Chapter 15 - Ethics, Communities, and Climate Resilience: An Examination by Case Studies

Abstract

As we know, human health is closely linked with environmental change, and several progressive initiatives have emerged to enhance both human and environmental health in tandem. This chapter looks to review such initiatives, elucidating the factors underlying their success and demonstrating the need to build initiatives that directly address community needs. The chapter additionally explores the question of whether ethical arguments are an effective means of eliciting social change. We conclude that human health initiatives can be a successful conduit for climate change resilience strategies, and that ethical arguments can serve to enhance participation in these strategies if they emerge from those most affected and are tied to the local culture. Indigenous groups often experience the earliest effects of climate change, and thus indigenous perspectives are critically important in building effective resilience and can serve as a model for many initiatives. However, it remains unclear whether people can transcend immediate moral relationships and act on moral obligations to unrelated others and future generations.