My greatest concern of the past several years is the potential for climate change to exacerbate pre-existing social tensions and injustices. Already, amidst a so-called “refugee crisis,” many countries are becoming increasingly unaccommodating to migrants and asylum seekers as the number of people forced or pressured to migrate rises. With increasing impacts of climate change, space and resources will become more scarce and those who are already struggling will become increasingly vulnerable. In some cases people may be forced or pressured to move from the hardest hit regions. I am terrified that will increase the risk of genocide and that hundreds of millions of people will suffer and parish if we do not make major political progress not only in mitigating climate change, but also in responding to impacts that are happening now and impacts that are already inevitable.
While that concern is what ultimately drives my work, I’ve come to see these sorts of dramatic narratives about inhabitability and mass exodus as inaccurate and harmful for the Marshall Islands. The Marshall Islands is not the first country to be lost to climate change and I don’t think it’s likely to be. People do migrate away from the Marshall Islands for all sorts of reasons, I think the academic community doesn’t very will understand how people who do migrate to the US remain connected to their home country, culture, communities, what they’re contributing to the future of Marshall Islands, and whether they intend to come back. I believe, along with others in this community that there is a generation of highly educated youth who have spent time abroad with the intention to lead their country to a better future.
I made a rule for myself that whatever I do in the Marshall Islands has to first and foremost be for the benefit of people here. I refuse to pursue any project or effort that is at the expense of Marshallese people for the sake my broader research or political goals. I’ve been increasingly resentful of how people capitalize on a simplistic story about the Marshall Islands as a rallying cry for environmental efforts that don’t do anything to help this community. It doesn’t help to say this country is doomed. There are so many amazing people in the Marshall Islands fighting for its future and they are the ones who deserve to be shaping the global narrative.
Research as well as informal conversations suggest that Marshallese people who have spent most of their life in United States are often more concerned than people living in RMI about the impacts of climate change. This often attributed to their education and access to information in the US, but it could also have to do with the fact that majority of news about the Marshall Islands is all doom and gloom so they may believe that the situation in the Marshall Islands is more dire than it is. So, I think the narrative about the Marshall Islands can become a self-fulfilling prophecy, and the exodus narrative is ultimately bad for the country and its future. Instead we need to be giving accurate and detailed information through our research, but also framing our work in ways that leave room for hope.
I’m sure lots of researchers and news-media have the best of intentions; to raise awareness about Marshall Islands and to advocate for them. Particularly, some of the more socially critical researchers are highlighting problems in order to hold the United States government responsible for what they owe to the Marshall Islands. Others, I think, find the doom and gloom narrative somehow alluring, whether because it sells, or because it’s in-line with their broader social concerns and political interests. This is a challenge for me, too, because I share the same ultimate concern that many of them do.
However, I’ve come to resent the Marshall Islands being so-often used as a sort of symbol of climate change or as a canary in the coal mine. I think there are other stories to be told here. Moreover, people don’t often enough consider the impacts on Marshall Islands and on Marshallese people of being portrayed as hopeless, vulnerable, victims; the first to loss in a global struggle against climate change. No, there is a fight here that can be won.
Sure, it’s an uphill battle, but the RMI government is entirely committed to long-term sustainability and habitability. It’s not naive or ill-informed, nor is it some desperate attempt to cling to some dwindling piece of land. They’re going to do it! It’s mostly a matter of acquiring and devoting enough funding and resources and of deciding what compromises can or should be made to support long-term habitability. It’s not going to be easy and there’s no denying that climate change is negatively impacting this country, but it’s not lost cause. Saying that may support global environmental efforts, but it hurts people here in the Marshall Islands.
The exodus narrative is too simple for Marshall Islands and I think it’s not useful or accurate to their struggles, even for those who do migrate. Yet I am simultaneously politically, morally, and religiously emphatic to support people who are forced to migrate as a result of climate change. I’m drawn to the imagery of an exodus. If not here, I do think it will become the reality for some people in some places. However, I think it might be a slower onset and might not always manifest so dramatically.
For now, and for the foreseeable future, I am in the Marshall Islands. I am not going to leave to search for people who better fit the story I had in mind. I am committed to the Marshallese people’s reality more so than my narrative. There is lots to be done here and I believe I can be of service, so that’s what I’ll do.
So, at the very least, please don’t call this place doomed. These are people with full lives, and I think anyone who spends any time here would come to realize they’re not just a story or a symbol of climate change. They’re not doomed. They’re fighting. I’m here, for as long as I am here, to fight alongside them. And I’ll continue to do whatever I think is most useful for Marshall Islands rather than for my career, for some international struggle, or for the sake of a good story.
Stay tuned. I’m also going to be rewriting my research proposal, starting some new projects and putting a new website up soon.