Yunita T. Winarto Anthropologist Academy Professor in Social Sciences & Humanities, Universitas Indonesia

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1 Yunita T. Winarto Anthropologist Academy Professor in Social Sciences & Humanities, Universitas Indonesia

2 Climate and Culture: A Dialectic Local communities have, for generations, adapted to their particular habitat, developed very rich empirical knowledge and various socio-cultural institutions to enable them to survive in a sustainable manner. Climate change is ultimately about culture, for in its wake, more and more of the intimate human-environmental relations, integral to the world s cultural diversity, lose place. (Crate & Nuttal 2009:12). Climate change led to the emergence of different risks and opportunities for people s life: - leading to environmental vulnerability, - threatening cultural sustainability?

3 Problems in learning process: The process of global warming and its implications on weather and climate condition could not be observed directly, be predicted and anticipated accurately by local people. The consequences of global warming on Other people s life were not being observed and experienced directly, so that those consequences do not become part of the Self s knowledge and experience. It is not part of their schema. The absence of institutions (norms, rules, sanctions, law) dealing with the actors actions leading to global warming. The absence of transferring/transmitting g information of climate change, its consequences, and networks. The problems become more complicated due to a complex set of dimensions: ethics, moral, politics, power, economics, environmental costs, and justice [see Crate & Nuttal 2009]

4 Understanding climate change Recollections of the past, observations of the present, and expectations for the future shape our experience of climate phenomena and our understanding of climate information. - To what extent did the condition of the past be reliable to explain the current condition of climate? For example, the farmers cosmology in the ongoing g climate change? - To what extent does the present situation help the people to understand the changes in climate if there is no direct access to valid and reliable information of climate? - What kind of expectations do the people have for their future if there are no warning nor threats to their present life?

5 Cultural models and aspirations Research shows that people filter and absorb scientific knowledge in terms of pre-existing cultural models and aspirations for a desired future [Roncoli et al. 2003:181, 2009]. If the cultural models and aspirations for a desired future are based on the previously accumulated precedents and ongoing experience which have not been affected by the risks and vulnerability due to climate change: how could the people filter and absorb scientific knowledge of climate change and its vulnerable consequences? Enriching knowledge and present experience of climate change is thus necessary to be able to evaluate & reinterpret the existing cosmology, cultural models, and aspirations for the future, and to develop the more adaptable & sustainable coping strategies

6 A need to enrich knowledge based on present observation of weather condition & its impacts on people s habitat Facilitating farmers: measuring rainfall, observing the condition of fields and crops Explaining the radiation Explaining the radiation process

7 Observing accurately, Enriching schema Field condition in a certain rainfall condition: what are the conditions of my plants? Rainfall condition in numerics: The researcher observing a farmer observing the rainfall

8 Developing the tradition of taking notes The notebook of a farmer: Precise, detailed, and tidy Observing and taking notes: A new habitus Wareng, Gunungkidul, Yogyakarta

9 Observing the field together, critically asking questions & discussing i future strategies t Discussing the future coping strategies: Need to collectively build drainage in the case of intense rains and flood

10 Collective Action in response to vulnerability Can individuals response to vulnerability in their habitat individually? No. Collective Action: the involvement of a group of people, it requires a shared interest within the group and it involves some kind of common action which works in pursuit that shared interest. t (Meinzen-Dick et al. 2004:4 5) In practice, people have a number of interests, even within a single sphere of activity (Poteete and Ostrom 2003). Various factors affect the operation of a collective action. (Poteete and Ostrom 2003). Improving knowledge of climate change needs a means to learn in a group/collective, so as to widening individual s schema, perspectives & understanding. Collective action is also necessary to create and carry out innovative strategy to response to vulnerability how to deal with diverse interests and various contextual factors?

11 Collectivity: its needs & challenges Responses to flood in dry-rain-fed & carst ecosystem: how to build drainage in the field if the farmers do not have the culture of forming and maintaining drainages? Responses to water mafia in irrigation water management: how to create and implement rules and sanctions for those practices affecting people s life in the down-stream areas? Creating and sustaining a collective action is an urgent need, yet it is not an easy thing to do needs a social-cultural approach and... political strategies.

12 Organizing farmers action to observe climate change Farmers were determining the points-of-observation: up to 50 points for 1 regency Organizing a workshop for farmers preparing the rainfall measurement

13 Anticipating drought: working in a group Planting seeds by using digging-stick: to anticipate drought in the beginning of rainy season Building ridges in the field to protect water & increase soil humidity

14 Constraints & challenges: Continuous learning and interpreting existing knowledge/cosmology: what are its purposes? Collaborating with people through local elites and people s organization in a power relationship: Are they ready to fully support the collaboration? Elites interests & needs are influential factors. Working in a group and reaching consensus: depends on the leader, his/her leadership, and the existing social-cultural norms and values. A serious facilitative work with various groups of people is an urgent need to do, yet a collaborative research can t be tailored in a uniform package for diverse social-cultural lt l situations.

15 Widening perspectives, enriching knowledge, changing practices, and forming collective actions need a serious effort to: develop new mechanisms for knowledge transmission, and new values, norms, and sanctions to strengthen the establishment of new institutions dealing with any environmental vulnerability. Thank you Yunita T. Winarto