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By Ma. Margarita Z. Sandejas, Contributor
Addressing the roots of local conflicts can help
mitigate the possible effects that climate change will bring to poor
communities.
To achieve that, Professor Ed Garcia, a Filipino
senior policy adviser for the London-based International Alert, a
non-government organization, is proposing an innovative approach to
resolving potential conflicts that will be caused by climate change,
which is called C3, or Climate Change and Conflict Initiative. He
claims C3 is the first of its kind in the world.
The main objective of C3 is to help create and
nurture societies resilient to climate change, starting with the
Philippines. It is a dialogue-led, community-based action plan that
is built on consensus, and advocates a negotiated approach to
conflicts—even armed conflicts—as opposed to military means.
“At the end of the day, we must focus on the
underlying factors that can lead to armed conflict, such as
inequality, and work at the root of the matter—peacefully. This is
where diplomacy comes in,” Garcia said.
The C3 approach to adaptation is essentially
people-centered and conflict sensitive—focusing on negotiation
panels, education of the masses and the government’s dutiful
implementation of agreements and resolutions.
Garcia set as an example the Mindanao situation,
and said that parties that feel they cannot be heard must be given
greater representation by the government.
Unfortunately, the ongoing strife in Mindanao
involves mutually interlocking factors such as poverty, inequality,
bad governance, poor systems of justice and weak government
institutions.
Garcia added that the legacy of past conflicts
also contributed to the factors that put additional strain on an
already fragile social and political system. This, in turn, has
become a vicious cycle of failing to adapt to climate change and its
resulting conflict. Unless this is corrected, climate change can
worsen the conflict in Mindanao.
To be partly blamed for regional and local
conflicts is the type of capitalism that pervades in Philippine
society.
“The capitalist system we have chosen to
embrace is built on greed and that is not right. That is also the
primary reason for social unrest and lapses in our country’s
capacity to adapt,” Garcia stressed.
But it is not too late for people to gradually
reverse that situation.
“We should go ahead and reimagine climate
change and its resulting conflicts vis-à-vis poverty, insurgency
and a conflict-sensitized economy,” Garcia said.
In a recent climate change forum held at the
Asian Institute of Management, it was revealed the Philippines is
listed among 46 countries most vulnerable to armed conflict arising
from climate change.
The physical effects of climate change, if not
properly addressed, will have serious sociopolitical implications
such as aggravated social tension, livelihood and food insecurity,
trade deficiencies and sharp declines in human health, experts at
the forum, including Garcia, said.
Likewise, the more underdeveloped the country,
the more susceptible it is to conflicts arising from climate change.
Although the C3 approach has not yet been
tested, Garcia sees it as appropriate for application in the
Philippines, and its future success may become a basis for other
countries to act on potential conflicts that will be caused by
climate change.
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