Frontline Communities Research Articles

The contradictions of Green New Deals: green sacrifice and colonialism

The focus in mainstream Northern versions of Green New Deals (GNDs) or Just Transitions is on ameliorating the implications of low-carbon transition upon communities within Northern economies - not upon the communities, most often in the global South, that will be adversely affected by the solutions that are being proposed, for example those based on mining for transition minerals, constructing damns for hydro-electricity or projects for the large-scale harnessing of solar power. Yet adverse impacts on the environment are expected to occur across the whole chain of provision of the resources required by GNDs: the transportation of materials, assemblage of green production infrastructure, siting of facilities to produce energy, and dealing with waste at the end-of-life of green infrastructure. The areas involved in this chain are becoming Green Sacrifice Zones. Assumptions about race and social difference provide the underpinning for a tendency to downplay or render invisible consequences for local communities. Furthermore, the extraction of resources often involves contemporary colonial practices, including land encroachment and highly exploitative labour relations. Resource-seeking multinational companies present themselves as offering the benefits of modernity to people living in green sacrifice zones - in the form of 'employment opportunities' and 'economic development'. Some of the more peripheral or 'disadvantaged' areas within Europe are also at risk from transition resource extractivism. To go beyond this mindset, there is a need to start listening to what frontline and vulnerable communities themselves say when they speak about just transition and GNDs: this will involve challenging leadership assumptions about which people and what frameworks should guide a just decarbonisation.

Not by trees alone: Centering community in urban forestry

Urban forestry and urban greening efforts are blossoming as cities and towns work to enhance their open spaces as green infrastructure that provides multiple benefits. This work has reached new urgency given the need for both high-performance landscapes that can mitigate the effects of climate change and accessible, safe greenspaces that can support community well-being during the COVID-19 pandemic. At the same time, activists, practitioners, scholars, and decision-makers--particularly those within Black, Indigenous, People of Color, and frontline communities who bear the brunt of negative impacts--are calling for the need to attend to environmental justice implications of greening efforts. Following a review of the literature, we draw upon our observations as researchers embedded in the field of urban and community forestry to offer three themes and related guiding questions that can help advance that work: 1) supporting human capacity and care (investments in people and organizations); 2) community organizing beyond the green silo (intersectional and cross-sectoral approaches); and 3) re-envisioning the functions of the urban forest (productive systems and biocultural approaches). Our perspective is inspired by the work of residents, practitioners, and decision-makers who are engaging in reflection and innovation in pursuit of “just cities” that can enhance diversity, equity, and inclusion as critical to and inseparable from sustainability and resilience. We suggest that the field of urban forestry draw upon a community forestry ethos as we center the needs, capacities, and priorities of historically marginalized communities at the heart of the work of creating more just, sustainable cities.

Transitioning From Urban Climate Action to Climate Equity

Problem, research strategy, and findings Historically, urban climate action plans have not focused on residents who are most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change: neighborhoods of people of color and low-income communities, also known as frontline communities. I examined the climate action planning process for five U.S. cities that have recently updated their climate action plans to focus on equity: Austin (TX), Baltimore (MD), Cleveland (OH), Portland (OR), and Providence (RI). The goal of the analysis was to identify how planners and policymakers are making the climate action planning process more inclusive of marginalized groups and incorporating equity into the plan’s goals. I examined three aspects of climate equity: procedural, distributional, and recognition. Using content analysis of the plans and interviews with past and current sustainability directors in each of the cities and a small number of participants, I provide context for how the updated plans addressed the three aspects of equity. Further, I call into question how academics have defined procedural equity. The experiences of these five cities revealed that three actions essential to achieving authentic participation are antiracism training, comprehensive efforts to bring underrepresented groups to the table, and creating a planning process in which participants are valued. The bottom line in all three is that procedural equity is a trust-building process. Participants in these planning processes viewed acknowledging previous rounds of harm committed in frontline communities as a first step in prioritizing equity. Although distributional equity is defined through implementation, the plans of these five cities, to varying degrees, attempted to stipulate how equitable implementation of goals will be measured. Takeaway for practice Developing climate plans that emphasize equity requires a considerable upfront commitment to building authentic participation from frontline communities and ensuring that it is measured in implementation.

COP 26, a Just Transition, trade unions and a movement of movements

COP 26, a Just Transition, trade unions and a movement of movements Declan Owens (bio) Chico Mendes was a Brazilian rubber tapper, trade union leader and environmentalist. He fought to preserve the Amazon rainforest and advocated for the human rights of Brazilian peasants and indigenous peoples. He was assassinated by a rancher on 22 December 1988. He coined the memorable phrase that, 'Ecology without class struggle is just gardening'. When the international trade union movement mobilised ahead of and during COP 26 in pursuit of its goal to achieve a Just Transition it sought to ensure that there was more than a mass gardening exercise in Glasgow. This sentiment was reflected and reinforced in the growing 'movement of movements', which aligned trade unionists with environmental NGOs and community groups, as demonstrated during the successful events held by the COP26 Coalition in Glasgow. Environmentalists joined the GMB pickets in Glasgow and GMB members even provided Greta Thunberg with a 'human shield' as she passed through the streets of Glasgow on the Global Day of Action on 6 November 2020. I was present at events in Glasgow and there was a tangible sense of progress and hope amongst trade unionists and environmental activists despite the failures of their governments. Just Transition The International Trade Union Confederation set up its Just Transition Centre in 2016 in the aftermath of its success in securing the ILO Guidelines for a Just Transition towards Environmentally Sustainable Economies and Societies for All (2015) and reference to the term, 'Just Transition' within the Preamble to the Paris Agreement, which stated that its provisions were formulated, Taking into account the imperatives of a just transition of the workforce and the creation of decent work and quality jobs in accordance with nationally defined development priorities … The phrase 'Just Transition' itself was coined in the US trade union movement by Tony Mazzocchi, leader of the Oil, Chemical, and Atomic Workers union (OCAW), who worked to bring trade unionists into the 'ban-the-bomb' peace movement, alongside a campaign to protect atomic workers in the transition to nuclear disarmament. He served as Vice President of the OCAW from 1977 to 1988, and as secretary-treasurer from 1988 to 1991. 'Just Transition' has been watered down as a concept by its co-option by some corporate interests and it is important that trade unionists retain a focus on the principles behind the adoption of the term and fight for its implementation. The COP 26 Coalition In the run up to COP26 it was clearer than ever that global problems need global solutions as anticipated by the International Trade Union Confederation and others, such as Trade Unions for Energy Democracy. The decisions made at COP26 will continue to shape how governments respond (or not) to the climate crisis. Their decisions determine who is to be sacrificed, who will escape and who will make a profit. The COP26 Coalition was a UK-based civil society coalition of groups and individuals mobilising around climate justice during COP26. It brought together movements from across the world to build power for system change for climate justice-indigenous movements, frontline communities, trade unions, racial justice groups, youth strikers, landworkers, peasants, NGOs, grassroots community campaigns, feminist movements, faith groups. Therefore, the COP 26 Coalition put indigenous, frontline and Global South communities front and centre of their campaign and extensively platformed them at their People's Assembly, a parallel series of meetings and workshops where there was an 'inside and outside' strategy to link activists with negotiators at the COP. As trade unionists know in relation to inadequate laws protecting workers in the workplace on health and safety issues, governments have done too little too late to address climate change and its impact on workers. Governments have colluded with corporations, hiding behind green washed 'solutions' that do not exist yet, that do not address the scale of the problem, and in many cases rely on more exploitation of people and the planet. Trade unions have long recognised that justice will not be handed to workers by world leaders or delivered by corporations. Only workers and communities can imagine and build the future that works for all of us. Trade unionists know...

A Health Justice Agenda for Local Governments to Address Environmental Health Inequities.

This article explores how structural failures in major federal environmental regulations -which set a foundation for environmental protections nationwide- have helped create many of the environmental injustices that people of color and low-income communities experience. It continues by examining how local governments have reinforced and compounded the failures in the federal environmental regulatory framework, particularly through local land use decisions. Although states play an important role in environmental policymaking, we propose that local governments are uniquely positioned to utilize a health justice approach to address environmental health inequities. This approach centers partnerships between frontline communities and local governments to develop just solutions that fill gaps within the federal environmental regulatory system and anticipate and mitigate the compounding effects of environmental health inequities.

Rooting and reaching: insights from Love Leitrim’s successful resistance to fracking in Ireland

Abstract What can community development learn from frontline community resistance to extractivism and the fossil fuel industry? In the global North, environmental governance often operates within the dominant mode of neoliberal ‘environmentality’ (Luke. 1999. Environmentality as green governmentality, in E. Darier ed, Discourses of the Environment, Blackwell, Oxford), conceptualizing environmental action in individualized and depoliticized ways. This is compounded by the discursive hegemony of the educated middle-classes, which frames environmental issues in ways that render invisible the concerns of marginalized communities and workers. In this paper, I present an activist ethnography and case study of Love Leitrim, a community group that played a crucial role in the successful Irish movement to resist fracking. I suggest that local environmental justice struggles point to the possibility of a ‘liberation environmentality’ (Fletcher. Environmentality unbound: multiple governmentalities in environmental politics, Geoforum, 2017;85, 311–315); which challenges capitalist modes of environmental governance that facilitate the exploitation of the environment for capital accumulation. The paper identifies how a combination of (i) relational local organizing; (ii) trans-local networking with other frontline communities and (iii) creative political engagement enabled campaigners to organize collectively around the environment, navigate power asymmetries and secure political change across spatial scales. I conclude by suggesting that Love Leitrim’s frontline community struggle offers important insights for community development workers who wish to address the environment as a political issue and play a role in bringing about a just transition for marginalized communities and workers.

Science in Service of our Communities

In the Golden Isles of Georgia, the Gullah art of braiding sweetgrass into baskets can be traced back over 400 years to its West African roots. This skill is passed on from generation to generation, preserving the oral history, sovereignty, and culture of the Gullah people. Local and indigenous coastal communities, like the Gullah-Geechee, have a deep connection with their natural environment as they depend on forests, fisheries, and wildlife resources for their livelihood and culture. These frontline communities are also facing a complex web of challenges that include rising sea levels, coastal erosion, saltwater intrusion, encroaching development and increasing property taxes, and loss of fisheries and other coastal livelihoods. As communities develop strategies to address these complex challenges, they need access to place-based research and education that is unique to their people, culture, and ecology.

Seroepidemiology and model-based prediction of SARS-CoV-2 in Ethiopia: longitudinal cohort study among front-line hospital workers and communities

SummaryBackgroundOver 1 year since the first reported case, the true COVID-19 burden in Ethiopia remains unknown due to insufficient surveillance. We aimed to investigate the seroepidemiology of SARS-CoV-2 among front-line hospital workers and communities in Ethiopia.MethodsWe did a population-based, longitudinal cohort study at two tertiary teaching hospitals involving hospital workers, rural residents, and urban communities in Jimma and Addis Ababa. Hospital workers were recruited at both hospitals, and community participants were recruited by convenience sampling including urban metropolitan settings, urban and semi-urban settings, and rural communities. Participants were eligible if they were aged 18 years or older, had provided written informed consent, and were willing to provide blood samples by venepuncture. Only one participant per household was recruited. Serology was done with Elecsys anti-SARS-CoV-2 anti-nucleocapsid assay in three consecutive rounds, with a mean interval of 6 weeks between tests, to obtain seroprevalence and incidence estimates within the cohorts.FindingsBetween Aug 5, 2020, and April 10, 2021, we did three survey rounds with a total of 1104 hospital workers and 1229 community residents participating. SARS-CoV-2 seroprevalence among hospital workers increased strongly during the study period: in Addis Ababa, it increased from 10·9% (95% credible interval [CrI] 8·3–13·8) in August, 2020, to 53·7% (44·8–62·5) in February, 2021, with an incidence rate of 2223 per 100 000 person-weeks (95% CI 1785–2696); in Jimma Town, it increased from 30·8% (95% CrI 26·9–34·8) in November, 2020, to 56·1% (51·1–61·1) in February, 2021, with an incidence rate of 3810 per 100 000 person-weeks (95% CI 3149–4540). Among urban communities, an almost 40% increase in seroprevalence was observed in early 2021, with incidence rates of 1622 per 100 000 person-weeks (1004–2429) in Jimma Town and 4646 per 100 000 person-weeks (2797–7255) in Addis Ababa. Seroprevalence in rural communities increased from 18·0% (95% CrI 13·5–23·2) in November, 2020, to 31·0% (22·3–40·3) in March, 2021.InterpretationSARS-CoV-2 spread in Ethiopia has been highly dynamic among hospital worker and urban communities. We can speculate that the greatest wave of SARS-CoV-2 infections is currently evolving in rural Ethiopia, and thus requires focused attention regarding health-care burden and disease prevention.FundingBavarian State Ministry of Sciences, Research, and the Arts; Germany Ministry of Education and Research; EU Horizon 2020 programme; Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft; and Volkswagenstiftung.

3 Challenges, 3 Errors, and 3 Solutions to Integrate Frontline Communities in Climate Change Policy and Research: Lessons From California

Frontline communities of California experience disproportionate social, economic, and environmental injustices, and climate change is exacerbating the root causes of inequity in those areas. Yet, climate adaptation and mitigation strategies often fail to meaningfully address the experience of frontline community stakeholders. Here, we present three challenges, three errors, and three solutions to better integrate frontline communities' needs in climate change research and to create more impactful policies. We base our perspective on our collective firsthand experiences and on scholarship to bridge local knowledge with hydroclimatic research and policymaking. Unawareness of local priorities (Challenge 1) is a consequence of Ignoring local knowledge (Error 1) that can be, in part, resolved with Information exchange and expansion of community-based participatory research (Solution 1). Unequal access to natural resources (Challenge 2) is often due to Top-down decision making (Error 2), but Buffer zones for environmental protection, green areas, air quality, and water security can help achieve environmental justice (Solution 2). Unequal access to public services (Challenge 3) is a historical issue that persists because of System abuse and tokenism (Error 3), and it may be partially resolved with Multi-benefit projects to create socioeconomic and environmental opportunities within frontline communities that include positive externalities for other stakeholders and public service improvements (Solution 3). The path forward in climate change policy decision-making must be grounded in collaboration with frontline community members and practitioners trained in working with vulnerable stakeholders. Addressing co-occurring inequities exacerbated by climate change requires transdisciplinary efforts to identify technical, policy, and engineering solutions.

Getting By and Getting Out: How Residents of Louisiana’s Frontline Communities Are Adapting to Environmental Change

ABSTRACT Scholars argue that U.S. programs and policy designed to help households adapt to or move away from environmental risk were not designed to address climate change. Others demonstrate that disaster response upholds and produces structural inequality. This article examines how existing mitigation and adaptation policies fail to respond to lived conditions of residents and communities on the front lines of environmental change and perpetuate inequality. Based on interviews with residents in the lower bayou communities of Terrebonne Parish, Louisiana, and professionals working in the study area, we identified three factors that influence the outcomes of mitigation and relocation initiatives. First, we found that adaptation is a dynamic, ongoing process which can lead to the need for multiple types of assistance for a given property or household over time. Second, program timing and how residents make decisions about whether and how to rebuild or relocate are misaligned. Third, current programs deny resources to frontline communities by creating participation barriers for low- and moderate-income households. The findings affirm the need for more flexible policy guidelines if assistance programs are to transform communities in ways that respond to resident priorities and the realities of environmental change.

Silent Spread of SARS-CoV-2 in Ethiopia: Longitudinal Cohort Study Among Frontline Healthcare Workers and Community

Background: Over a year since the first reported case, COVID-19 burden in Ethiopia remains unknown due to limited surveillance. We aimed to investigate seroepidemiology of SARS-CoV-2 among frontline healthcare workers (HCW) and communities in Ethiopia.Methods: We conducted a population-based, prospective, longitudinal cohort study involving HCW, urban residents, and rural communities in Jimma and Addis Ababa. Serology was performed with Elecsys® Anti-SARS-CoV-2 anti-nucleocapsid assay (Roche Diagnostics, Switzerland) in three consecutive rounds with a mean interval of six weeks between tests to obtain seroprevalence and incidence estimates within the cohorts.Findings: SARS-CoV-2 seroprevalence among HCW increased dramatically during the study period: in Addis Ababa from 10·9% (95% Credible Interval: 8·3%; 13·8%) in August 2020 to 53·7% (44·8; 62·5) in February 2021, incidence rate 2,223 (1,785; 2,696) per 100,000 person-weeks; in Jimma from 30·8% (26·9; 34·8) in November 2020 to 56·1% (51·1; 61·1) in February 2021, incidence rate 3,810 (3,149; 4,540) per 100,000 person-weeks. Among urban communities, an almost 40% increase in seroprevalence was observed in early 2021, with incidence rates of 1,622 (1,004; 2,429) in Jimma and 4,646 (2,797; 7,255) per 100,000 person-weeks in Addis Ababa. Seroprevalence in rural communities increased from 18·0% (13·5, 23·2) in November 2020 to 31·0% (22·3, 40·3) in March 2021.Interpretation: SARS-CoV-2 spread in Ethiopia has been highly dynamic among HCW and urban communities. It can be speculated that the greatest wave of SARS-CoV-2 infections is currently evolving in rural Ethiopia and thus requires focused attention in respect to healthcare burden and disease prevention.Funding Information: Bavarian State Ministry of Sciences, Research and the Arts (Bayerisches Staatsministerium, F.4-V0122.4/3/20), Germany Ministry of Education and Research (MoKoCo19; 01KI20271), EU Horizon2020 program (ORCHESTRA; 101016167), Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (SEPAN; HA 7376/3-1), Volkswagenstiftung (E2; 99450).Declaration of Interests: The authors declare no competing interests.Ethics Approval Statement: This research was approved by the institutional review boards of (i) the Jimma University Institute of Health, (ii) St. Paul’s Hospital Millennium Medical College, and (iii) Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich. Additional approvals were obtained from Addis Ababa and Oromia Regional Health Bureaus. Written informed consent was obtained from all participants.

Addressing the challenges of climate-driven community-led resettlement and site expansion: knowledge sharing, storytelling, healing, and collaborative coalition building

Presently coastal areas globally are becoming unviable, with people no longer able to maintain livelihoods and settlements due to, for example, increasing floods, storm surges, coastal erosion, and sea level rise, yet there exist significant policy obstacles and practical and regulatory challenges to community-led and community-wide responses. For many receiving support only at the individual level for relocation or other adaptive responses, individual and community harm is perpetuated through the loss of culture and identity incurred through forced assimilation policies. Often, challenges dealt to frontline communities are founded on centuries of injustices. Can these challenges of both norms and policies be addressed? Can we develop socially, culturally, environmentally, and economically just sustainable adaptation processes that supports community responses, maintenance and evolution of traditions, and rejuvenates regenerative life-supporting ecosystems? This article brings together Indigenous community leaders, knowledge-holders, and allied collaborators from Louisiana, Hawai‘i, Alaska, Borikén/Puerto Rico, and the Marshall Islands, to share their stories and lived experiences of the relocation and other adaptive challenges in their homelands and territories, the obstacles posed by the state or regional governments in community adaptation efforts, ideas for transforming the research paradigm from expecting communities to answer scientific questions to having scientists address community priorities, and the healing processes that communities are employing. The contributors are connected through the Rising Voices Center for Indigenous and Earth Sciences, which brings together Indigenous, tribal, and community leaders, atmospheric, social, biological, and ecological scientists, students, educators, and other experts, and facilitates intercultural, relational-based approaches for understanding and adapting to extreme weather and climate events, climate variability, and climate change.

Peer Support as a Tool for Community Care: “Nothing About Us, Without Us”

In the face of socio-political marginalization, frontline communities reclaim power by harnessing peer wisdom and resilience. The year 2020 marked the confluence of a global pandemic and widespread resistance against anti-Black racism and police violence, highlighting the value of peer voices and community perspectives. To dismantle and transcend carceral approaches to community care, the field of social work is invited to join a larger anti-carceral mental health movement that honors lived experience and works alongside peers to build identity-affirming structures of mental health care. This article examines the ways in which frontline communities benefit from expanded access to anti-carceral formal and informal peer support as a mental health safety net that interrupts harm and prioritizes agency, consent, and self-determination. This paper broadens social work’s conceptualization of peer support through theoretical frameworks of anti-carceral social work, abolition, and intersectionality. Social work and its adjacent fields are called to urgently center Black liberation, collective healing, and community care by advocating for the integration of formal and informal peer support into mental health policy and practice. This paper strategically leans into a lineage of critical peer thought scholarship by utilizing footnotes and citations to model the ethical acknowledgment of peer labor within human rights movements. This intentional structure promotes radical solidarity that resists the exploitation of people with lived experience.

Equity in addressing climate change: Using law and policy to serve frontline communities.

Climate change is and will continue to impact the hardest Black, Native American, and Latinx are called so because they tend to live in areas that experience the impacts of climate change first and most (Krause & Reeves, 2017) The term frontline communities is most commonly used in the conversation about climate change focused on the United States However, they have commonalities with similar globally: disproportionately poor, Black, Brown, and located in vulnerable areas Many times, this is so because of the cost of living, cultural ties and structural oppression Rather, cheap land is often coastal and vulnerable (Climate impacts on coastal areas;US EPA, 2017) The way we enforce or do not enforce laws and policies to address these disparities, particularly in the context of climate change, will shift outcomes for these and all (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved)

Operating principles for collective scholar-activism: Early insights from the Agroecology Research-Action Collective

Scholar-activism is attractive to researchers who want not just to learn about the world, but about how to change that world. Agri-food studies have experienced a surge in the past two decades in researchers who see closer ties to social move­ments as key to food systems change. Yet to date, much scholar-activism depends on individually negotiated researcher-movement relationships, which may or may not be sustained long term and where knowledge can remain siloed. The Agro­ecology Research-Action Collective (ARC) seeks something different. Born of a desire to subordi­nate scholarship for scholarship’s sake to the needs and exigencies of movements, ARC envisages collective processes, horizontal non-exploitative learning among ourselves and with movements, and mechanisms for multidirectional accounta­bility. This reflective essay is the story of how ARC set out to “get our house in order”: to organize ourselves as scholars committed to systematizing more accountable and reciprocal relationships with frontline communities and grassroots movements. We first share the Principles & Protocols that guide our actions and the process through which we developed them. We then discuss two intercon­nected arenas in which ARC is developing a com­munity of practice guided by the Principles & Protocols. The first arena is through integrating participatory education into our everyday teaching and mentoring. The second arena is working to achieve broader social and institutional change by sharing methods and strategies for mobilizing resources and legitimating knowledge, both old and new.

Measuring the Efficacy of a Pilot Public Health Intervention for Engaging Communities of Puerto Rico to Rapidly Write Hurricane Protection Plans.

The efficacy is measured for a public health intervention related to community-based planning for population protection measures (PPMs; ie, shelter-in-place and evacuation). This is a mixed (qualitative and quantitative) prospective study of intervention efficacy, measured in terms of usability related to effectiveness, efficiency, satisfaction, and degree of community engagement. Two municipalities in the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico are included. Community members consisting of individuals; traditional leaders; federal, territorial, and municipal emergency managers; municipal mayors; National Guard; territorial departments of education, health, housing, public works, and transportation; health care; police; Emergency Medical Services; faith-based organizations; nongovernmental organizations (NGOs); and the private sector. The intervention included four community convenings: one for risk communication; two for plan-writing; and one tabletop exercise (TTX). This study analyzed data collected from the project work plan; participant rosters; participant surveys; workshop outputs; and focus group interviews. Efficacy was measured in terms of ISO 9241-11, an international standard for usability that includes effectiveness, efficiency, user satisfaction, and "freedom from risk" among users. Degree of engagement was considered an indicator of "freedom from risk," measurable through workshop attendance. Two separate communities drafted and exercised ~60-page-long population protection plans, each within 14.5 hours. Plan-writing workshops completed 100% of plan objectives and activities. Efficiency rates were nearly the same in both communities. Interviews and surveys indicated high degrees of community satisfaction. Engagement was consistent among community members and variable among governmental officials. Frontline communities have successfully demonstrated the ability to understand the environmental health hazards in their own community; rapidly write consensus-based plans for PPMs; participate in an objective-based TTX; and perform these activities in a bi-lingual setting. This intervention appears to be efficacious for public use in the rapid development of community-based PPMs.

Uber Sub-Saharan Africa: contextual leadership for sustainable business model innovation during COVID-19

Learning outcomes The learning outcomes are as follows: to gain insight into the importance of location, in terms of spatial and temporal context and the capability of leadership to tune into and strategically adapt to context; to understand and explain the sharing economy and explain how the Uber business model fits into this new way of doing business; to evaluate how Uber South Africa has adapted its business model in the period of the COVID-19 crisis and discuss the nature of the business model innovations that is has made; and to understand business model for sustainability and how it differs from the general understanding of business models. Case overview/synopsis On 15 May 2020, Alon Lits, General Manager of Uber Africa was considering his dilemma of adapting their business model to the demands of COVID-19, without losing their core business model as a multi-sided technology platform business. Uber was asking their riders to stay home to ensure social distancing during the lockdown, rather than booking a ride with Uber. The question was how they could support their driver partners, while they were discouraging riders to make use of Uber. Uber had taken initiatives to create additional revenue streams for drivers. The case highlights how Alon Lits and his executive team prioritised the health and well-being of their Uber community and quickly adapted their technology to meet the evolving needs during the COVID-19 pandemic. They customised their offerings to the different needs in the seven Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) countries in which they operated. Uber supported businesses by using the Uber-X sedan vehicles to deliver necessities like food, medicine and parcels to the frontline and poor communities. Uber globally offered their drivers in quarantine 14 days of financial assistance. Serving communities also involved offering free rides to women and children who were victims of domestic violence to get them to a safe space. The multi-sided platform technology business had to consciously adapt, to the “next normal” as the COVID-19 era evolved. Complexity academic level The case is most suitable for Post-Graduate Master’s level courses, MBA, MPhil in Corporate Strategy. Supplementary materials Teaching Notes are available for educators only. Subject code CSS: 11 Strategy.

Beyond Climate Impacts: Knowledge Gaps and Process-Based Reflection on Preparing a Regional Chapter for the Fourth National Climate Assessment

AbstractThe Fourth National Climate Assessment (NCA4) provided the most up-to-date understanding of climate change and its effects on the Earth system and on consequences for the United States, including impacts and associated risks, along with approaches to coping with these effects. It is intended to provide guidance to decision-makers in governmental sectors while, in practice, providing guidance for nongovernmental actors. Its regional and topical chapters highlight current knowledge, uncertainties, gaps in knowledge, and emerging threats. The current knowledge and gaps can help set a research agenda to inform future national, regional, and local climate assessments and thereby support better decision-making. The evolution of the assessment, including greater diversity in participation, and more grounded research in the Northwest represents a growing and deepening engagement with more diverse participants. This shift emphasizes the importance of diversity, inclusion, and a greater acknowledgment of multiple ways of knowing, including local and Indigenous knowledge. The Northwest chapter reflects the broader shift in framing from NCA3 to NCA4 to better understand how climate impacts pose risks to things of value in each sector or region. It considers climate impacts through five broad ways in which humans relate to the environment: natural resource economy; heritage and quality of life; water, transportation, and infrastructure; health and social systems; and frontline communities. We reflect on the assessment process and identify three recommendations to improve the assessment outcomes and processes: seek new ways to 1) engage diverse authors and stakeholders and 2) value and integrate epistemic plurality and different knowledge systems, and 3) when gaps are identified, promote research or data collection efforts designed to fill those gaps. Done well, the assessment can build support and knowledge to facilitate community action, leading to broader resilience.

“The impulse is cartographic”: Counter‐Mapping Indonesia’s Resource Frontiers in the Context of Coloniality

AbstractResource frontiers continue to expand globally across Indigenous lands as states and corporations enact forms of expropriation redolent of the formal colonial era for the sake of extraction. In the face of this expansion, the burden remains largely on frontline communities to defend their ecologies using the tools available to them. Across Indonesia’s resource frontiers, the “cartographic impulse” Edward Said once named to describe anticolonial struggles is apparent in the form of counter‐mapping, which seeks to secure adat (customary) rights and defend Indigenous lands against extractivist expansion. This article revisits this practice and argues that the counter‐map and its goals remain tenuous—mapping in its scalable form risks processing complex and multi‐dimensional ways of relating to land into two‐dimensional representations appropriate for a liberal property regime, while adat itself is a contingent and mutable legal goal. Ultimately, the article echoes emerging calls for the burden to be shifted away from frontline communities through the pursuit of just transitions to post‐extractivism. Pemburuan sumber daya ke wilayah‐wilayah baru yang masih kaya (resource frontiers) di tanah masyarakat adat semakin meluas secara global, seiring praktek‐praktek perampasan berbau kolonial yang dilakukan oleh negara dan korporasi demi tujuan ekstraksi. Berhadapan dengan ekspansi ini, masyarakat di gugus depanlah yang menanggung beban terbesar untuk mempertahankan lingkungan hidup mereka, dengan menggunakan sarana yang tersedia bagi mereka. Di wilayah‐wilayah baru ekstraksi sumber daya alam di Indonesia, apa yang pernah disebut Edward Said sebagai ‘cartographic impulse’ untuk menggambarkan perjuangan anti‐kolonial terlihat jelas dalam bentuk counter‐mapping, yang bertujuan untuk mempertahankan tanah‐tanah adat dari ekspansi ekstravistik. Artikel ini hendak meninjau kembali praktek counter‐mapping ini dan berargumen bahwa counter‐map dan tujuan‐tujuannya masih lemah– mapping dalam bentuk yang dapat diukur mengalami masalah dengan persoalan proses dan persoalan corak multidimensioanal dari hubungan dengan tanah dalam kaitan dengan representasi dua‐dimensi yang hanya cocok dengan rezim kepemilikan liberal; sementara adat sendiri adalah tujuan legal yang sifatnya kontingen dan terbuka terhadap perubahan. Pada akhirnya artikel ini ikut menyuarakan seruan yang banyak muncul, bahwa beban harus dialihkan dari masyarakat frontline melalui usaha untuk transisi‐transisi yang adil menuju post‐extractivism.

Ambassadors of the Sensible World

We may work on things, but the opposite is perhaps even more true: things work on us. Reflecting on several projects of art and research that I have been involved in over the past years, which address different aspects of the environmental mutations currently in process, this paper will aim to partly divert from a usual focus on the deliberate intentions and goals that we can set ourselves as authors, rather observing how various objects of concern can progressively grow in our conscience and in our practice, calling for new transdisciplinary and investigative tools.
 These projects include the observation of a negotiation summit re-enacted at SciencesPo Paris in 2012, during which the « specter » of climate change seemed to appear in the room as an almost physical presence; the long term artistic research project « A tale as a tool » developed with anthropologist and writer Sandrine Teixido, involving a text of fiction as an investigative object of mediation, allowing to collect testimonies by members of frontline communities from the South of Brazil to the North of Norway; and the research project « The Anthropocene Atlas of Geneva » at Geneva school of Art and Design, gathering self-reflexive interviews with numerous scientists, artists and other actors of the ecological transition.