Rural Sociology 75(1), 2010, pp.

1–16
Copyright © 2010, by the Rural Sociological Society

Climate Change and Societal Response: Livelihoods,

Communities, and the Environment*

Joseph J. Molnar
Department of Agricultural Economics and Rural Sociology
Auburn University

Abstract Climate change may be considered a natural disaster evolving in

slow motion on a global scale. Increasing storm intensities, shifting rainfall
patterns, melting glaciers, rising sea levels, and other manifold alterations are
being experienced around the world. Climate has never been constant in any
location, but human-induced changes associated with greenhouse gases and
fossil fuel use are new and rapidly shifting conditions for rural communities
and regions across the planet. Rural sociologists have long been carving out
the contours of this topic through research on family well-being, rural liveli-
hoods, community, and the environment. Now climate change and subse-
quent policy responses present a new and fundamental source of social
change. The purpose of this article is to assess lines of research and theory
that consider and direct our understanding of the impacts of climate change,
the ways it might be mitigated, and the coping strategies of rural people and
communities that are both victims and perpetrators in the global realign-
ment. As climate-change impacts and policy responses begin to impinge on
rural populations, the first line of resistance and participation will be the rural
community. The distribution of rewards from climate-change mitigation is
broad and diffuse; the distribution of costs, compromised livelihoods, and
community disruption often is focused.

Climate change is advancing in most areas of the world, in ways that

feature increasing storm intensities, shifting rainfall patterns, melting
glaciers, rising sea levels, and other manifold alterations (Parry et al.
2007; Philander 2008). Climate has never been constant in any location,
but human-induced changes associated with greenhouse gases and fossil
fuel use are new and rapid sources of shifting conditions for rural
communities and regions across the planet (Bi and Parton 2008). Soci-
ologists have been slow to address the climate-change issue, due to the
geophysical nature of the problem and transsocietal nature of the
impacts (Buttel 2000; Freudenburg 1986; Perrow 1999). Yet societies are
responding, some are resisting, and some are caught in the middle. The
basic dilemmas of inequality that divide the planet also are defining the
struggles between and within nations over what the climate problems

* This article is a revised version of the presidential address to the 48th annual meeting
of the Rural Sociological Society, Madison, WI. I thank Linda Lobao and Peter Korsching
for helpful comments on an earlier version of the manuscript, and William Freudenburg,
Rabel Burdge, and Ken Pigg for advice and encouragement on many fronts.
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2 Rural Sociology, Vol. 75, No. 1, March 2010

might be, who is responsible, and who will take responsibility for address-
ing the problem (Kelly and Adger 2000; Yearley 2005, 2009).
Rural sociologists have long been carving out the contours of this
topic through research on family well-being, rural livelihoods, commu-
nity, and the environment (Beaulieu and Israel 1997), but it is the
work of Buttel and his colleagues that provides the foundational
context for interpreting the problem of climate change (Buttel 2003,
2004). Rural sociologists often articulate a commitment to influencing
policy and providing research that elucidates the dilemmas and possi-
bilities facing local decision makers. Yearley (2009) focuses on the
comparatively neglected role of the social sciences in projections about
climate change and about societies’ responses to changing climates
and related environmental phenomena. He argues for an approach
informed by social constructionism, and science and technology
studies. One of the challenges for sociologists will be to articulate and
measure the social mechanisms of climate change as they impinge on
communities and individuals (Gross 2009). Thus the sociology of
climate science constitutes an emerging sociological frontier (Adger
et al. 2003).
C. Wright Mills (1959) noted a difference between “the personal
troubles of milieu” and “the public issues of social structure.” As an
essential aspect of the sociological imagination, the distinction has rel-
evance to our thinking about climate change. Mills maintains that
troubles occur within the character of the individual. The resolution of
troubles properly lies within the individual as a biographical entity and
within the scope of one’s immediate milieu—the social setting that is
directly open to personal experience and potentially willful activity. A
trouble is a private matter: values cherished by an individual are felt to be
threatened.
Issues, in contrast, have to do with matters that transcend the local
context of the individual and the range of individual inner life (Morris-
sey and Reser 2007). Issues have to do with the organization of many
such milieux into the institutions of a historical society as a whole, with
the ways in which various milieux overlap and interpenetrate to form the
larger structure of social and historical life. Climate change as an issue is
a public matter: Some value cherished by publics is felt to be threatened
(Dunlap and Van Liere 2008). Often there is a debate about what that
value really is and about what it is that really threatens it. The climate-
change debate is often without focus if only because it is the very nature
of the issue, unlike even widespread trouble, that it cannot be very well
discerned in terms of the immediate and everyday environments of
ordinary men. Following Mills (1959), we can say that climate change in
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Climate Change and Societal Response — Molnar 3

fact involves a crisis in institutional arrangements characterized by con-

tradictions or antagonisms.
Dietz, Ostrom, and Stern (2003:1907) maintain that human
institutions—ways of organizing activities—often fail when rapid change
occurs. Recreancy has been used to describe the failure of institutional
actors to carry out their responsibilities with the degree of vigor necessary
to merit the trust they enjoy from society (Freudenburg 1992). Recreancy
may be manifested in critical incidents that test institutional capacities to
respond and anticipate the symptomatic events of climate change such as
those experienced by coastal Mississippi, Louisiana, and New Orleans
(Freudenburg et al. 2009; Laska 2009). Problems such as climate change
are at large scales, involve nonlocal influences, and challenge societies as
a problem of the commons (Adger 2006; Adger et al. 2005). Rural
populations often are closest to the manifestations of climate change, but
are physically and sociologically distant from the level at which institu-
tional solutions emanate (Agrawal 2001; Berkes 2002).
The purpose of this article is to assess lines of research and theory that
consider and direct our understanding of the impacts of climate change,
the ways it might be mitigated, and the coping strategies of rural people
and communities who are both victims and perpetrators in the global
realignment. I focus on specific manifestations of climate change in the
context of agriculture, forestry, and the environments of rural commu-
nities as central concerns of impact. Finally, I identify some core features
of several research fronts that engage rural sociology. The selective
review of the literature endeavors to bring social sciences perspectives
and new understandings about climate change into focus under the lens
of rural sociology and its disciplinary interests.
Climate-Change Basics
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (2001) is the central
clearinghouse for technical information about trends in temperature,
greenhouse gases, and glacial melting. The central focus of the panel’s
analyses is on the average temperature of the planet derived from large-
scale simulation models. Three different scenarios project that our
planet will heat up by another 1 to 2.3 degrees F by 2034. This is the same
amount of warming induced by the last 100 years of human activity, but
it will occur in the next 25 years. End-of-the-century projections are large
and unstable, so I focus on a currently living adult’s lifetime as a horizon
(Allen-Diaz 2009).
What is driving the rapid increase in temperature? Greenhouse gases
(GHG)—carbon dioxide (CO2), methane, and nitrous oxide—have
grown with the number of people on the planet, the number of animals
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4 Rural Sociology, Vol. 75, No. 1, March 2010

that emit these gases, and the surging use of coal and other fossil fuels.
Although the CO2 coming from new Chinese coal-fired electricity plants
currently coming online at a rate of about one per week is significant,
methane has a higher climate-impact multiplier, and agriculture around
the planet is a big part of the problem (Arnell et al. 2002; Cuéllar and
Webber 2008).
It is possible to compute a climate-change impact multiplier that
connects the addition of a new human being to the population, the level
of consumption at which that individual lives, and the relative conse-
quence of that new life for the health of the planet (Birkmann 2006;
Rayner and Malone 1998). Population numbers and relative affluence
suggest that consumption and climate impact are going in a worrisome
direction. The soon-to-be 7 billion inhabitants on the planet are projected
to level off at around 9 billion in 2050. The aspirations and needs of most
of the next 2 billion will be much higher than those of the population they
are joining. The surging rates of new demand on resources and atmo-
spheric systems are central sources of social change for the foreseeable
future.
Agriculture contributes to and can mitigate climate change in several
ways, but food and fiber production is also fundamentally affected by
temperature, rainfall, and seasonal variability. For example, producing a
kilogram of beef requires 15,000 liters of water, a resource that might
become limited in some areas due to climate change. In the United
States, Cuéllar and Webber (2008) estimate that livestock agriculture
produces over 1 billion tons of manure annually. Most of this manure is
treated in lagoons or stored outdoors to decompose. Such disposal
methods emit methane and nitrous oxide, two important GHG with 21
and 310 times the global warming potential of CO2, respectively. In total,
GHG emissions from the agricultural sector in the United States
amounted to 536 million metric tons of CO2 equivalent, or 7 percent of
total U.S. emissions in 2005. About 15 percent of the GHG from agri-
culture resulted from livestock manure emissions alone, with trends
showing this contribution increasing from 1990 to 2005. Cuéllar and
Webber (2008) conclude that limiting GHG emissions from manure
represents a valuable starting point for mitigating agricultural contribu-
tions to global climate change.
Farmers will have to respond to climate change and societal needs to
mitigate impacts. Farmers employ a range of specific coping and adap-
tation strategies to respond to climate shifts, some generic across regions
and some facilitated by specific local factors (Thomas et al. 2007).
As animal agriculture contributes methane, some governments
provide incentives for plant agriculture to capture emissions in order to
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Climate Change and Societal Response — Molnar 5

meet mandatory cuts in GHG outputs. The use of cover crops leads to
increased carbon storage, by as much as 2.3 to 2.9 metric tons per
hectare over standard farming practices (Allen-Diaz 2009). Plants
sequester carbon, but use fertilizer that releases nitrogen, another green-
house gas. So farmers are asked to capture methane, reduce nitrogen,
and keep carbon in the ground by growing plants. These measures
increase farmer costs and primarily benefit society, so government pro-
grams still in formation will provide incentives and technical guidance to
achieve the necessary reductions.
Recent and predicted increases in temperature will have major
impacts on where plants can be grown. Changing temperatures will also
likely shift the range of native and invasive plants and cause new prob-
lems with weeds and losses of familiar species. The Soil and Water
Conservation Society (2003) concludes that the magnitude and extent of
increased rates of soil erosion that could occur under simulated future
precipitation regimes are large. The changes in precipitation patterns
are occurring now. Agricultural practices may have to be recalibrated in
the light of evidence that the new climate regimes feature an increased
frequency of extreme events (Soil and Water Conservation Society
2003).
Initial thinking on rising CO2 levels projected a beneficial impact on
crop yields, but new research suggests that the effects of “CO2 fertiliza-
tion” fall off rapidly, an important implication for hunger and food
supplies worldwide. Bloom (2009:67) concludes that as CO2 rises, food
quality may decline without careful nitrogen management. Rising atmo-
spheric concentrations of CO2 could dramatically influence the perfor-
mance of crops. He finds that when C3-type metabolic pathway plants
(e.g., wheat) are grown under CO2 enrichment, productivity increases
dramatically at first. But over time, organic nitrogen in the plants
decreases and productivity diminishes in soils where nitrate is an impor-
tant source of this nutrient. Agriculture and the climate would benefit
from the careful management of nitrogen fertilizers, particularly those
that are ammonium based.
Shifts in seasonal rainfall patterns have important impacts on crop
and animal systems and the human populations that depend on their
reliable functioning. Unreliable rainy seasons disrupt planting and plant
growth, leading to food insecurity and famine in some cases. Water
harvesting, irrigation, and other coping strategies often are not directly
available to the small and medium-size farmers that depend on the
natural hydrological regime. There is a critical need to understand the
processes by which adaptation to global environmental change comes
about, and the implications of these processes for present-day vulner-
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6 Rural Sociology, Vol. 75, No. 1, March 2010

ability to these changes (Lobao and Boucher 1994). Adger (1999) argues
that such enhanced understanding informs both the scientific commu-
nity and policymakers of the underlying causes of vulnerability, and the
potential policy for ameliorating it.
The more worrisome concerns connect to rising temperatures.
Retreating glaciers and wider fluctuations in river levels have significant
implications for downstream irrigation systems and communities depen-
dent on water supplies. Glacial melting fuels important rivers, such as the
Ganges. When climate changes alter melting rates, the agriculture and
communities in the valleys and plains below the mountains must cope
with the new hydrologic regime. Irrigation schemes are one coping
strategy, but systems dependent on melt and buffered runoff present
challenges to the communities that use the seasonal resource.
At the moment, a number of significant rivers across the planet never
reach the sea (the Rio Grande, for a North American example). The last
glacier in the lower 48 U.S. states is disappearing at a rate that may lead
it to vanish within the next 25 years.
During the past century, changes in temperature patterns have had a
direct impact on the number of frost days and the length of growing
seasons, with significant implications for agriculture and forestry (Salin-
ger, Sivakumar, and Motha 2005).1 The main issue now is how to make
better use of the existing information and dispersion of knowledge to
the farm level. Direct participation by farming communities in pilot
projects on climate-forecast services will be essential to determine the
actual value of climate knowledge and to better identify specific user
needs. Old (visits, extension radio) and new (Internet) communication
techniques, when adapted to local applications, may assist in the dissemi-
nation of useful information to farmers and decision makers (van den
Ban and Hawkins 1996).

Adaptation and Resilience

Vulnerability has been conceptualized as a function of exposure to risk
and as an ability to adapt to the effects. Conversely, social resilience is the
capacity for positive adaptation despite adversity (Luthar and Cicchetti
2000; Tompkins and Adger 2004). The concepts of adaptation, adaptive
capacity, vulnerability, resilience, exposure, and sensitivity are interre-
1
Land-cover changes, changes in global ocean circulation and sea surface temperature
patterns, and changes in the composition of the global atmosphere are leading to changes
in rainfall. The new variability may be more pronounced in the tropics. For example, crop
varieties grown in the Sahel may not be able to withstand the projected warming trends and
will certainly be at risk due to projected lower amounts of rainfall as well (Salinger et al.
2005).
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Climate Change and Societal Response — Molnar 7

lated and have wide application to global-change science. In the context

of climate change, social resilience is the ability of groups or communi-
ties to adapt in the face of external social, political, or environmental
stresses and disturbances (Adger 2006; Norris et al. 2008). To be resil-
ient, societies must generally demonstrate the ability to buffer distur-
bance, self-organize, and learn and adapt (Tompkins and Adger 2004).
Some farming systems with an inherent resilience may adapt more
readily to climate pressures, making long-term adjustments to varying
and changing conditions (Salinger et al. 2005). Other systems will need
interventions to stimulate adaptation, particularly where pests and dis-
eases play an important role. Scientists have to guide policymakers in
fostering an environment in which adaptation strategies can be propa-
gated. The farmers themselves have indigenous knowledge that gener-
ates coping strategies that are not to be underestimated (Berkes,
Colding, and Folke 2000).
There is a clear need for integrating preparedness for climate vari-
ability and climate change. Resilience and how to increase the coping
capabilities of vulnerable communities is a central line of social science
inquiry (Berke and Campanella 2006; Birkmann 2006). In developed
countries, a trend of higher yields but with greater annual fluctuations
and changes in cropping patterns and crop calendars can be expected
with changing climate scenarios. Shifts in projected cropping patterns
can be disruptive to rural societies in general (Perarnaud et al. 2005).
However, developed countries have the technology to adapt more
readily to the projected climate changes. In many developing nations,
conditions of agriculture and forestry are already marginal, due to deg-
radation of natural resources, the use of inappropriate technologies, and
other stresses. For these reasons, the ability to adapt will be more difficult
in the tropics and subtropics and in countries in transition. Food security
will remain a problem in many developing countries (Sen 1981). Nev-
ertheless, there are many examples of traditional knowledge, indigenous
technologies, and local innovations that can be used to make farming
systems more resilient.
Before we can develop adaptation strategies, it is essential to learn
from the actual difficulties faced by farmers as they cope with risks.
Forecasters and rural sociologists play an important role in helping
farmers adapt and cope with the new vulnerabilities of climate variability
and climate change (Salinger et al. 2005).
Adaptation to the adverse effects of climate variability and climate
change is of high priority for nearly all countries, but developing coun-
tries are particularly vulnerable (Allison et al. 2009). New seasonal rain-
fall patterns, droughts, and typhoons directly threaten agricultural
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8 Rural Sociology, Vol. 75, No. 1, March 2010

systems and large populations in the tropics (Burby et al. 2000; Gallopin
2006). Capacity building must be integrated into adaptation measures
for sustainable agricultural development. Consequently, nations must
develop approaches that effectively focus on specific regional issues to
promote sustainable development.
McLeman and Smit (2006:217) review the widely used concepts of
risk and vulnerability as they relate to climate and weather hazards. They
find that government subsidization of insurance against risks associated
with adverse climatic conditions and weather events, such as flood
damage and crop loss, may lead to individual decisions that actually
increase the susceptibility of people, property, and economic activities to
those risks. The processes that give rise to this phenomenon are impor-
tant in understanding the vulnerability of human populations to climate
change.
This treatment of vulnerability compares with similar concepts in
insurance and risk management whereby events that cause loss are
known as perils, and physical conditions, such as climate change, that
increase the likelihood of a peril occurring are known as physical
hazards. Thus, crop and flood insurance are possible adaptive measures
(McLeman and Smit 2006), but these policy tools also have some unex-
pected effects.
Human behavior that increases the exposure of individuals to poten-
tial perils is known as moral hazard, depending on the intentions of the
person. Vulnerability consequently becomes a function of hazard and
responses taken to reduce risk (McLeman and Smit 2006). Subsidized
insurance might create a moral hazard in addition to physical hazards
such as short-term weather events and long-term climate change, result-
ing in a higher level of vulnerability than would otherwise exist. Thus
policy responses to climate change may have perverse consequences for
individual behaviors that exacerbate the problem the policy was origi-
nally intended to resolve (Roncoli, Ingram, and Kirshen 2001).

Rural Livelihoods and Climate Change

Since most rural communities are economically dependent on natural
resources, impacts from climate change on those resources will create
substantial challenges for residents’ and community well-being (Wall
and Marzall 2006:376). A fairly extensive literature examines the societal
impacts of climate change by endeavoring to describe and measure
vulnerability to shifts in rainfall and temperature. Allison et al. (2009)
find that vulnerability to climate change depends upon three key ele-
ments: exposure to physical effects of climate change, the degree of
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Climate Change and Societal Response — Molnar 9

intrinsic sensitivity of the natural-resource system or dependence on

social and economic returns from that sector, and the extent to which
adaptive capacity enables these potential impacts to be offset. There are
no objective, independently derived measures of exposure, sensitivity, or
adaptive capacity, and so their relevance and interpretation depend on
the scale of analysis, the particular sector under consideration, and data
availability.
It is also possible to consider the impacts of climate change on forest,
fishery, or other forms of resource-dependent settlements. Communities
with an employment niche dependent on a particular species of plant,
tree, or animal may lose the basis for their livelihood as the range of
its viability shifts to another altitude, opens up competition from a
competitor or displacing species, or causes the organism to disappear
altogether.
Lundmark (2005) examined two Scandinavian counties with the
expectation that a positive impact of climate change on annual increment
in forest growth would have positive effects on employment as well. This
positive relationship has not been found to be significant. The develop-
ment of forestry and related sectors has moved and is still moving toward
a more capital-intensive management. She concluded that this means that
the productivity rate of each worker is so high that the increasing amount
of harvestable forest does not involve employment of more people.
Davidson, Williamson, and Parkins (2003) suggest that northern
forest ecosystems are among those regions at greatest risk to the impacts
of climate change. The social dimensions of these communities indicate
both a limited adaptive capacity and a limited potential to perceive
climate change as a salient risk issue that warrants action. They identify
five features of forest-based communities that constrain the ability of
rural, resource-dependent communities to respond to risk in a proactive
manner. In particular they note the tendency of members of these
communities to underestimate the risk associated with climate change,
particularly in the face of multiple climate-change risk factors in these
locales.
Others assess whether forest-protection carbon projects can signifi-
cantly benefit local people. Asquith, Vargas-Ríos, and Smith (2002)
projected long-term positive impacts of a forest-based carbon-
sequestration effort in 56 Bolivian rural communities. They instead
found that certain sections of the communities are financially poorer in
the short run, but they nevertheless conclude that forest-protection
projects clearly have the potential to sequester carbon. They assert that
it is possible to protect biodiversity and simultaneously contribute to
sustainable rural development, but if projects really are to improve rural
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10 Rural Sociology, Vol. 75, No. 1, March 2010

livelihoods, they must be designed and implemented carefully and

participatively.
Discontinuities in the resource base can threaten incomes, food secu-
rity, and the basic identity of residents as the focal aquatic organisms,
trees, or plants become scarce or nonexistent. The anchovy fishery off
the coast of Peru, for example, ebbs and flows with the El Niño or el Niña
currents (Chavez et al. 2003). In turn, the feast and famine affects the
Peruvian fishing industry and the rural communities who depend on it.
More broadly, the anchovy are a key protein ingredient in many animal
feeds used around the world.
The most immediately vulnerable places from climate change are
coastal and insular communities that face long-term sea level rise,
increased frequency of flooding, and other manifestations of a destabi-
lized climate (Adger et al. 2005). Palau and Bangladesh are examples of
rural locales threatened by sea level rise, increasing storm intensity, and
flooding (Barnett 2001).
Recent evidence from ice cores and other sources suggests that ocean
pH levels are changing due to increased absorption of CO2 gas by the
sea. Increased acidity alters the viability of some aquatic species, while
others seem unaffected. In particular, the shells of some aquatic shellfish
are thinner than ever recorded, a condition attributed to increased
acidity (Chavez et al. 2003). The mechanisms of climate change are
manifold, complex, and still being discovered and understood. Climate
change may be considered a natural disaster evolving in slow motion on
a global scale.

Rural Sociology: Understanding, Anticipating, and Coping

with Impacts
Scientists from the geophysical disciplines address the social impacts of
climate change in the course of interpreting the implications of the
biophysical trends they observe. Urry (2000) argues for the increasing
irrelevance of societies per se in modern life, and climate change may be
an illustrative situation. Certainly the current impasses over the regula-
tion of GHG illustrates the impotence of individual nation–states in
solving climate change and how an individual nation–state in advancing
its economic growth can bring collective environmental peril.
Social scientists have considered the consequences of climate change
for industries, particular agriculture, food supplies, and the potential for
international conflict. Climate change is expected to lead to an increase
in the number and strength of natural hazards produced by climatic
events. Blanco (2006) examines organizational strategies for incorporat-
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Climate Change and Societal Response — Molnar 11

ing new understandings about climate into the design and implementa-
tion of local adaptation strategies, most importantly by boosting the
resilience of local livelihoods. She notes a need to bridge a gap between
scientific and local knowledge in order to create projects capable of
withstanding stronger natural hazards.
As impact scientists, rural sociologists tend to focus on the local: rural
communities, local food systems, and regional development (Burdge
2004a, 2004b). Community is the central focus and raison d’être of rural
sociology. Case studies, for example, offer qualitative understanding of
coping strategies and the macro social forces that disrupt or shift the
nature of local institutions. Van Aalsta, Cannon, and Burton (2007)
report an analysis of community risk assessments considering climate
change carried out by various national Red Cross offices shows that such
participatory exercises can foster community engagement in climate-
change risk reduction. They find that many strategies to deal with
current climate risks also help to reduce vulnerability to climate change.
A key challenge is to keep such exercises simple enough for wide
application.
Research on the rural and local impacts of climate change and how
rural communities respond to these increasingly recognized challenges
is a growing need (Morrissey and Reser 2007). The discourse and
vocabulary of motive associated with climate change is integrally linked
with policy responses and the social mechanisms of climate change
(Gross 2009; Mills 1940). Policies will shape technologies and land-use
patterns in ways that can directly improve the possibilities for livelihood
in rural communities. Carbon-sequestration facilities may provide new
sources of jobs for some communities. If rural lands become largely
passive sinks for CO2 from urban industry, then development of forests
and natural areas may become limited sources of livelihood from for-
estry and other otherwise renewable resource use. Policy analyses of
climate-change impacts from a rural perspective will become increas-
ingly significant as rural people and communities become central part-
ners in solving global problems (Berkes and Jolly 2001).
Milne (2007) argues for engaging rural women in climate-change
policy and strategy. She notes that some rural women are very active in
maintaining the status quo in rural areas and frequently fight environ-
mental activism that threatens traditional ways of life, while others are
environmentally active and committed to social change (Sachs 2005).
Milne observed women working across vast differences, learning from
each other’s experiences, and working collaboratively in the interests of
the community. She suggests that including rural women in problem-
solving and decision-making processes provides alternative and innova-
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12 Rural Sociology, Vol. 75, No. 1, March 2010

tive perspectives. Her core argument is that the diversity of rural

women’s personal identities, skills, and knowledge is one of their great-
est strengths. Their holistic and future-oriented perspective is central to
addressing complex social, environmental, and economic issues associ-
ated with climate change where innovative solutions are urgently
needed. Milne maintains that climate change is the most complex social,
economic, and environmental problem that will be faced this century.
She concludes that the voice of rural women in the climate-change
policy and strategy process not only ensures equity, innovation, and
access to situated knowledges but also goes a long way toward ensuring
the health of rural communities and peoples across the planet.
Many changes that will alter the conditions of rural livelihoods are not
direct consequences of temperature, CO2, or other physical conditions
but of the policy changes that are emanating from global and societal
regulation. Although climate change is the impetus, the most direct
force altering the conditions for rural livelihoods connects to the rules
by which animals are raised, crops are grown, or wood is cut.
The compromise of limitations and sacrifices to be made in the name
of climate change is the great moral and policy debate of our time (Kelly
and Adger 2000). Climate impacts experienced as personal troubles that
aggregate and transform into public issues may lead to support for policy
measures (Mills 1940), but the climate problem is most directly assessed
by repeated measures of melting glaciers and trends in climate data. The
distribution of rewards from climate-change mitigation is broad and
diffuse; the distribution of costs, compromised livelihoods, and commu-
nity disruption often is focused. The opportunities for institutional rec-
reancy through benign neglect or active exploitation of less-populated
locales in the conduct of climate-change mitigation are many.
Rural sociologists are participating in a new research paradigm that
extends beyond our traditional institutional niche in the land-grant
universities and the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Instead, politicians
and the geophysical science community that identified the trends and
causes in the first place have largely set the resources and terms of
engagement for climate-change issues.
There is also a rural sociology teaching dimension to the problem of
climate change (Maw 2009). Dramatic new policy environments seem to
portend fundamental shifts in the workforce that will require fundamen-
tal understanding of human and community processes (Burton et al.
2002). The sociological implications must be part of the curriculum and
career preparation process. Technical understanding of climate change
and impact mitigation can impel the implementation of creative, rel-
evant courses that address these issues. The social and community
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Climate Change and Societal Response — Molnar 13

processes of response to climate change will undoubtedly be a significant

source of vocations and employment in the years to come; rural sociol-
ogy has an important role to play in shaping and implementing the
instructional response to these needs.

Conclusion
One of the higher-order life goals for the sociologist might be to foster
the next generation by clarifying the context for life and coexistence. In
his essay “On Intellectual Craftsmanship,” C. Wright Mills (1959) simi-
larly suggested that our scholarship must respond to the moral argument
of our time. Clearly the largest and most compelling issue that will
reshape life on our planet is climate change, not only the process of
coping with what is occurring but also mitigating the human actions that
are making the problem worse. There also are second-order effects that
connect to the impacts of national-level policy responses on the liveli-
hoods of rural people and their communities. Rural sociology has an
opportunity and arguably a responsibility to make these matters a focus
of research and scholarly examination.
There is a broad stream of scholarship on climate change, but other
disciplines do not always possess the distinctive competence of rural
sociology to articulate the problems and perspective of rural people and
their communities. As climate-change impacts and policy responses
begin to impinge on rural populations, the first line of resistance and
participation will be the rural community. Our discipline may be opti-
mally situated to guide this dialogue with our research and perspective
on the local process of social change.
I have endeavored here to motivate, inform, and direct our research
tradition toward the problem of climate change. It is an opportunity and
challenge that we ignore at our peril of irrelevance. We may miss signifi-
cant opportunities for interdisciplinary collaboration, intellectual stimu-
lation, and funding. We face the challenge of learning the basic aspects
of the science of climate change, of listening to, learning from, and
sometimes guiding our geophysical colleagues. The integration and syn-
thesis that characterizes the rural sociological imagination will be tested
by the new thinking required to advance the science of human response
to climate change. The possibilities are many, the need is urgent, and the
potential of rural sociology to make a difference is immediate.

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