Climate Change, Development, and Livelihoods in Coastal Bangladesh
Perilously close to sea level and vulnerable to floods, erosion, and cyclones, Bangladesh is one of the top recipients of development aid earmarked for climate change adaptation. Yet, to what extent do adaptation projects address local needs and concerns? Combining environmental history and ethnographic fieldwork with development professionals, rural farmers, and landless women, Misreading the Bengal Delta critiques development narratives of Bangladesh as a “climate change victim.” It examines how development actors repackage colonial-era modernizing projects, which have caused severe environmental effects, as climate-adaptation solutions. Seawalls meant to mitigate against cyclones and rising sea levels instead silt up waterways and induce drainage-related flooding. Other adaptation projects, from saline aquaculture to high-yield agriculture, threaten soil fertility, biodiversity, and livelihoods. Bangladesh’s environmental crisis goes beyond climate change, extending to coastal vulnerabilities that are entwined with underemployment, debt, and the lack of universal healthcare.
This timely book analyzes how development actors create flawed causal narratives linking their interventions in the environment and society of the Global South to climate change. Ultimately, such misreadings risk exacerbating climatic threats and structural inequalities.
Camelia Dewan is a postdoctoral research fellow in the Department of Social Anthropology, University of Oslo.
Centered in anthropology, the Culture, Place, and Nature series encompasses new interdisciplinary social science research on environmental issues, focusing on the intersection of culture, ecology, and politics in global, national, and local contexts. Contributors to the series view environmental knowledge and issues from the multiple and often conflicting perspectives of various cultural systems.
Series editor: K. Sivaramakrishnan
I’m deeply humbled that I’ll be a panellist on “New Directions in Bangladesh Studies: Recent Scholarship and New Pu… https://t.co/3YlRwDSd7W
@calynndowler @CameliaDewan Really a fantastic book🙏 -will check out your review Calynn #MisreadingTheBengalDelta… https://t.co/xrelKEtf2F
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Such a thoughtful review of #MisreadingTheBengalDelta in Water Alternatives. This means so much to hear ❤️… https://t.co/83kkIdRunG
Thank you @ritodhi_c for your careful reading and thorough engagement with #MisreadingTheBengalDelta! It’s a heartw… https://t.co/pjGN1cxP9z
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