# Climate change from the margin: Intersecting inequities in adaptation to climate change in the West African Sahel

Houria Djoudi, Bruno Locatelli, Denis Gautier, Mathurin Zida

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Houria Djoudi, Bruno Locatelli, Denis Gautier, Mathurin Zida. Climate change from the margin: Intersecting inequities in adaptation to climate change in the West African Sahel. FTA 2020 Science Conference: Forests, trees and agroforestry science for transformational change, Sep 2020, Bogor, Indonesia. pp.154-154. hal-05177166

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Submitted on 22 Jul 2025

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FTA
Science
Conference

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RESEARCH
PROGRAM ON
Forests, Trees and
Agroforestry

FTA 2020 Science Conference

Forests, trees and agroforestry
science for transformational change

14-18 | 21-25

September 2020

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Book of Abstracts

Corrigendum of 10.03.2021
FTA 2020 Science Conference

Forests, trees and agroforestry
science for transformational change

14-18 | 21-25

September 2020

Book of Abstracts
Book of Abstracts

© 2020 The CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA)

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Content in this publication is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0), http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

DOI: 10.17528/cifor/007925

Gitz V, Meybeck A, Ricci F, Belcher B, Brady MA, Coccia F, Elias M, Jamnadass R, Kettle C, Larson A, Li Y, Louman B, Martius C, Minang P, Sinclair F, Sist P, Somarriba E. (Editors). 2020. *Book of Abstracts: FTA 2020 Science Conference - Forests, trees and agroforestry science for transformational change*. 14–18 | 21–25, September 2020. Bogor, Indonesia: The CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA).

CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry
CIFOR Headquarters
Jalan CIFOR
Situ Gede, Sindang Barang
Bogor Barat 16115
Indonesia

T +62-251-8622-622
E cgiarforestsandtrees@cgiar.org

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We would like to thank all funding partners who supported this research through their contributions to the CGIAR Fund. For a full list of the 'CGIAR Fund' funding partners please see: http://www.cgiar.org/our-funders/

Any views expressed in this publication are those of the authors. They do not necessarily represent the views of The CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA), the editors, the authors' institutions, the financial sponsors or the reviewers.
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## AUTHORS

Houria Djoudi† Bruno Locatelli‡ Denis Gautier‡

Mathurin Zida†

## E-MAIL ADDRESS OF PRESENTER

h.djoudi@cgiar.org

## ORGANIZATIONS

† CIFOR, Bogor, Indonesia

‡ CIRAD, Montpellier, France

# Climate change from the margin: Intersecting inequities in adaptation to climate change in the West African Sahel

People and species living in drylands have adapted over millennia to cope with extreme climatic variability. Diverse human populations in the drylands have created behavioral dynamics and social relations that enable reciprocity and mutual responsibility to use highly variable resources. For instance, mobility is a complex socio-ecological mechanism that relies on highly fine-tuned rules and norms to build the strategic exploitation of sporadic water and pastoral resources in an ecosystem characterized by high spatial and temporal climate variability. It allows different social groups to mutually manage and share resources through long-term traditional, negotiated tenure agreements, rights and responsibilities. Mobility is rooted in a broader governance system, and it is central to the identity of mobile pastoralists. While considerable attention and resources have been made available for the humid tropical forests, there has been a lack of comparable sustained attention on drylands. Local knowledge systems in drylands, the adaptive alliances woven through the coexistences of multiple identities and visions to manage and negotiate the landscape and the future are precious human experiences and knowledge systems, yet they sit on the periphery of the climate change agenda. Furthermore, within and outside the drylands, the repertoire of marginalization in the climate change debate includes those of major groups without social power: women, pastoralists and poor farmers.

Taking deliberately an opposite approach – focusing on climate change from the margin – this presentation will use case studies from the West African Sahel to illustrate the profound socio-ecological interactions and environmental and sociological shift happening within drylands systems.

The analytical approach used in the case studies aligns with theories on gender and climate change to include social differentiation. It relies on intersectionality as a tool to bring together existing concepts (e.g. vulnerability, adaptive capacity) to critically assess and enrich both common climate change and gender debates and theories. Using an intersectionality approach unveils emancipatory pathways and challenges the dominating narratives on vulnerability research. Through the examination of the intersecting factors and conditions by which power is not only produced and reproduced but also actively resisted, intersectionality calls for a more complex approach to address the system that creates power differentials, rather than the symptoms of it.

## KEYWORDS

Adaptation, Sahel, gender, drylands

## REFERENCES

* Djoudi H, Locatelli B, Vaast C, Asher K, Brockhaus M and Sijapati BB. 2016. Beyond dichotomies: Gender and intersecting inequalities in climate change studies. *Ambio* 45:248–62. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13280-016-0825-2

* Koffi CK, Djoudi H and Gautier D. 2017. Landscape diversity and associated coping strategies during food shortage periods: Evidence from the Sudano-Sahelian region of Burkina Faso. *Regional Environmental Change* 17:1369–80. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10113-016-0945-z