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J. Atkinson-Nolte et al.
adult community members before a decision is made on the community response
(Nunn et al. 2014). The hereditary leader of the whole-island community, advised
by (typically) elderly leaders, will reach decisions which the community will not
normally question and will implement. Since many responses to climate change, like
building seawalls or replanting vegetation (like mangroves) along eroding shorelines,
are labour intensive, the community works together cooperatively to achieve them.
This situation, named solesolevaki in Fiji, remains commonplace in rural communities like those on Ono where every adult male is required to devote 1–2 days each
week to communal activities, which may include house repair/construction and maintenance of communal food gardens as well as responses to climate change impacts. In
less-rural, often peri-urban, Fiji communities, solesolevaki has largely disappeared
because residents are busy with other things, often in wage employment (Movono
and Becken 2018). Recently there have been calls to restore such practices as a way
of adapting to climate change without any or little need for cash (Nunn and Kumar
2019a).
Conclusion and Future Research
This study shows how non-western scientific beliefs (religious or cultural) influence
people’s understanding of climate change in the Pacific Islands, a conclusion similar
to that of others who have studied this region (Kempf 2012; Haluza-DeLay 2014;
Nunn et al. 2016). Yet this study also finds, as did Fair (2018) and others, that residents
of rural remote communities in the Pacific Islands may comfortably hold contrasting
beliefs about climate change. Our study shows that this dualism does not hinder
responses to climate change on Ono Island; in fact, it may drive them more than
might be the case if people adhered to a single explanation.
Dualistic responses to climate-change impacts are similar to those that are likely
to underpin recent ecumenical efforts to develop guidance for people of faith in the
Pacific Islands region to address climate-change concerns (Rowland 2019). The way
forward that is most likely to succeed in terms of minimizing livelihood disruption
from future climate change is one that is “likely to lie in a mixture of traditional
knowledge and scientific information filtered through worldviews of Pacific Island
decisionmakers” (Nunn et al. 2016, p. 478). With this end in mind and as previously
synthesised, “it remains an important priority for climate change adaptation in the
Pacific Island region to continue building consilience in local communities through
a heightened emphasis on science-faith integration” (Luetz and Nunn 2020, p. 304).
As the pace of climate change accelerates and its impacts on human livelihoods
in places like Ono Island diversify and increase in severity, the need for effective and
sustainable adaptation becomes ever more exigent. At present, much adaptation in
the Pacific Islands region is funded by external agencies, typically bilateral donors
or international agencies, who uncritically privilege their own (supposedly global)
adaptive solutions, attempt to impose these on ‘others’, then wonder why they do
not produce the intended outcomes. The study presented here, like others recently
J. Atkinson-Nolte et al.
adult community members before a decision is made on the community response
(Nunn et al. 2014). The hereditary leader of the whole-island community, advised
by (typically) elderly leaders, will reach decisions which the community will not
normally question and will implement. Since many responses to climate change, like
building seawalls or replanting vegetation (like mangroves) along eroding shorelines,
are labour intensive, the community works together cooperatively to achieve them.
This situation, named solesolevaki in Fiji, remains commonplace in rural communities like those on Ono where every adult male is required to devote 1–2 days each
week to communal activities, which may include house repair/construction and maintenance of communal food gardens as well as responses to climate change impacts. In
less-rural, often peri-urban, Fiji communities, solesolevaki has largely disappeared
because residents are busy with other things, often in wage employment (Movono
and Becken 2018). Recently there have been calls to restore such practices as a way
of adapting to climate change without any or little need for cash (Nunn and Kumar
2019a).
Conclusion and Future Research
This study shows how non-western scientific beliefs (religious or cultural) influence
people’s understanding of climate change in the Pacific Islands, a conclusion similar
to that of others who have studied this region (Kempf 2012; Haluza-DeLay 2014;
Nunn et al. 2016). Yet this study also finds, as did Fair (2018) and others, that residents
of rural remote communities in the Pacific Islands may comfortably hold contrasting
beliefs about climate change. Our study shows that this dualism does not hinder
responses to climate change on Ono Island; in fact, it may drive them more than
might be the case if people adhered to a single explanation.
Dualistic responses to climate-change impacts are similar to those that are likely
to underpin recent ecumenical efforts to develop guidance for people of faith in the
Pacific Islands region to address climate-change concerns (Rowland 2019). The way
forward that is most likely to succeed in terms of minimizing livelihood disruption
from future climate change is one that is “likely to lie in a mixture of traditional
knowledge and scientific information filtered through worldviews of Pacific Island
decisionmakers” (Nunn et al. 2016, p. 478). With this end in mind and as previously
synthesised, “it remains an important priority for climate change adaptation in the
Pacific Island region to continue building consilience in local communities through
a heightened emphasis on science-faith integration” (Luetz and Nunn 2020, p. 304).
As the pace of climate change accelerates and its impacts on human livelihoods
in places like Ono Island diversify and increase in severity, the need for effective and
sustainable adaptation becomes ever more exigent. At present, much adaptation in
the Pacific Islands region is funded by external agencies, typically bilateral donors
or international agencies, who uncritically privilege their own (supposedly global)
adaptive solutions, attempt to impose these on ‘others’, then wonder why they do
not produce the intended outcomes. The study presented here, like others recently