This working paper explores the perspectives of young men and women in rural Kenya on social equity and climate adaptation. It draws on research conducted in three Endorois indigenous communities in Baringo County. Focus group discussions addressed young people’s understandings and experiences of social equity and fairness, empowerment, collective action, local governance, natural resource management, and climate adaptation. By applying a social equity lens to young people’s understandings and interpretations of the risks and opportunities they face, this research aims to identify entry points that empower them to advance their own lives and communities in ways they value. The findings suggest that young men and women perceive their communities as largely equitable — despite facing compounding disadvantages that include climate change and loss of livestock, the mainstay of their livelihoods. They value social equity and fairness, advocating for a balanced approach that prioritizes the most vulnerable, treats people equally, and ensures inclusive decision-making guided by competent leaders. Based on these understandings, they emphasize the strength of their village institutions and of their generation’s agency and capabilities. Nevertheless, the testimonies also reveal significant barriers to achieving equitable climate adaptation, related to the need for greater access to resources and opportunities. Young women, especially, report a deep sense of marginalization and experience significant gender inequalities, noting their limited participation in the institutions and networks governing decision-making and resource distribution within their households and communities. Despite these challenges, both young women and men in the study had attained education at high school or college level, and felt empowered by their academic achievements. Their aspirations for improving their lives and strengthen their villages’ resilience to climate change offer a basis for optimism. The study proposes investing in stakeholder capacity, fostering youth leadership and intergenerational exchanges, and developing strategies and partnerships responsive to the needs of rural youth, with particular concern for young women’s inclusion. It underscores the importance of locally-led governance, inclusive decision-making, and collective action as key to achieving equitable climate adaptation and social transformation.
A study of the perspectives of young indigenous men and women in rural communities in Kenya shows that strong institutions for local governance, inclusive decision-making and collective action are key for social equity and climate adaptation. To achieve this, we need to: (1) invest in the capacities of stakeholders to promote locally-led climate and equity initiatives; (2) promote young women’s and men’s leadership and networks, together with inter-generational exchange of experiences; and (3) build strategies and partnerships that are responsive to locally-identified youth needs.
Global climate policies recognize the urgent need to address the inequitable impacts of climate change on smallholder agricultural communities, but there is limited understanding of how to accomplish this in practice. We contribute to closing this gap through the design of a participatory qualitative methodology intended to nurture locally-led “transformative adaptation pathways” that strengthen social equity and sustainability. Our conceptual framework draws upon theories of social equity and justice rooted in participatory parity—values and norms that encourage people to interact with one another as equals and synergistically nurture recognitional, distributional, representational and intergenerational equities. Recognizing that social equity is enhanced when poor and vulnerable people gain decision-making power that expands their access to resources and opportunities, we question how people understand and experience social equity and its relationship to their capacity to adapt. We also ask how norms about gender, generation, and socio-economic status shape people’s understandings and experiences of social equity and adaptation. To address these questions, we illustrate the methodological approach with evidence gathered from pilot tests conducted in smallholder communities of Kenya and Philippines. Our findings show how understandings of fairness provide a basis for learning, eliciting comparative and contextualized findings that can inform community-based adaptation. Overall, we demonstrate that in the face of social processes that typically fuel inequities, participatory tools and learning tactics can serve to empower low-income women and men to identify, contribute to, and monitor actions that nurture their community’s progress towards strong and equitable climate adaptation capacity.
This guide is a principal output of a qualitative methodology study that explored people’s understandings of and experiences with social equity and adaptation to climate change in smallholder agricultural communities. Study objectives featured development and testing of research methods that worked to reveal openings for positive change and potentially disrupt drivers of vulnerability and resource scarcity. The learning approach addresses an urgent need for greater understanding of social processes that advance equitable adaptation. The methodology was tested with 323 study participants in six villages of Kenya and the Philippines in 2023 and 2024. The guide is shared in the spirit of nurturing further “bottom-up” action learning on social equity and climate adaptation. This publication provides an interim version while a fuller methodology guide is in process.