Voices

In a historic step, 193 member states recently signed the Pact for the Future at the UN Summit of the Future. The UN is calling the Pact “the most wide-ranging international agreement in many years.” Notably, the Pact includes a commitment to develop new metrics for progress and growth that prioritise the well-being of both people and the planet. For over half a century, Gross Domestic Product (GDP) has been widely accepted as the standard measure of a country’s overall standing and progress. However, human rights advocates — not to mention groups within the UN itself  – have stated that GDP is an inadequate goalpost if we are to create secure, sustainable, and flourishing futures. Furthermore, research has found that commitment to well-being over economic growth not only increased public health outcomes in Bhutan and New Zealand, but also improved economic performance. Before mobilising organisations in India to develop and test well-being metrics for sustainable development, it is essential to establish an equity-based, intersectional understanding of what well-being is, and how it is missing from mainstream climate solutions today.

What would developing a truly intersectional, equity-based lens in climate solutions look like? I would argue that before developing national, regional, and local well-being metrics, it is critical to center a definition of well-being that is rooted in equity and regard for all beings. This ensures that we are moving towards our goal of ensuring that everyone has opportunities to create meaningful, flourishing futures. While some corporate wellness programmes and mental health professionals may operationalise well-being as a matter of individual responsibility, I use this definition: Well-being occurs when the essential needs of individuals and communities are met, and they have opportunities to create meaningful, flourishing futures. There is now growing recognition across disciplines that an individual’s health is influenced by their environment and the social structures that they interact with. Achieving well-being for marginalised groups becomes impossible when structures and social attitudes still block equal access and opportunities. A climate solution is intersectional and equity-driven when it:

1. Takes a person’s marginalised identities into account, including how living with multiple marginalised identities impacts their life in a particular context.
2. Accounts for the interplay between different forms of well-being in its design, namely social, occupational, financial, physical, mental, spiritual, and environmental well-being.

Prominent climate and sustainability solutions lack an equity-based understanding, which needs to change. During a sustainable architecture course hosted by a renowned climate institute in Ladakh, I met a lovely lady who worked at the institute’s sister school. She was visually impaired. It was only our second conversation, yet she instantly recognised my voice — “Aayaan, it’s you!” her voice rang out. In addition to her extraordinary hearing-memory recall, she also knew every step and slope on the school grounds by heart. However, navigating new pathways or buildings not designed with accessibility in mind required innovative approaches. When we trekked up a concrete path to a viewpoint, she linked arms with two colleagues, who grasped her hands tightly. The climate institute that hosted us did not build its buildings and bathrooms to be accessible to people with a range of disabilities, despite some of the country’s most renowned architects shaping its construction. Why don’t we design climate solutions with accessible design? Not just people with disabilities, but all of us will thrive more when we cultivate intersectionality, and treat accessible and sustainable design as interconnected solutions, instead of separate issues. Designing comprehensive solutions for climate change begins by understanding how people experience it through multiple axes, such as one’s caste, tribal status, class, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, physical and neurological disabilities, educational attainment, and caregiving responsibilities. LGBTQI+ people, disabled people, and Adivasi people of all genders are particularly marginalised in climate spaces. Adivasi people’s displacement, which forces them to migrate away from their forests and perform manual labour in cities, which then leaves them vulnerable to heat stress, is a climate issue. Yet, Adivasi people’s rights and well-being are rarely centred in elite climate policy discussions. I recommend reading “Mental Health and Well-Being for Adivasis and Tribals” by Ruby Hembrom, and “Locating Adivasi Self Within Environmental Justice” by Alice Barwa.

I'll share another example of building non-intersectional climate solutions. Our accommodation at the sister school had all-gender, single-stall dry toilets which have notable water-saving benefits over flush toilets. The waste you excrete is collected in a chamber below the toilet, turned into compost, and used as fertilizer to grow food. Dry toilets are an excellent low-tech, Indigenous solution to address water scarcity. However, yet again, thinking about user needs intersectionally seemed missing. There were no guidelines on safe usage for people who may be menstruating, and there was no disposal mechanism for sanitary napkins. Until practitioners, designers, innovators, and funders in the climate space develop an equity-based understanding of well-being, we will design incomplete, ineffective solutions.  The great thinker and activist Audre Lorde said in the 1980s, "there is no such thing as a single-issue struggle, because we do not live single-issue lives".

Similarly, the consequences of climate change for LGBTQI+ persons can no longer be ignored. LGBTQI+ people constitute roughly 10% of the country's population, yet their existence is not even acknowledged in most climate spaces I am in. A study titled "Health Impacts of Climate Change on Gender Diverse Populations" found that climate disasters pose a greater health threat to transgender and nonbinary communities.  The study on health impacts also noted that gender-sensitive data was not being collected in most cases, making it impossible to assess the true extent of disparities and threats. Researchers found testimonies indicating that transgender individuals in India were denied access to emergency shelters, while those in Nepal were assigned lower priority for rescue. Imagine that your town is flooded, and you have mere minutes to evacuate your home. You have no time to grab your medication. When it’s time to take your hormone therapy, whether via injection or tablet, you first struggle to find it. Even if you manage to get it, medical providers may refuse to administer it due to their own biases. To learn more about how climate disasters uniquely impact LGBTQI+ people, the webpage "LGBTQIA+ Communities and Disasters" by Disaster Philanthropy is a good starting point.

So, how do we change this? We can't speak of progress and sustainable development without recognizing communities that are bearing the brunt of social exclusion are also unseen and unheard in spaces where solutions are designed and decided. Climate advocates and funders with social and financial capital must partner with LGBTQI+ advocates, disability advocates, and Adivasi, Dalit and Bahujan advocates. They must move beyond tokenistic inclusion, share their resources and social capital, to advance well-being for all. Build equitable relationships and trust with them, amplify their voices, and compensate them fairly for their contributions. Fund projects led by marginalised people to advance intersectional well-being. Funders, NGOs, and practitioners in development spaces must broaden their focus beyond renewable energy or agricultural output to see the bigger picture: advance the well-being of groups whose bodies and identities are still deemed disposable by some – that is central to effectively addressing climate change. Viewing our biggest problems –climate change, unequal development and so on– through an intersectional and equity-based lens is a pre-requisite to defining well-being and growth beyond GDP in India.

Illustration by: Athulya Pillai