Seizing history: development and non-climate change in Small Island Developing States

Abstract

Purpose This paper offers a critical review of climate change related initiatives in small island states, including Small Island Developing States (SIDS), which can end up as ontological traps: fuelled and supported by external donor agencies, thwarting out-migration and shifting scarce and finite resources away from other, shorter-term and locally spawned development trajectories and objectives. Design/methodology/approach This paper is based on a selective literature review. It clusters important themes found in published research and policy documents. Findings The results identify a burgeoning critical voice in regards to resilience and its legitimation of climate change driven projects in SIDS. This paper recommends a more nuanced approach which also privileges migration. Originality/value This paper provided a critical overview and synthesis of the immobility implicit in much climate change related work, through the critical lens of island studies and post-colonial studies.

Envisioning the Sicilian-Maltese archipelago: a Braudelian inspired triple-level analysis of a European cross-border region

“…While it is true that these issues may represent an obstacle to development, a growing strand of literature has sought to counter arguments on islands' disadvantages by reshaping development-oriented definitions of concepts such as 'vulnerability' and 'resilience' (Kelman, 2019). By embracing new views on relationality and empowering discourses, island scholars rightfully warn against excessive prejudice in policymaking and suggest alternative ways of interpreting island realities (Baldacchino, 2018;Chandler & Pugh, 2018). When considering further interpretations which go beyond the island development debate, our case study provides interesting elements for the elaboration of an alternative outlook on the Sicilian-Maltese Archipelago.…”

Pork food culture and sustainability on islands along the Kuroshio Current: resource circulation and ecological communities in Okinawa and Jeju

“…Similarly, Hong et al (2013) note the contribution of traditional lifestyles to conservation of biodiversity by paying attention to the relationship between the biodiversity of Asian islands, traditional biocultural diversity, and traditional ecological knowledge. Some scholars have, however, been critical of the manner in which the discourse of sustainability and ecology sometimes overshadows or crowds out attention to other issues in island communities (Baldacchino, 2018;Grydehøj & Kelman, 2017;Baldacchino & Kelman, 2014), while Pugh (2018) calls for recognition of the more nuanced relationality affecting environmental processes in the Anthropocene. These various discussions are useful for examining the traditional ways of life and ecological knowledge of the peoples of Okinawa and Jeju.…”

Critical approaches to island geography

“…Recent moves toward decolonial perspectives (Grydehøj, 2018a;Luo & Grydehoj, 2017;Nadarajah & Grydehøj, 2016;Nogues, 2018;Nolasco, 2018) have prompted self-reflection regarding how geography research facilitates the imposition of Western and mainland assumptions on island societies. As recent studies have highlighted (Baldacchino, 2018;Grydehøj & Kelman, 2017;Kelman, 2018;Krieg, 2018), reductionism risks legitimising socially, environmentally, politically, or economically damaging practices on the grounds of an illusory island exceptionalism. It is thus that otherwise-skilled researchers may straightforwardly apply development theory from the Pacific to the Caribbean, may ask that East Asian archipelagos live up to North Atlantic island ideals, and may assume that every island tourist shares the mindset of the author's own culture.…”