Localness in climate change

Shepherd, T. G. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6631-9968 and Sobel, A. H. (2020) Localness in climate change. Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East, 40 (1). pp. 7-16. ISSN 1548-226X doi: 10.1215/1089201X-8185983

Abstract/Summary

Climate change is a global problem, yet it is experienced at the local scale, in ways that are both place-specific and specific to the accidents of weather history. This article takes the dichotomy between the global and the local as a starting point to develop a critique of the normative approach within climate science, which is global in various ways and thereby fails to bring meaning to the local. The article discusses the ethical choices implicit in the current paradigm of climate prediction, how irreducible uncertainty at the local scale can be managed by suitable reframing of the scientific questions, and some particular epistemic considerations that apply to climate change in the global South. The article argues for an elevation of the narrative and for a demotion of the probabilistic from its place of privilege in the construction and communication of our understanding of global warming and its local consequences.

Item Type	Article
URI	https://reading-clone.eprints-hosting.org/id/eprint/85548
Identification Number/DOI	10.1215/1089201X-8185983
Refereed	Yes
Divisions	Science > School of Mathematical, Physical and Computational Sciences > Department of Meteorology
Publisher	Duke University Press
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