Climate Justice in a Time of Expansive Climate Coloniality

Amidst growing ecological crises, escalating climate-induced disasters, and increasing losses and damages from climate change, the need to confront systems that perpetuate and exacerbate such harms appears to be a unanimous global desire. Yet that is not the case. I have argued in recent years that climate coloniality disrupts simplistic narratives of climate justice. Climate Coloniality reproduces the hauntings of colonialism and imperialism through climate impacts, complicating climate politics at global and local scales. Climate change lays bare the colonialism of not only of the past but an ongoing coloniality, one that governs and structures interconnected lives, societies, ecosystems, one that is co-constitutive of processes of capitalism, imperialism, militarism, and economic growth ideologies. In such expansiveness of climate coloniality, how do communities and solidarity networks usher in meaningful equity and justice? This talk critically engages with challenges, opportunities, and pathways for decolonizing climate justice.

Dr. Farhana Sultana is an internationally recognized interdisciplinary scholar whose research interests include water governance, climate justice, political ecology, critical development studies, transnational feminist theories, critical urban studies, social justice, human rights, citizenship, decolonizing, and South Asia. Dr. Sultana is a Professor in the Department of Geography and the Environment and Research Director for Environmental Collaboration and Conflicts in the Program for the Advancement of Research on Conflict and Collaboration (PARCC) at the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University. She has been a prominent voice on global climate justice and I would urge you to read her recent papers about climate coloniality and planetary justice if you are not already familiar with her work. She is also a powerful speaker as you can see from other lectures you can find on YouTube, for example.

Date: Friday, 5 April 2024
Time: 4:00PM – 5:30PM (lecture followed by reception)
Venue: Witherspoon Cinema, in the Witherspoon Student Center

Live stream the lecture here.