Most Albertans do not understand what climate change means for their community or what to do about it (Team Alberta, Personal Communication, June 8, 2022). This is the Problem Statement in my team’s design thinking challenge. Our prototype is a workshop guidebook, designed to build local climate understanding and identify practical actions within existing community groups. 

We held a test workshop with a small group of City of Leduc environment team members.* They were asked to bring a photo of a place they held “near and dear,” to share a story about this place and then to consider climate impacts there. In the design, the facilitator was to provide potential actions. However during the discussion on climate impacts, the workshop took a twist and three learnings emerged.  

• Participants generated solutions without prompting because their understanding of the impacts was local and personal.
• Participants put their own anxiety aside in favour of helping others because it relieved anxiety and because of an innate sense of community. 
• The exercise built relationships between participants because of storytelling and openness.

In our Climate Communications course, we learned that “knowledge itself is insufficiently motivating to take action and that it is far from clear to even the most motivated people what actions to take” (Moser, 2016, p. 351). However, without a list of actions, participants moved quickly towards solution generation on their own; for example, to purchase crampons in order to continue hiking at a favorite spot during increasingly frequent freezing rain events. I believe that visualizing impacts at their place led to a better understanding of the climate risks and local solutions, and therefore motivated action, as also found by Altnay (2017). Place attachment should continue to be utilized because it empowers climate action and because in many cases hyper-local adaptation solutions are required. 

Even though participants felt anxious about climate impacts on their own places, they put their fears aside in favour of helping others. They gave consideration to the vulnerability of seniors during heat waves and to farmers’ potential lost crop revenue, as examples. I feel inspired by this because it aligns with Indigenous duty to community where “self interest is cast into oblivion” (Dekanawidah, n.d., Article 28) and because caring for others will be essential for transformative adaptation. In addition, “the alleviation of anxiety that happens when you’re working towards a common goal, even if it’s a really depressing one, in community is actually very joyful and very fulfilling” (Ray, 2021 as cited in North, 2021). 

Even though building relationships among workshop participants was not the primary purpose of the workshop, it was a natural outcome as participants shared their stories. This was expected to a degree, because storytelling builds trust (Armstrong et al., 2018) and has long been an Indigenous foundation for relationship-building. However, when participants also shared their fears regarding climate impacts (e.g. declining lake levels affecting meaningful canoe experiences), trust was built and offers of support were provided, creating stronger bonds than expected. Although the role of social capital in climate adaptation is underexplored (Aldrich, et al., 2016 and Nyahunda and Tirivangasi, 2021), more studies are showing the value of relationships and trust in improving community climate resilience (Paul, et al., 2016 and Vasseuer, et al.,2022). Future engagement should foster this openness between participants as a way to build resilience. 

Overall, testing our workshop resulted in new learnings for climate empowerment. Referencing places “near and dear” helped participants to understand climate impacts and move quickly to generating solutions. Fostering the duty to community alleviated climate anxiety and motivated action to help others adapt. Relationships were strengthened, and this will serve participants well in their own future climate resiliency.

I want to research further the resilience of the human spirit. I was surprised by the energy and internal strength of participants that emerged, moving them quickly from climate despair to solutions and wanting to help others, all while building trust with each other. This internal human resiliency is intriguing as an adaptation mechanism that we will all require in the future. 

*I acknowledge that this group represents one, uniform set of interests that may have influenced the learnings. Future prototype testing should involve a broader group of rights and interests.

What do you think of these learnings? Is it a twist, or is it what you would expect? I would love to hear your perspective. Please feel free to email me at kerra.chomlak@royalroads.ca or contact me on social media. 

References

Aldrich, D. P., Page-Tan, C.M., and Paul, C.J. (2016). Social capital and climate change. Climate Science. 22 November 2016. https://oxfordre.com/climatescience/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780190228620.001.0001/acrefore-9780190228620-e-342

Armstrong, A. K., Schuldt, J. P., & Krasny, M. E. (2018).  Establishing trust. Communicating climate change: A guide for educators.: Cornell University Press. Ebook. 

Altinay, Z. (2017). Visual communication of climate change: Local framing and place attachment. Coastal Management, 45(4), 293-309. https://go.openathens.net/redirector/royalroads.ca?url=https%3A%2F%2Fdoi.org%2F10.1080%2F08920753.2017.1327344

Dekanawidah. (n.d.)  Constitution of the Iroquois Nations. Gayanashagowa (The Great Binding Law).  http://www.indigenouspeople.net/iroqcon.htm.

Moser, S.C. (2016). Reflections on climate change communication research and practice in the second decade of the 21st century: What more is there to say? WIREs Climate Change, 7, 345–369. https://go.openathens.net/redirector/royalroads.ca?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwires.onlinelibrary.wiley.com%2Fdoi%2Ffull%2F10.1002%2Fwcc.403%3Fsid%3Dworldcat.org

North, A. (2021). How to fight climate despair. Vox. August 6, 2021. https://www.vox.com/22595896/climate-change-fire-heat-wave-anxiety

Nyahunda, L. and Tirivangasi, H.M. (2021). Harnessing of social capital as a determinant for climate change adaptation in Mazungunye communal lands in Bikita, Zimbabwe. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8075665/.

Paul, C.J., Weinthal, E.S., Bellemare, M.F. and Jeuland, M.A. (2016).  Social capital, trust, and adaptation to climate change: Evidence from rural Ethiopia. Global Environmental Change, 36, 124-138. 

Vasseur, L., Thornbush, M.J. and Plante, S. (2022). Engaging communities in adaptation to climate change by understanding the dimensions of social capital in Atlantic Canada. Sustainability,14, 5250. https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/9/5250/pdf?version=1650979247