Conference of the Parties

Mind boggling phenomena, that climate change. political, physical, social, spiritual.
Yet another layer of complexity, on top of what is already happening.

One sad fact of life is how CC logic is spun very depressingly in deshi commonsense. This is for all sorts of reasons (lack of hope/scope). One of them is that the CC case was made first with impacts and mitigation strategies. Whenever i see that early coloured in contour map for the loss of 16% deshi land following x metre sea rise I wonder whats worse, little knowledge or no knowledge or the gap between the disciplines. Of course there will always be a local view for exaggeration and further dependence on the international political red light district.

Now we are onto Adaptation, the actual content flung around the ends of the earth and transformed locally might be hopeful. Over the next 12 days, the climate caravan is in Bali for the UNFCCs CoP 13 where some people will try to do good. Best of luck to them.

There are a few outfits who specialise in the arena, from science for the south types, to policy wonks to humanitarians. Here are some links to their CC resources.

Centre for Science and Environment (India, serious southern scientists, even political ones with balls of steel)
South South North (South Africa, practical types)
Red Cross/Red Crescent (Heroes)
International Institute for Sustainable Development (Canada)
Stockholm Environment Institute (Sweden)
International Institute for Environment and Development (UK)

Of course the different countries are going in with their own intents and much of the fun will be to see who plays with what and how the international science and environment politics unfold.

• Australia is post regime change. Soft Lefties love the environment right?... but what about social justice? how is their changed diplomatic dance going to impact things and their ex ally in these matters, the Occupied States?
• India, judging by the CSE preparatory papers for cop are not going to take the eco-charge of 'oi paki, turn off your lights' (thankyou Omid Djalili).
• Bangladesh. CS Karim, the Bangladesh Agriculture Advisor recently called for the international community to set up an institution of excellence in Bangladesh. Probably the first cringe worthy thing he has come up with, although the rest of his Nov 25th speech really is worth a read.
• UK, the man Milliband is on fire, one of the highlights of the Brown cabinet. Only beef is that the whole uk approach to CC is that of the civilising missionary.
• Random nonaligned country to show some moves.

The battle for beurocratised knowledge and war of position on the environment is afoot.

A lot of old wisdoms are coming under new scrutiny. I wouldn't invoke paradigm shift hyperbole at this time. Given the total jacking up of the seasons, some in the development institutions are rethinking the value of recommending agriculture.

For me sitting here, practically this Adaptation issue has more to do with the geography and sociology of ingenuity and technology in different places and at all the scales. When i think about desh, I wonder how dramatically the behaviour and function of the bureaucracy, the engineers, the political community, the scholars, the students, the 'industrialists' and the people needs to 'move' to resolve even the basic problems before CC even enters the equation.