CiR2P Option 6 | Support social programs

DISCUSSION:

International support to help establish formal education programs teaching tolerance, cooperation, and the development of positive attitudes between members of previously hostile or suspicious communities crucial item on any agenda addressing the underlying causes of mass atrocities.

General education programs that teach communities about the dangers of climate-related impacts and new technologies and infrastructure that can help reduce those dangers (adaptation); as well as those education programs that teach communities how to plan, construct and operate new technologies that promote low pollution economic growth and poverty alleviation (mitigation) can be viewed as social programs that help reduce climate-related harm on vulnerable populations.

Specific climate-related educations programs and workshops such as those operating as part of a broader water diplomacy agenda can help to build trust and cooperation between community members, groups and countries with sub-optimal relations.  

Supporting community peacebuilding initiatives – the kind run by a great number of national and international civil society organisations working with local actors at the grassroots level – is another way that foreign governments can help dispel the fear, mistrust, and prejudice so often at the heart of intractable conflicts.

These initiatives can include different techniques to create a forum for respectful interactions and dialogue such as the use of various multimedia and social networking platforms, live drama performances and music, sport, and facilitating debates and discussions in neutral settings and offers training opportunities. The interactions and shared learnings are designed to build trust and cooperation on issues such as human rights, economic development, democracy, human health, or environment and climate change in the context of preventing deadly violence between groups.

With growing understanding of diminishing returns resulting from top-down climate change responses, assistance is increasingly being delivered at the local scale through bottom-up responses such as community-based adaptation (CBA) programs. 

CBA’s are small-scale, place-based and grassroots driven approaches that have synergies with broader development aspirations. CBA initiatives are vast and can include for example education and capacity building programs to enhance food and or water security in fragile states.

The advantage of CBA’s are that they seek to not impose adaptation strategies on local communities, but rather empower local communities by giving them the skills and tools they need to plan, make decisions and implement an adaptation strategy that works for them and is consistent with their values and needs.

CBA programs established in this way are more like to have local ownership and therefore have a greater chance of being managed sustainably over the longer-term by the local community, and will be effective in helping to protect vulnerable populations from climate change impacts.