More Like this

1. Alaska Native Responses to Climate Change: The Role of Community Values in Housing Adaptation

   Taylor, J; Poleacovschi, C; Perez, M. (June 2019, Engineering Project Organization Conference)

   Chinowsky, P; Taylor, J; Tech, G. (Ed.)

   The Arctic is experiencing intensified impacts from climate change, resulting in unprecedented rates of change, especially for Indigenous communities. Alaska Natives are experiencing transformations in housing, food security, economic stability, and cultural practices as a result of the biophysical changes such as thawing permafrost and coastal erosion. In response, communities are prioritizing adaptation. Although Indigenous communities have been adapting for hundreds of years, adaptation strategies, or actions that seek to moderate harm through the adjustment to actual or expected climate change effects, are not well documented. Housing adaptation strategies are especially understudied, which include any adaptation strategy that is in response to or in preparation for a biophysical change affecting housing. Housing adaptation strategies in response to climate change are primarily focused on physical dimensions (e.g., retrofitting homes, constructing sea wall). Nevertheless, adaptations to changes in biophysical systems are closely interlinked to sociocultural systems, which are often neglected in adaptation discourse. Analyzing existing strategies through the lens of community values captures the sociocultural aspects of adaptation and is critical for sustainable adaptation. This paper presents a research design that addresses these gaps in adaptation discourse by asking: How are community values represented in housing adaptation strategies in response to climate change? This research will employ interviews, focus groups, and observations in partnership with two Alaska Native communities in Oscarville, Alaska and Point Lay, Alaska using community based participatory research methods (CBPR). Understanding the role of community values in housing adaptation is essential for developing sustainable adaptation plans, engineering designs, and future research studies. Further, employing CBPR methodologies in the context of adaptation, grounds identified strategies and resulting plans in community experience. As a result, future findings will not only contribute to the intellectual understanding of adaptation processes and theory, but also facilitate actions in response to climate change. 

   more » « less
2. Global Change Impacts on Indigenous Sustainability in Sakha Republic: A Synthesis of Knowledge

   https://doi.org/10.3390/su16031157  

   Ksenofontov, Stanislav Saas; Petrov, Andrey N (February 2024, Sustainability)

   Indigenous understanding of sustainability is embedded in close relations to land and environment, Indigenous Knowledge systems, Indigenous epistemologies and ontologies, and Indigenous languages. However, the sustainability of Indigenous peoples’ livelihoods is significantly affected by various global change drivers. In the Arctic, Indigenous peoples’ livelihoods are impacted by environmental, social, and cultural changes, including climate change, environmental pollution, economic processes, and resource extraction. This paper aims to review and synthesize recent academic and gray literature on the sustainability of Indigenous communities in Sakha Republic, Northeast Siberia, Russia in the face of global change with a particular focus on land- and water-based traditional activities, native language, and the Indigenous Knowledge system. 

   more » « less
3. The Arctic Rivers Project: Using an Equitable Co‐Production Framework for Integrating Meaningful Community Engagement and Science to Understand Climate Impacts

   https://doi.org/10.1029/2022CSJ000024  

   Herman‐Mercer, Nicole; Andre, Alestine; Buschman, Victoria; Blaskey, Dylan; Brooks, Cassandra; Cheng, Yifan; Combs, Evelynn; Cozzetto, Karen; Fitka, Serena; Koch, Joshua; et al (November 2023, Community Science)

   Abstract As the Arctic and its rivers continue to warm, a better understanding of the possible future impacts on people would benefit from close partnership with Indigenous communities and scientists from diverse fields of study. We present efforts by the Arctic Rivers Project to conduct community‐engaged research to increase collective understanding of the historical and potential future impacts of climate change on rivers, fish, and Indigenous communities. Working in central to northern Alaska and the Yukon Territory in Canada, the project seeks to engage with Indigenous communities in ethical and equitable ways to produces science that is useful, useable, and used that may serve as an example for future research efforts. Toward this goal, we formed an Indigenous Advisory Council and together developed project‐specific knowledge co‐production protocols. This paper provides a novel model of design and implementation to co‐produce knowledge with communities across a large study domain. 

   more » « less
4. A values-centered relational science model: supporting Indigenous rights and reconciliation in research

   https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-14768-290211  

   David-Chavez, Dominique; Gavin, Michael; Ortiz, Norma; Valdez, Shelly; Carroll, Stephanie (January 2024, Ecology and Society)

   This material is primarily based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship (grant no. DGE-1321845). Addressing complex social-ecological issues requires all relevant sources of knowledge and data, especially those held by communities who remain close to the land. Centuries of oppression, extractive research practices, and misrepresentation have hindered balanced knowledge exchange with Indigenous communities and inhibited innovation and problem-solving capacity in all scientific fields. A recent shift in the research landscape reflects a growing interest in engaging across diverse communities and ways of knowing. Scientific discussions increasingly highlight the inherent value of Indigenous environmental ethics frameworks and processes as the original roadmaps for sustainable development planning, including their potential in addressing the climate crisis and related social and environmental concerns. Momentum in this shift is also propelled by an increasing body of research evidencing the role of Indigenous land stewardship for maintaining ecological health and biodiversity. However, a key challenge straining this movement lies rooted in colonial residue and ongoing actions that suppress and co-opt Indigenous knowledge systems. Scientists working with incomplete datasets privilege a handful of narratives, conceptual understandings, languages, and historical contexts, while failing to engage thousands of collective bodies of intergenerational, place-based knowledge systems. The current dominant colonial paradigm in scientific research risks continued harmful impacts to Indigenous communities that sustain diverse knowledge systems. Here, we outline how ethical standards in researcher practice can be raised in order to reconcile colonial legacies and ongoing settler colonial practices. We synthesize across Indigenous and community-based research protocols and frameworks, transferring knowledge across disciplines, and ground truthing methods and processes in our own practice, to present a relational science working model for supporting Indigenous rights and reconciliation in research. We maintain that core Indigenous values of integrity, respect, humility, and reciprocity should shape researcher responsibilities and methods applied in order to raise ethical standards and long-term relational accountability regarding Indigenous lands, rights, communities, and our shared futures. 

   more » « less
5. Arctic roads and railways: social and environmental consequences of transport infrastructure in the circumpolar North

   https://doi.org/10.1139/as-2021-0033  

   Povoroznyuk, Olga; Vincent, Warwick F; Schweitzer, Peter; Laptander, Roza; Bennett, Mia; Calmels, Fabrice; Sergeev, Dmitrii; Arp, Christopher; Forbes, Bruce C; Roy-Léveillée, Pascale; et al (June 2023, Arctic Science)

   Land-based transport corridors and related infrastructure are increasingly extending into and across the Arctic in support of resource development and population growth, causing large-scale cumulative changes to northern socio-ecological systems. These changes include the increased mobility of people, goods and resources, and environmental impacts on landscapes and ecosystems as the human footprint reaches remote, unindustrialized regions. Arctic climate change is also generating new challenges for the construction and maintenance of these transport systems, requiring adaptive engineering solutions as well as community resilience. In this review article, we consider the complex entanglements between humans, the environment, and land transportation infrastructure in the North and illustrate these interrelations by way of seven case studies: the Baikal–Amur Mainline, Bovanenkovo Railway, Alaska–Canada Highway, Inuvik–Tuktoyatuk Highway, Alaska Railroad, Hudson Bay Railway, and proposed railways on Baffin Island, Canada. As new infrastructure is built and anticipated across the circumpolar North, there is an urgent need for an integrated socio-ecological approach to impact assessment. This would include full consideration of Indigenous knowledge and concerns, collaboration with local communities and user groups in assessment, planning and monitoring, and evaluation of alternative engineering designs to contend with the impacts of climate change in the decades ahead. 

   more » « less