44 CFR §201.6(c)(4)(i).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by National Science Foundation: [Grant Number EAGER#1645868]; Unitarian Universalist Service Committee; Climate Justice Resilience Fund.