Climate change adaptation and individual fear : a pivotal security trend

Abstract

This study explores the current state of the literature surrounding climate security and the climate-conflict nexus. Currently, literature surrounding climate security and the climate- conflict nexus is preoccupied with empirical climate data, pathways of vulnerability, human security and migration. There is minimal consideration of the emotional responses of the individual. Rather the individual is seen as that which needs to be secured and therefore not as a relevant participant or possible agent of climate security. This research seeks to answer the following questions: “why does the conceptualisation of national security, especially with regard to the rising climate crisis, need to include the individual as a potential security threat,” and “how could such a consideration lead towards improved methods of security, and a deeper understanding of the climate-conflict nexus ?” This study will engage this issue area through a critical interpretivist lens. This will allow the study to explore and engage with the possible blind spots, as well as the unappreciated complexities, that exist within the discipline of security studies, specifically pertaining to climate security, the climate-conflict nexus, and the concepts of ‘adaptation, ’ ‘security-dilemma,‘ ’threat perception,‘ ’the individual ’and ‘fear.’ An integrative literature review of current debates and findings will be employed as the key method of this research. This is followed by a discussion and integration of findings by means of scenario-building and the utilisation of an existing qualitative expression formulated to identify threats. The literature utilised is a purposively sampled set of secondary sources. This study maintains the position that the individual and his/her unruly emotions are an overlooked and understudied threat to all spheres of security.