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Myhre, S. L., Scobie, M., Meriläinen, E., Kelman, I. & Gopinathan, U. (2024). Climate Change, Community Action, and Health in the Anglophone Caribbean: A Scoping Review. Public Health Reviews, 44, Article ID 1605843.
Open this publication in new window or tab >>Climate Change, Community Action, and Health in the Anglophone Caribbean: A Scoping Review
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2024 (English)In: Public Health Reviews, ISSN 0301-0422, E-ISSN 2107-6952, Vol. 44, article id 1605843Article, review/survey (Refereed) Published
Abstract [en]

Objective: This scoping review investigates the status of research focusing on the nexu of community action, climate change, and health and wellbeing in anglophone Caribbean Small Island Developing States (SIDS).

Methods: This review was guided by Arksey and O’Malley framework and utilized the PRISMA-ScR checklist. We searched Medline/OVID, PsychInfo, VHL, Sociological Abstracts, Google Scholar, and Scopus to capture interdisciplinary studies published from 1946 to 2021.

Results: The search yielded 3,828 records of which fourteen studies met the eligibility criteria. The analysis assessed study aim, geographic focus, community stakeholders, community action, climate perspective, health impact, as well as dimensions including resources/assets, education/information, organization and governance, innovation and flexibility, and efficacy and agency. Nearly all studies were case studies using mixed method approaches involving qualitative and quantitative data. Community groups organized around focal areas related to fishing, farming, food security, conservation, and the environment.

Conclusion: Despite the bearing these areas have on public health, few studies explicitly examine direct links between health and climate change. Research dedicated to the nexus of community action, climate change, and health in the anglophone Caribbean warrants further study.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Frontiers Media S.A., 2024
Keywords
wellbeing, climate change, health, community action, Caribbean
National Category
Public Health, Global Health, Social Medicine and Epidemiology Human Geography
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:oru:diva-110930 (URN)10.3389/phrs.2023.1605843 (DOI)001148774400001 ()38283581 (PubMedID)2-s2.0-85183109929 (Scopus ID)
Funder
The Research Council of Norway, 312046NERC - the Natural Environment Research Council, NE/T013656/1
Note

This research was supported by the Research Council of Norway [Project Number 312046] and the UK’s Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) [Grant Number NE/T013656/1] under the Belmont Forum’s transdisciplinary Collaborative Research Action on Climate, Environment and Health.

Available from: 2024-01-22 Created: 2024-01-22 Last updated: 2025-01-30Bibliographically approved
Kelman, I. & Meriläinen, E. (2024). Climate change, disasters and humanitarian action. In: Silke Roth; Bandana Purkayastha; Tobias Denskus (Ed.), Handbook on Humanitarianism and Inequality: (pp. 338-351). Edward Elgar Publishing
Open this publication in new window or tab >>Climate change, disasters and humanitarian action
2024 (English)In: Handbook on Humanitarianism and Inequality / [ed] Silke Roth; Bandana Purkayastha; Tobias Denskus, Edward Elgar Publishing, 2024, p. 338-351Chapter in book (Refereed)
Abstract [en]

This chapter surveys how climate change affects humanitarian action. Humanitarian actors respond to disasters and support those affected by them. This chapter defines climate change and unpicks to what extent disasters are related to climate change, what causes climate change and how it impacts on and is addressed by humanitarian actors. It addresses to what extent disasters, conflict, and forced migration are caused by climate change and provides an overview of how humanitarian actors have responded to these challenges. The chapter discusses that different regions and populations are differently affected by climate change and that inequalities in access to humanitarian aid can be noticed. After defining humanitarianism and climate change, this chapter examines three areas of humanitarian intervention: disasters, conflict, and migration. Throughout, the chapter considers how in the context of humanitarianism and climate change, inequalities matter, persist, and are perpetuated.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Edward Elgar Publishing, 2024
Series
Elgar Handbooks on Inequality
Keywords
Adaptation, Climate change, Conflict, Disaster risk management, Disaster risk reduction, Mitigation
National Category
Human Geography
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:oru:diva-110934 (URN)10.4337/9781802206555.00034 (DOI)2-s2.0-85188867839 (Scopus ID)9781802206555 (ISBN)9781802206548 (ISBN)
Available from: 2024-01-22 Created: 2024-01-22 Last updated: 2025-01-14Bibliographically approved
Peters, L., Kelman, I., Van Den Hoek, J., Meriläinen, E. & Shannon, G. (2024). Intersecting Participatory Action Research and Remote Sensing for Climate Change, Health, and Justice. In: Rajini Srikanth; Linda Thompson (Ed.), Climate Justice and Public Health: Realities, Responses, and Reimaginings for a Better Future (pp. 66-87). University of Massachusetts Press
Open this publication in new window or tab >>Intersecting Participatory Action Research and Remote Sensing for Climate Change, Health, and Justice
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2024 (English)In: Climate Justice and Public Health: Realities, Responses, and Reimaginings for a Better Future / [ed] Rajini Srikanth; Linda Thompson, University of Massachusetts Press, 2024, p. 66-87Chapter in book (Refereed)
Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
University of Massachusetts Press, 2024
National Category
Human Geography Climate Science
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:oru:diva-110935 (URN)9781625348043 (ISBN)9781625348036 (ISBN)9781685750756 (ISBN)
Available from: 2024-01-22 Created: 2024-01-22 Last updated: 2025-02-01Bibliographically approved
Matthews, L. J., Clark-Ginsberg, A., Scobie, M., Peters, L. E. R., Gopinathan, U., Mosurska, A., . . . Kelman, I. (2023). Collective action by community groups: solutions for climate change or different players in the same game?. Climate and Development, 15(8), 679-691
Open this publication in new window or tab >>Collective action by community groups: solutions for climate change or different players in the same game?
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2023 (English)In: Climate and Development, ISSN 1756-5529, E-ISSN 1756-5537, Vol. 15, no 8, p. 679-691Article in journal (Refereed) Published
Abstract [en]

Community groups are taking initiatives to adapt to a changing climate. These organizations differ from businesses and governments by being non-profit, often informal, resource limited, and reliant on volunteer labor. How these organizations facilitate collective action is not well known, especially since they do not necessarily solve common pool resource governance, but rather improve common pool resources through collective action. In fact, at first glance, community groups seem to not have the means for solving collective action problems used routinely in industry and government, such as paying people for cooperation or punishing them for lack of it.This article investigates how community groups solve collective action problems though data gathered across 25 organizations in three sites - Sitka, Alaska, USA; Toco, Trinidad; and a global site of distributed citizen science organizations. We found that community groups used positive reinforcement methods common to industry and used little punishment. Groups also engaged in mechanisms for collective action, such as relying on altruistic contributions by few individuals, that generally are not considered commonplace in businesses and governments. We conclude by discussing implications from this study for collective action theory and for how policymakers might learn from community groups to address climate change.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Taylor & Francis, 2023
Keywords
Collective action, community resilience, prisoner's dilemma, snowdrift, game theory, punishment, ethnicity, volunteerism, climate change adaptation
National Category
Human Geography
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:oru:diva-110927 (URN)10.1080/17565529.2022.2149254 (DOI)000943505100001 ()2-s2.0-85150344497 (Scopus ID)
Funder
The Research Council of Norway, 312046
Note

This work was supported by NSF: [Grant Number 2028065]; Research Council of Norway: [Grant Number 312046]; National Environment Research Council (UK): [Grant Number NE/T013656/1].

Available from: 2024-01-22 Created: 2024-01-22 Last updated: 2024-01-23Bibliographically approved
Meriläinen, E. (2023). Conceptualizations of resilient community for social futures. In: David S-K Ting; Jacqueline Ann Stagner (Ed.), Nourishing Tomorrow: Clean Engineering and Nature-friendly Living (pp. 281-316). World Scientific Publishing
Open this publication in new window or tab >>Conceptualizations of resilient community for social futures
2023 (English)In: Nourishing Tomorrow: Clean Engineering and Nature-friendly Living / [ed] David S-K Ting; Jacqueline Ann Stagner, World Scientific Publishing , 2023, p. 281-316Chapter in book (Refereed)
Abstract [en]

The concepts “resilience” and “community” appear frequently in research on disasters associated with major society-shaping phenomena such as climate change or urbanization. The chapter seeks to explicate how social science research conceptualizes the resilient community, building on a descriptive overview of disaster studies and climate change adaptation literature. Furthermore, the chapter explores how different conceptualizations of the resilient community frame social futures amid disasters. Three key conceptualizations of resilient community arise from the literature: (i) resilient community of belonging, (ii) resilient community of practice, and (iii) resilient community as an object of governance. Patterns arising across these conceptualizations resonate with previous critiques on how a focus on resilience and communities can serve to suppress the ideas and practices of the social, in line with neoliberal politics. Yet the conceptualizations are not univocally compatible with neoliberalism and can point to a variety of social futures. Conceptualizations of the resilient community can draw attention to the self-organizing of communities, as well as illustrate how a civil society mobilizes around a cause. Ideally, the cause is in line with the interests of the disaster-affected people, who typically are also marginalized in and across societies.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
World Scientific Publishing, 2023
Keywords
Community, community resilience, conceptualization
National Category
Climate Science
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:oru:diva-103653 (URN)10.1142/9789811264375_0009 (DOI)9789811264368 (ISBN)9789811264382 (ISBN)
Available from: 2023-01-27 Created: 2023-01-27 Last updated: 2025-02-07Bibliographically approved
Sirviö, H., Meriläinen, E., Lehtinen, A., Kellokumpu, V. & Luukkonen, J. (2023). Metsät metsinä, kiistakapulana ja talouden materiaalisena perustana. Alue ja Ympäristö, 51(2), 1-3
Open this publication in new window or tab >>Metsät metsinä, kiistakapulana ja talouden materiaalisena perustana
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2023 (Finnish)In: Alue ja Ympäristö, ISSN 1235-4554, Vol. 51, no 2, p. 1-3Article in journal (Refereed) Published
Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Alue- ja ympäristötutkimuksen seura, 2023
Keywords
Metsäpolitiikka, tilallinen työnjako, poliittinen talous, luonnonsuojelu, ennallistaminen
National Category
Climate Science Human Geography
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:oru:diva-103712 (URN)10.30663/ay.125505 (DOI)
Available from: 2023-01-30 Created: 2023-01-30 Last updated: 2025-02-01Bibliographically approved
Shannon, G., Basu, P., Peters, L. E. .., Clark-Ginsberg, A., Herrera Delgado, T. M., Gope, R., . . . Prost, A. (2023). Think global, act local: using a translocal approach to understand community-based organisations' responses to planetary health crises during COVID-19. The Lancet Planetary Health, 7(10), e850-e858
Open this publication in new window or tab >>Think global, act local: using a translocal approach to understand community-based organisations' responses to planetary health crises during COVID-19
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2023 (English)In: The Lancet Planetary Health, E-ISSN 2542-5196, Vol. 7, no 10, p. e850-e858Article in journal (Refereed) Published
Abstract [en]

Little is known on how community-based responses to planetary health crises, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, can integrate concerns about livelihoods, equity, health, wellbeing, and the environment. We used a translocal learning approach to co-develop insights on community-based responses to complex health and environmental and economic crises with leaders from five organisations working with communities at the front line of intersecting planetary health challenges in Finland, India, Kenya, Peru, and the USA. Translocal learning supports collective knowledge production across different localities in ways that value local perspectives but transcend national boundaries. There were three main findings from the translocal learning process. First, thanks to their proximity to the communities they served, community-based organisations (CBOs) can quickly identify the ways in which COVID-19 might worsen existing social and health inequities. Second, localised CBO actions are key to supporting communities with unique challenges in the face of systemic planetary health crises. Third, CBOs can develop rights-based, ecologically-minded actions responding to local priorities and mobilising available resources. Our findings show how solutions to planetary health might come from small-scale community initiatives that are well connected within and across contexts. Locally-focused globally-aware actions should be harnessed through greater recognition, funding, and networking opportunities. Globally, planetary health initiatives should be supported by applying the principles of subsidiarity and translocalism.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Elsevier, 2023
National Category
Public Health, Global Health, Social Medicine and Epidemiology
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:oru:diva-108902 (URN)10.1016/S2542-5196(23)00193-6 (DOI)001177182800001 ()37821163 (PubMedID)2-s2.0-85173479129 (Scopus ID)
Note

The work was funded by a University College London Grand Challenges grant under its Place: Equality & Prosperity initiative. GS, LERP, and CW are supported through Stema. AC-G, IK, EM, and LERP receive funding from Belmont Forum by the UK’s Natural Environment Research Council (grant number NE/T013656/1) and US National Science Foundation (grant number 2028065).

Available from: 2023-10-12 Created: 2023-10-12 Last updated: 2024-04-15Bibliographically approved
Meriläinen, E., Joseph, J., Jauhola, M., Yadav, P., Romo-Murphy, E., Marin, J. & Gadhavi, S. (2022). Examining relational social ontologies of disaster resilience: lived experiences from India, Indonesia, Nepal, Chile and Andean territories. Disaster Prevention and Management, 31(3), 273-287
Open this publication in new window or tab >>Examining relational social ontologies of disaster resilience: lived experiences from India, Indonesia, Nepal, Chile and Andean territories
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2022 (English)In: Disaster Prevention and Management, ISSN 0965-3562, E-ISSN 1758-6100, Vol. 31, no 3, p. 273-287Article in journal (Refereed) Published
Abstract [en]

Purpose: The neoliberal resilience discourse and its critiques both contribute to its hegemony, obscuring alternative discourses in the context of risk and uncertainties. Drawing from the "ontology of potentiality", the authors suggest reclaiming "resilience" through situated accounts of the connected and relational every day from the global south. To explore alternate possibilities, the authors draw attention to the social ontology of disaster resilience that foregrounds relationality, intersectionality and situated knowledge.

Design/methodology/approach: Quilting together the field work experiences in India, Indonesia, Nepal, Chile and Andean territories, the authors interrogate the social ontologies and politics of resilience in disaster studies in these contexts through six vignettes. Quilting, as a research methodology, weaves together various individual fragments involving their specific materialities, situated knowledge, layered temporalities, affects and memories. The authors' six vignettes discuss the use, politicisation and resistance to resilience in the aftermath of disasters.

Findings: While the pieces do not try to bring out a single "truth", the authors argue that firstly, the vignettes provide non-Western conceptualisations of resilience, and attempts to provincialise externally imposed notions of resilience. Secondly, they draw attention to social ontology of resilience as the examples underscores the intersubjectivity of disaster experiences, the relational reaching out to communities and significant others.

Originality/value: Drawing from in-depth research conducted in six disaster contexts by seven scholars from South Asia, South America and Northern Europe, the authors embrace pluralist situated knowledge, and cross-cultural/language co-authoring. Thus, the co-authored piece contributes to diversifying disaster studies scholarship methodologically.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Emerald Group Publishing Limited, 2022
Keywords
Lived experience, resistance, disaster resilience, situated knowledge, social ontology, gender and disaster
National Category
Climate Science
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:oru:diva-103204 (URN)10.1108/DPM-02-2021-0057 (DOI)000733248100001 ()2-s2.0-85121754246 (Scopus ID)
Note

Funding agencies:

Academy of Finland Fellowship Gendered Political Violence and Urban PostDisaster Reconstruction 286013

Helsinki Institute of Sustainability Science (HELSUS) (International visitors program )

Chile-Finland Network on Socioenvironmental Science ANIDREDES170041

Foundation of Economic Education

George Washington University

Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Project 17-S20R

Available from: 2023-01-17 Created: 2023-01-17 Last updated: 2025-02-07Bibliographically approved
Meriläinen, E., Kelman, I., Peters, L. E. R. & Shannon, G. (2022). Puppeteering as a metaphor for unpacking power in participatory action research on climate change and health. Climate and Development, 14(5), 419-430
Open this publication in new window or tab >>Puppeteering as a metaphor for unpacking power in participatory action research on climate change and health
2022 (English)In: Climate and Development, ISSN 1756-5529, E-ISSN 1756-5537, Vol. 14, no 5, p. 419-430Article in journal (Refereed) Published
Abstract [en]

The health impacts of climate change are distributed inequitably, with marginalized communities typically facing the direst consequences. However, the concerns of the marginalized remain comparatively invisible in research, policy and practice. Participatory action research (PAR) has the potential to centre these concerns, but due to unequal power relations among research participants, the approaches often fall short of their emancipatory ideals. To unpack how power influences the dynamics of representation in PAR, this paper presents an analytical framework using the metaphor of ‘puppeteering’. Puppeteering is a metaphor for how a researcher-activist resonates and catalyses both the voices (ventriloquism) and actions (marionetting) of a marginalized community. Two questions and continuums are central to the framework. First, who and where the puppeteer is (insider and outsider agents). Second, what puppeteering is (action and research; radical and managerial). Examples from climate change and health research provide illustrations and contextualizations throughout. A key complication for applying PAR to address the health impacts of climate change is that for marginalized communities, climate change typically remains a few layers removed from the determinants of health. The community’s priorities may be at odds with a research and action agenda framed in terms of climate change and health.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Taylor & Francis, 2022
Keywords
Climate change, health, participatory action research, puppeteering, marginalized
National Category
Human Geography
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:oru:diva-103205 (URN)10.1080/17565529.2021.1930509 (DOI)000658194500001 ()2-s2.0-85107493869 (Scopus ID)
Funder
NERC - the Natural Environment Research Council, NE/T013656/1
Available from: 2023-01-17 Created: 2023-01-17 Last updated: 2023-01-18Bibliographically approved
Meriläinen, E. & Lehtinen, A. A. (2022). Re-articulating forest politics through “rights to forest” and “rights of forest”. Geoforum, 133, 89-100
Open this publication in new window or tab >>Re-articulating forest politics through “rights to forest” and “rights of forest”
2022 (English)In: Geoforum, ISSN 0016-7185, E-ISSN 1872-9398, Vol. 133, p. 89-100Article in journal (Refereed) Published
Abstract [en]

Forests, and the politics around them, are posited both as a cause of and solution to the contemporary ecological crisis. This paper explores how rights to forest and rights of forest conceptualisations can re-articulate, and potentially challenge, the problematic dominance of capitalist forest politics in Northern Finland and beyond. Conceptually, the paper combines the debates on rights-to-nature and rights-of-nature. Rights-to-nature is concerned with how people can access and use nature to support their lives. Rights-of-nature, meanwhile, highlights the nature’s intrinsic value and the rights of indigenous peoples. Combining the two perspectives might allow imagining politics of nature that is both ecologically and socially just. Empirically, the paper studies forest politics in Tornio River valley in Northern Finland through an ethnographic case study. The rights- to-nature conceptualisation associates locally with the existing use rights and ownership rights. Rights-to-nature may guarantee access to a forest, but it does not guarantee its existence. Rights-of-nature, meanwhile, associates with strong conservation, nature’s power, and indigenous land rights. However, also the rights- of-nature conceptualisation is unlikely to challenge the gradual degradation of most Northern forests, as these “boring” forests lack both recognised human stewardship and intrinsic value. Thus, in the study area the rights conceptualisations do not decisively challenge the existing forest politics, even if the framings can acquire a more radical content. Overall, this paper shows that transnational rights discourses and conceptualisations entangle with local common senses. Factoring in the local understandings is essential for re-articulating politics of nature that could receive broad local support.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Elsevier, 2022
Keywords
rights to nature, rights of nature, politics of nature, forest politics, capitalism, Northern Finland
National Category
Political Science (excluding Public Administration Studies and Globalisation Studies)
Research subject
Political Science
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:oru:diva-99222 (URN)10.1016/j.geoforum.2022.05.010 (DOI)000809889200003 ()2-s2.0-85131120552 (Scopus ID)
Funder
Tore Browaldhs stiftelse, B21-0005
Note

Funding agencies:

UK’s Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) NE/T013656/1

Hanken Support Foundation

Liikesivistysrahasto

Available from: 2022-05-30 Created: 2022-05-30 Last updated: 2022-07-28Bibliographically approved
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