Environmental Citizenship in the Indian Ocean Region

Benito Cao

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781000403862
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Corporate Governance
• Index: Business

The scale and severity of our environmental challenges are quickly becoming apparent. The Indian Ocean region features many places particularly vulnerable to the effects of environmental degradation and climate change, which will have profound social, economic, and cultural impacts. The increasing preoccupation with the state of the environment is also having significant political effects, including on the concept and content of citizenship. The language of citizenship has permeated environmental discourse and, conversely, environmental issues are often articulated in the language of citizenship.

This book explores environmental citizenship and civil society responses to environmental challenges in the Indian Ocean region. The articles provide practical insights to improve resilience and adaptation, as well as conceptual insights into the nature of environmental citizenship discourse and practice across this vast region, from Mauritius to Malaysia. The volume showcases the complex field of environmental citizenship through a wide range of approaches, and alongside closely related concepts, such as environmental governance, environmental education, environmental justice, and corporate social responsibility. In essence, the book provides a rich, diverse and multidimensional picture of environmental citizenship in the Indian Ocean region.

The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue in the Journal of the Indian Ocean Region.

Climate change adaptation: the need for an Indian Ocean regional metamorphosis

Victor R. Savage and Lin Qi Feng

ABSTRACT

The Indian Ocean contains one of the busiest trade routes in history, connecting East Asia, Southeast Asia, South Asia, the Middle East, and East Africa, as well as giving passage to Europe. Given its historical and economic connections and diffusion of ideas, religions, and cultural traditions, the Indian Ocean region’s (IOR) fertile cultural complex can serve as an important platform for addressing climate change. In order to survive and thrive under climate change, societies in the IOR need to undergo profound transformation or metamorphosis. We briefly discuss the history and major climate change issues of the IOR before proposing five suggestions: engaging in regional cooperation on climate change; combining the region’s folk science and indigenous traditions with modern science and technology in the formulation and implementation of climate strategies; embracing the region’s terraqueous geography; initiating development corridors inland; and ensuring that cities and urban development are sustainable and liveable.

Introduction

The increasing mantras on climate change reflect three themes. First, there is growing international concurrence of the evident role and severity of human impacts on climate change through varied activities ranging from fossil fuel use, industrialization, and landscape changes. The second theme is the resulting imperative of the first: we need to shift away from ‘business as usual’ trajectory – growth-based economics driven by capital accumulation, consumption, and powered by fossil fuels. Third, the tropical region is expected to undergo immense changes, more so than the temperate region, making countries in the tropics vulnerable to climate change. The Indian novelist Amitav Ghosh describes our present climate predicament, which was borne out of modernity’s disregard for the environment and obsession with freedom, and perpetuated through capitalism, imperialism, and fossil fuel use as ‘The Great Derangement’ (Ghosh, 2016).

We use metamorphosis to describe the profound transformation which societies in the Indian Ocean region (IOR) need to undergo in order to survive and thrive under climate change. In this paper, we briefly discuss the history of the IOR and major climate change issues in the region. We then provide suggestions which hopefully will lead us towards the desired metamorphosis. While our focus is on climate change adaptation, we believe our suggestions are also pertinent to mitigation and that both adaptation and mitigation should be pursued in tandem in the IOR.

History of the Indian Ocean region

William Kirk (1951) was the first academic to outline the development of an ‘Indian Ocean Community,’ a diverse grouping of states. Historically the states, or their predecessors, have traded and communicated with one another under relatively peaceful conditions. More recently, the states have been collectively referred to as the Indian Ocean region (IOR). In terms of geographical terminology, the IOR is not a ‘formal’ region in the sense of a shared history, culture, or social systems, but is best seen as a ‘functional’ region that is bound together by similar functional interests, such as shipping, fishing, and environmental issues.

The former kingdoms, thalassic empires, and ports around the Indian Ocean thrived on creating a terraqueous history (Bashford, 2017). While the Eurasian continent joins Asia and Europe, the Indian Ocean, as the ‘Afrasian Sea’ (Ray & Alpers, 2007), links Africa and Asia. Despite its far-flung spatial extent across a diversity of vernacular cultures, three pan-Oceanic cultural and migratory movements have linked the IOR over the centuries. These movements can be seen as a rudimentary basis for considering the IOR as a ‘formal’ region that has been shaped by historical processes and cultural exchanges.

First, the Austronesian migration across the Indian Ocean has linked the Southeast Asian peoples from the Malay world (Alam Melayu) with the Malagasy people and language that is native to Madagascar (Bellwood, Fox, & Tryon, 2006). The cultural links are strong and show that the Malayo-Polynesian language is also the main language in Malagasy (Linton, 1955).

Second, Indianization has been a powerful cultural force through which Hinduism and Buddhism were spread and has linked Southeast Asian states, polities, and cultures to the Indian sub-continent. The most pervasive aspect of Indianization has been Sheldon Pollock’s (2006) thesis on the spread of Sanskritization across India and Southeast Asia. The ‘Sanskrit cosmopolis’ transcended multilingual and multiethnic populations in India and Southeast Asia, expanding across ecological, cultural, and political boundaries. Sanskrit had spread almost by ‘cultural osmosis’ because of its expressive power in communication, its translocality, its transethnicity, and the stability and dignity that is conferred by its grammar (Pollock, 2006, pp. 254–256). The spread of Buddhism from India created important linkages between India, Sri Lanka, and East Asia. Chinese traders, Buddhist monks, and pilgrims provide many accounts of travels from East Asia to Southeast Asia and India (Haw, 2017).

Third, Islam has been a powerful religious force in the IOR, linking East African peoples with South Asia and Southeast Asia. Using the established trading networks, Muslim traders spread their religion in coastal East Africa, South Asia, and Southeast Asia. The Muslim Mogul reign in India has become an integral aspect of Indian architecture, foods, culture, music, and dressing. In Southeast Asia, Islam became an anchor in the kingdoms and states of the Malay world, spreading from Aceh, Melaka, and pesisir or coastal towns in Java, to Sulawesi, Brunei, and the Sulu Archipelago.

This historical crisscrossing of cultures, religions, trading produce, and ideas results in a fertile cultural complex. For example, the original indigenous spirits of seafaring communities in Southeast Asia were later joined, and in some cases supplanted, by the localization of the ‘macrocosmic’ pantheon of gods and deities from Islam, Hinduism, Christianity, and China (Andaya, 2017). Vernacular travelogues that emerged alongside steam travel in the Indian Ocean during the nineteenth century showed that a vernacular intellectual milieu existed that was not captured by European intellectual ‘hegemony’ (Green, 2018). In the present time, this cultural complex can be a source of indigenous adaptive systems as well as a platform for dialogue and collaboration amongst states and communities over environmental and climate change issues, and possibly be supplemented in this endeavor by the experience of developed countries.

The impact of climate change in the Indian Ocean region

According to the Fifth Assessment Report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), ‘it is extremely likely that human influence has been the dominant cause of the observed warming since the mid-twentieth century’ (IPCC, 2014a, p. 17). In an October 2018 special report, the IPCC noted with high confidence that ‘global warming is likely to reach 1.5°C between 2030 and 2052 if it continues to increase at the current rate’ (IPCC, 2018, p. 4). There are at least three areas through which climate change and El Niño – the warm phase of the El Niño – Southern Oscillation (ENSO) – will impact states and peoples in the Indian Ocean region.

Warming of the Indian Ocean

Recent studies indicate that the Indian Ocean is the warmest ocean and that the sea surface temperatures (SST) are greater than 28°C (Luo, Sasaki, & Masumoto, 2012). From 1950 to 2016, the surface of the Indian Ocean basin has warmed by 0.11°C, compared to 0.07°C and 0.05°C for the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans respectively (IPCC, 2014c, ch. 30).

Studies demonstrate more links between the Indian and Pacific Oceans with impacts on terrestrial areas still subject to scientific enquiry. The western Indian Ocean between 1901 and 2012 shows evidence of SST warming and is related to the Pacific La Niña events (Roxy, Ritika, Terray, & Masson, 2014). While globally oceans account for 93 percent of all heat accumulated since 1970 due to human greenhouse gas emissions, the Indian Ocean alone absorbs 70 percent of all heat taken up by global oceans (Lee et al., 2015). The rise in the warming of the Indian Ocean could have a modulating impact on the Pacific Ocean in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries (Luo et al., 2012). The question is whether the Indian Ocean influence will have an impact on the El Niño-La Niña cycle globally. Unlike the Pacific Ocean, on which long term research has been conducted, the Indian Ocean has been relatively understudied. Only in 2008 was an Indian Ocean multilateral collaboration established called the Research Moored Array for African-Asian-Australian Monsoon Analysis and Prediction, or RAMA. RAMA is investigating the variability of the Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD) – an irregular oscillation of SST in the Indian Ocean – in terms of east–west anomalies of precipitation and drought as well as its societal consequences (McPhaden et al., 2009).

The increase in ocean temperatures is already affecting coral reefs. Some two-thirds of the Indian Ocean’s 12,070 km² of corals are already destroyed or critically damaged (Michel, 2012, p. 115). Climate change is putting at risk the biodiversity of the region and inducing species extinction. Elizabeth Kolbert’s (2014) The Sixth Extinction is a chilling description of what might take place in the following decades. In the five previous mass extinctions, 80 percent of all organisms were exterminated. The imminent species extinction might include Homo sapiens (Imanishi, 2002; Rees, 2003).

Sea level rise

One of the most worrying outcomes of climate change for littoral states and coastal cities globally is the imminent threat of sea level rise. Thermal expansion of sea water and irreversible melting of ice caps will result in sea level rise. The IPCC estimated that between 1901 and 1990 the rate of global mean sea level rise was 1.4 mm per year, and between 2006 and 2015 the rate was about 2.5 times higher at an unprecedented 3.6 mm per year (IPCC, 2019, pp. SPM-10). Global mean sea level rise for the period 2081–2100, compared to 1986–2005, is projected to range from 0.26–0.92 m, depending on the representative concentration pathways (IPCC, 2019, pp. SPM-23). Sea level rise will cause the frequency of extreme sea level events at most locations to increase and collapse of Antarctic ice sheets could increase Antarctica’s contribution to sea level rise (IPCC, 2019, pp. SPM-23).

The scientific predictions and forecasts are not very positive for the IOR. Sea level rise is not uniform in Indian Ocean coasts. The coasts of the north Indian Ocean are said to have risen 12.9 cm per century (Han et al., 2010, p. 546). Specifically, due to the Indo-Pacific warm pool effects, certain mid-ocean islands like the Mascarenhas archipelago, coasts of Sumatra in Indonesia, and the north Indian Ocean may experience significantly more sea level rise than the global mean (Han et al., 2010, p. 549). Conversely, the Seychelles islands and the east coasts of Kenya and Tanzania may witness little or no sea level rise (Han et al., 2010, p. 549). While eastern Pacific Oceanic rise in temperature had impacts on the IOR thousands of kilometers away in Southeast Asia (e.g. droughts, forest fires, haze), IOR governments need to brace themselves for new scientific reports that temperatures and sea-levels in the Pacific and Indian Oceans are linked, which is resulting in a rise in temperatures and sea levels in the Indian Ocean (Han et al., 2010; Luo et al., 2012; Mochizuki, Kimoto, Watanabe, Chikamoto, & Ishii, 2016).

Many of the Indian Ocean states have major ports, capitals, and development zones abutting the coastlines that are vulnerable to sea level rise and related factors, such as extreme weather events. States that are at risk include Australia, those in Southeast Asia, India, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka in South Asia, Yemen and the Gulf States in the Middle East, and Somalia, Kenya, and Mozambique in East Africa. The island states of the Maldives and Seychelles are likely to be hit hardest within the next couple of decades. Studies show that sea levels have risen since 1960 along all Indian Ocean coasts, except Zanzibar (Han et al., 2010, p. 546). Bangladesh is especially vulnerable: in 2000, about 40 percent of its land is in low elevation coastal zones where 46 percent of its population lives (McGranahan, Balk, & Anderson, 2007). Agriculture in its coastal zones has been and will continue to be affected by multiple climate change factors (Huq, Hugé, Boon, & Gain, 2015; Ruane et al., 2013).

Droughts

While El Niño is associated with reduced precipitation, climate change will likely induce extreme weather events, leading to floods, dro...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Citation Information
• Notes on Contributors
• Introduction: Environmental citizenship in the Indian Ocean region
• 1 Climate change adaptation: the need for an Indian Ocean regional metamorphosis
• 2 Indian Ocean fisheries regulation: exploring participatory approaches to support small-scale fisheries in six States
• 3 Ecosocial work through corporate social responsibility: the case of company engagement with civil society in coastal communities in Mauritius
• 4 Crisis, constitutionalism and the geographies of belonging: Indian eco-politics in the Anthropocene
• 5 Contradictions of citizenship and environmental politics in the Arabian littoral
• 6 Environmental citizenship for inclusive sustainable development: the case of Kelab Alami in Mukim Tanjung Kupang, Johor, Malaysia
• Index