Climate Justice Collaborative Toolkit: A Community Co-Development Process for Addressing Climate and Racial Justice Needs

Massive gaps exist within and across climate efforts, which are often siloed, inequitable, and ineffective within and across local, national, and global community contexts. Climate justice was defined in this study as the need for activism and advocacy to address the disproportionate crises, impacts, and intersectional needs that communities experience due to climate crises. The intent of the “Climate Justice Collaborative Toolkit” and co-development process that I developed and examined in this dissertation was to improve intersectional collaboration, capacity building, and reciprocal agreements that would ensure better mitigation and adaptation of climate crisis events. The purpose of this study was to answer this research question: What are community participants' perceptions of this toolkit and collaborative co-development process for purposes of climate and racial justice? The purpose of this study was also to assess the impacts of the toolkit and accompanying process among members involved in climate justice and action groups, and develop case study stories to help revise and finalize the toolkit and surrounding co-development process for inclusive purposes. I asked these questions via a mixed-methods action research study, in which participants completed a pre-survey instrument, engaged in group orientations and toolkit meetings, participated in group leader interviews, and completed a post-survey instrument. Mixed-methods data suggested the near-unanimous need for greater participation, as well as representation, in climate efforts in order to create more equitable and racial justice outcomes. Additional findings involved to what extent collective groups, organizations, and other entities might better focus on the significant impacts of gender inequality within climate change crises. Another finding evidenced was that the toolkit was also used by participants as a decision-making system that helped enhance participants’ communication efforts and subsequent identifications of climate and racial justice issues, as well as potential solutions. Future iterations from these findings will include more detailed toolkit versions to effectively promote collaboration as linked to case studies presented as stories in the toolkit. This supports that a diverse range of community members’ lived experiences and intersectional issues considered in any climate effort can lead to more equitable, intersectional, and systems changing processes and outcomes.