The Discursive Politics of Adaptation to Climate Change

Abstract

Adaptation to climate change is a policy objective of rapidly growing importance for development programming across the Global South. This article offers an interrogation of the discursive politics surrounding the term based on insights from postcolonial theory. By employing a theoretical framework rooted in the concepts of imaginative geographies and discursive violence, this contribution seeks to deconstruct how adaptation is being imagined and promoted by development actors in a Global South context. The underlying study adopts a multisited, institutional ethnography to critically analyze an adaptation project in São Tomé and Príncipe (STP) implemented jointly by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and the national government. The article presents evidence for how agents of development (re)produce an imaginative geography of the country’s vulnerability and engage in a discursive violence that renders project beneficiaries vulnerable on the one hand, and seeks to transform them into model adaptation subjects on the other. It discusses how local residents have been effectively excluded from the project based on their perceived vulnerabilities and points to critical political theory and “imaginative countergeographies” as ways in which the disempowering representations of the Global South as vulnerable and the discursive violence committed against its residents can be counteracted.

适应气候变化是一项政策目标, 其在全球南营各国的发展规划中具有越来越重要的意义。本文以后殖民理论的相关见解为依据, 审视了与该术语相关的论证政治主题。本文以想象地理和论证暴力概念为理论为框架, 试图解构在全球南营国家阵营的背景中, 发展相关各方是如何对这一适应主题进行构想和推广的。这项研究采用一种多地点、建制民族志方法, 批判地分析了在圣多美和普林西比（STP）由联合国开发计划署（UNDP）和中央政府共同实施的适应项目。本文通过相关证据, 证明了发展相关的代表是如何对其国家的脆弱性（重新）推出想象地理, 参与论证暴力的过程的, 这一方面导致项目受益人易受伤害, 另一方面又试图让其变为适应这种模式的主体。作者讨论了当地居民如何在感知脆弱性的基础上被排除在项目之外的, 并指出批判性政治理论和“想象反地理”削弱了全球南营在脆弱性方面的话语权, 同时也抵消了对居民所进行的论述暴力。

La adaptación al cambio climático es uno de los objetivos de las políticas públicas que está ganando rápidamente importancia en la programación del desarrollo a través del Sur Global. Con base en una perspectiva de la teoría poscolonial, en este artículo se presenta un cuestionamiento a la política discursiva que rodea aquellos términos. Empleando un marco teórico arraigado en los conceptos de las geografías imaginativas y la violencia discursiva, esta contribución busca deconstruir el modo como la adaptación está siendo imaginada y promovida por los actores del desarrollo dentro de un contexto del Sur Global. El estudio de trasfondo adopta una etnografía institucional de localización múltiple para analizar críticamente un proyecto de adaptación en Santo Tomás y Príncipe (STP), implementado conjuntamente por el Programa para el Desarrollo de las Naciones Unidas (PNUD) y el gobierno nacional. El artículo presenta evidencia sobre cómo los agentes del desarrollo (re)producen una geografía imaginativa de la vulnerabilidad del país y se involucran en una violencia discursiva que, por una parte, representa los beneficiarios vulnerables del proyecto, y busca transformarlos en sujetos modelos de adaptación, por la otra. Se discute el modo como los residentes locales han sido excluidos efectivamente del proyecto en razón de sus vulnerabilidades percibidas, y apunta hacia la teoría política crítica y a “contra-geografías imaginativas” como los caminos a través de los cuales las representaciones desempoderadoras del Sur Global, como ente vulnerable, y la violencia discursiva perpetrada contra sus residentes, puedan ser contrarrestadas.

Key Words:

• adaptation
• Africa
• development
• discursive violence
• imaginative geography

关键词:

• 适应
• 非洲
• 发展
• 论证暴力
• 想象地理

Palabras clave:

• adaptación
• África
• desarrollo
• geografía imaginativa
• violencia discursiva

Acknowledgments

I thank the two anonymous reviewers, whose profound insights have greatly improved this article compared to its original version. Special thanks to Saska Petrova, James Evans, Marcus Taylor, and Shannon O’Lear, who helped me shape my thinking on this topic and offered important words of encouragement. I am also very grateful to Graham at the Cartographic Unit at the School of Environment, Education, and Development at the University of Manchester for producing the map included in this article. I owe a debt of gratitude to the UNDP staff at the Regional Service Center for Africa in Addis Ababa and the Country Office in São Tomé and Príncipe for accommodating my professional and personal needs during fieldwork. My deepest appreciation goes to the residents of Liberdade who extended their hospitality and assistance during my visits to their village. I am forever indebted to Davilson for always making me feel welcome in his home.

Notes

1 The village name has been altered to preserve residents’ anonymity.

2 These are Santomé, Angolar, and Cabo-Verdean on São Tomé island and Lung’le on Príncipe (Becker 2015).

3 This was due to the limited financial resources available to the project.

4 Besides STP, these include Cabo Verde, Comoros, Guinea-Bissau, Haiti, Kiribati, Maldives, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, and Vanuatu.

5 STP is a net absorber of greenhouse gases (Ministry of Public Works, Infrastructures, and Natural Resources and the Environment 2019).

6 The total number of interviews with development professionals was thirty-six, but the topic of climate change impacts was not discussed with two participants.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Michael Mikulewicz

MICHAEL MIKULEWICZ is a Research Fellow at the Center for Climate Justice, Glasgow Caledonian University, Glasgow, Scotland, G4 0BA, UK. E-mail: [email protected]. He is a political and development geographer interested in the concepts of climate justice, adaptation to climate change, resilience, and vulnerability. He uses critical theory to investigate the various issues of inequality, exclusion, and exploitation surrounding adaptation, vulnerability, and resilience to climate change impacts, with a focus on the Global South.