Hearing local voices from Small Island Developing States for climate change

Contemporary climate change is posing significant challenges to people around the world, including to communities on Small Island Developing States (SIDS). Beyond the local context, are local voices from SIDS being heard, listened to, and integrated into appropriate climate change processes? This paper details some climate change topics emerging from local voices from SIDS, discussing some dimensions of justice in how climate change is addressed and not addressed within the context of SIDS’ concerns and needs. Following an illustrative description and analysis of selected literature that supports SIDS voices regarding climate change, some justice concerns are addressed regarding SIDS and climate change. Then, some existing programmes related to the role of local voices from SIDS in climate change topics are described to lead to a discussion of some opportunities and challenges. Conclusions highlight the need to try to balance justice and action at different political, spatial, and temporal scales.


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