Like climate change more broadly, El Niño phenomena rarely act as direct sources of insecurity. Instead, they interact with existing economic, social and governance pressures, amplifying pre-existing vulnerabilities, write Jamie Tarawa and Will Carter.

As the world and Pacific brace for an expected “very strong” El Niño, the region faces challenges. The likelihood of significant climate disruption is increasingly clear, yet it remains difficult to predict where the most severe impacts will be felt.

The lessons from recent events caution that there is no single Pacific experience of El Niño, and that the region should expect a shifting geography of risk as human security, essential services and state capacity come under pressure.

What can be learned from past El Niño-induced climate insecurity?

The El Niño in 2015-16 followed a recognisable Pacific pattern. Papua New Guinea experienced drought, frost and crop losses, with an estimated two million people affected by critical food and water shortages. Conditions in Vanuatu worsened pressures on food gardens and water systems. Fiji, Samoa, Tonga and FSM also experienced drought, while the Marshall Islands declared an emergency. Water rationing, saline groundwater, sanitation risks, food-price pressure and costly relief followed across the region.

Yet even this ‘classic’ El Niño event, which typically leads to warming oceans in the eastern equatorial Pacific, was not uniform. Sea levels fell across much of Micronesia, exposing reefs and adding to bleaching stress, while the central Pacific experienced higher seas, inundation and erosion.

Cyclones Pam in Vanuatu, Winston in Fiji and Maysak in FSM compounded losses during the same El Niño-related impacts, illustrating how these hazards can interact and accumulate. These cyclones added to existing demands on communities, infrastructure and public services.

The 2023-24 event reinforced just how difficult El Niño impacts can be to anticipate.

Despite being a strong oceanic event, its atmospheric expression was unusual.

Some countries were in drought, while others experienced flooding and excess rainfall. Kiribati, for example, recorded above-normal rainfall, while other parts of the same region faced water shortages. More than 21,000 people needed urgent water and food assistance as a result of drought in Pohnpei, Yap and Chuuk. And in the Marshall Islands, more than 5,200 people across 15 atolls or islands were affected when storm surges flooded northern islands.

What do previous El Niño events tell us?

The first lesson is that El Niño redistributes security pressure and creates a shifting, uneven geography of risk. The experiences of the 2015-16 and 2023-24 events suggest there is no single Pacific experience of El Niño. A stronger El Niño increases the likelihood of significant climate anomalies but does not specify their location or character. General preparedness and adaptive management are important.

Secondly, important security risks lie in how pressures cascade and interact between systems. A drought may begin as a water problem, but quickly become an energy, food or fiscal challenge. Empty tanks force desalination; desalination needs power and maintenance; power needs fuel; fuel must arrive through distant ports; and high operating costs compete with health and education budgets. Crop losses increase reliance on imported foods.

Yet these cascading pressures do not have uniform consequences. Their significance depends on the conditions already in play, including economic pressures, existing inequity, political dynamics, social cohesion and the legacies of previous shocks.

A third lesson is the way in which climate impacts and security pressures can surface on different timelines. By the time an El Niño has officially weakened, some of its most consequential impacts may only be beginning to emerge. The impact of agricultural losses may later be felt as pressure on household income and food prices. Fiscal costs also accumulate as governments subsidise utilities, import supplies, support affected communities and defer other spending.

The official end of an El Niño can come before the most difficult period for households, ministries and national budgets.

A more complicated 2026-27 map

The United States’ National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration puts the chance of a strong El Niño emerging later this year and persisting into early 2027 at 90 per cent. What is less certain is where the impacts will be felt hardest in the Pacific, and how these will interact with the current strategic context.

The Pacific enters this period against a backdrop of geopolitical uncertainty, rising costs and constrained public finances. Recent disruptions due to the Strait of Hormuz, for example, offer a reminder of how quickly events far afield can create localised pressures.

Some parts of the region are still recovering from previous shocks. In Solomon Islands, communities and government agencies are grappling to manage recovery needs associated with Cyclone Maila. Acute water and food security challenges persist, with many internally displaced, and the broader economy is vulnerable to higher fuel costs and future climate shocks.

The political calendar also raises the stakes. Citizens of Fiji, FSM and Papua New Guinea will head to the ballot box over the next 12 months. Disruptions to transport, power, water or service delivery may place additional pressure on institutions already managing politically sensitive periods, and where public confidence and government responsiveness are of utmost salience. Evidence suggests that hazards can disrupt campaigning, voter access, polling and counting.

If previous El Niño events taught us that risk emerges unevenly and cascades across interconnected systems, the lesson for 2026-27 may be that risks are also increasingly likely to converge.

Where do these lessons leave us?

If climate shocks increasingly interact with food systems, livelihoods, energy security, fiscal pressures, politics and social cohesion, as the forthcoming El Niño may well demonstrate, then investments designed to build resilience should account for, and aim to prevent, these intersecting impacts.

The Pacific Resilience Facility (PRF) presents an opportunity to think and act beyond traditional models of disaster preparedness and recovery.

Pre-COP31 in Fiji and Tuvalu, and the launch and capitalisation of the PRF, coincide with this live stress test. The opportunity and challenge for Pacific leaders, among many demands, is whether national systems can act on uncertain but actionable forecasts, and whether regional institutions can support different emergencies simultaneously.

A serious security posture could track where pressure is accumulating, identify dependencies and vulnerabilities through which disruption might cascade across sectors, and recognise that climate hazards and security pressures often operate on different timelines, requiring support long after the initial shock has passed.

The impending El Niño will not be the last. Opportunity lies in ensuring the Pacific emerges better prepared for a future in which climate-related security risks are becoming more frequent, complex and consequential.

Jamie Tarawa is the UNDP Climate Security Advisor to the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat, seconded via the UN Climate Security Mechanism.

Will Carter is a climate adaptation and aid worker with more than 16 years of experience in both fragile and climate-vulnerable settings.

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Views expressed via the Pacific Wayfinder blog are not necessarily those of the Pacific Security College. Read our publishing policy.

As a Pacific Islander and ni-Vanuatu, I know how climate change affects our communities. The worst climate threat I have personally experienced was when category 5 Cyclone Pam struck Port Vila in 2015. Facing the cyclone and living through its aftermath were terrifying and desperate experiences.

Cyclone Pam caused about US$449 million in damages in Vanuatu, while the damage bill from Cyclone Harold in April 2020 was between US$408-525 million in Vanuatu, and more than US$291 million across Tonga, Fiji and Solomon Islands.

But a sole focus on the numbers can obscure the real-life consequences of climate change, which has created both hardship and resilience across Pacific communities.

Climate change affects behaviour and causes emotional stress, which generates frustration over the slow pace of global climate action. Many young people have grown up facing constant climate threats and their related traumas. Adaptation and resilience measures are extremely costly for communities whose livelihoods rely primarily on small scale agriculture and subsistence farming, noting that in the case of Vanuatu, more than 70 per cent of the population lives in rural parts of the archipelago.

Meanwhile, many Pacific economies remain trapped in a cycle of rebuilding after repeated disasters. In the early weeks of March this year, Vanuatu responded to three disasters: the eruption of the Manaro Voui volcano on the island of Ambae, flooding in Port Vila and damages caused by Tropical Cyclone Urmil.

Looking for a change of direction

As climate impacts intensify, Pacific states have increasingly questioned the effectiveness of existing United Nations frameworks. While the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) has progressed in negotiating climate action under the Paris Agreement, it has limitations in enforcing commitments and ensuring real reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, which is the dominant cause of global warming.

In 2019, Pacific law students at the University of the South Pacific’s Emalus Campus in Port Vila began reflecting on these challenges. They proposed seeking an Advisory Opinion from the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to clarify states’ obligations under international law to protect the climate system for present and future generations.

The students and Pacific youth more broadly recognise a gap between the urgency of the crisis and the slow pace of the international response, in contrast to increased global military spending and fossil fuel investments and subsidies.

Collective action: politics, diplomacy and civil society

These frustrations led Pacific students to explore new avenues for climate accountability. When they presented their proposal to Honorable Ralph Regenvanu, then Minister of Foreign Affairs of Vanuatu, the government took the initiative seriously and supported efforts to seek clarity from the ICJ.

The ICJ initiative quickly became a unifying national effort across Vanuatu. It brought together the government and opposition, the Head of State, civil society, churches and citizens throughout the process.

Students formed a new organisation, Pacific Island Students Fighting Climate Change, to partner with the Pacific Islands Climate Action Network, and used their network to amplify the call for support globally.

Vanuatu worked closely with regional and international partners to build political and diplomatic support and momentum.

The road to the ICJ

On 29 March 2023, the draft resolution co-sponsored by 132 countries was presented to the United Nations General Assembly and unanimously adopted.

This decision was celebrated as a significant achievement for Vanuatu and its partners. It also marked the start of the next stage of the ICJ campaign, as Vanuatu began to build its case.

It worked tirelessly with regional partners to organise writeshops that guided the preparation of written submissions during the Court’s oral proceedings. This was a critical and decisive step, as it helped ensure that more submissions were made in support of the case than against it, and that these submissions were factual and reflecting the climate impacts experienced.

A record-breaking 91 written statements were submitted to the court by states and international organisations, followed by 62 written comments responding to those statements. During the hearings, 96 states and 11 international organisations presented oral statements.

The court delivered its landmark advisory opinion on 23 July 2025, adopted unanimously by its 15 judges.

The advisory opinion affirmed that climate change constitutes an urgent and existential threat caused by human activities and clarified that states have binding legal obligations under international law to prevent, mitigate, and remedy harm to the climate system.

The Court emphasised that states must act with due diligence, cooperate in good faith, regulate harmful activities (including those of private actors), and align their actions with the best available science. It further established that failure to meet these obligations may constitute an internationally wrongful act.

Uniting for the fight ahead

For vulnerable communities, the opinion represents an important step towards climate justice. Although it is not legally binding, it carries significant moral and normative authority that may influence international law and global climate governance.

The journey to the decision also holds lessons for future climate action.

The success of the ICJ initiative is a testament to the joint efforts of political leadership, diplomatic and civil society engagement, and the contributions of dedicated individuals throughout the process.

The initiative embodies the voice of communities seeking clarity and accountability in addressing climate change and could be understood as an expression of impatience and frustration over the slow pace of climate action.

The collective effort behind the campaign sets an important precedent and provides a pathway that could be followed to advance future climate priorities, noting the current global movement around the energy transition, the fossil fuel treaty initiative and the criminalisation of ecocide.

The unanimous support of the UN General Assembly and the majority decision of the judges of the ICJ demonstrate growing global recognition that states have legal responsibilities to comply promptly with their international obligations in addressing climate change.

While writing this piece, Vanuatu and its partners are working on a follow-up resolution seeking the Assembly’s endorsement for implementing the opinion. While it has already received pushback from the United States, it is a critical step forward for the urgent task at hand: elevating climate actions and securing climate justice.

Kemson Tavdey was a participant in the Pacific Security College’s Pacific Visitorship Program. He is a Climate Diplomacy Coordinator and former Regional Cooperation Coordinator at the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation in Vanuatu. His views are his own.

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Views expressed via the Pacific Wayfinder blog are not necessarily those of the Pacific Security College. Read our publishing policy.

In Vanuatu, security can no longer be defined solely through traditional notions of defence and law enforcement. The country’s long-term stability increasingly depends on its capacity to adapt to climate change, protect vulnerable communities, and strengthen resilience at both national and local levels.

Vanuatu has had a national security strategy since 2022, which traditionally focuses on state-centred security concerns. Yet in Vanuatu’s context, climate change increasingly shapes national security outcomes by intensifying natural hazards, disrupting economic activity, placing pressure on critical resources, and threatening the long-term viability of coastal communities.

While several national frameworks – including the Climate Change and Disaster Risk Reduction (CCDRR) Policy 2022-2030, the Vanuatu National Adaptation Plan and sectoral policies on food and water security – address aspects of these challenges, they operate largely within separate policy domains. As a result, climate-related risks are often managed through fragmented approaches rather than through an integrated national security lens.

A stand-alone national climate security plan is needed to focus attention and harness resources towards the country’s biggest security threat.

Climate change as a threat multiplier

Climate change intensifies existing social and economic vulnerabilities across Vanuatu, posing broader risks to national stability and development trajectories.

The country has experienced increasingly severe tropical cyclones, prolonged droughts, coastal erosion and rising sea levels. Disasters such as tropical cyclones Pam in 2015, Harold in 2020, and the unprecedented twin cyclones Judy and Kevin in 2023 illustrate how climate-related events can overwhelm national systems and reverse development gains.

For example, the total economic impact of Tropical Cyclone Pam was estimated at approximately VT48.6 billion (US$449.4 million), accounting for both physical damage and economic loss. This represented 64.1% of Vanuatu’s gross domestic product (GDP), highlighting the immense scale of the disaster’s impact on the national economy.

Previously in my capacity as Director for Climate Change, I observed the extent to which climate-related loss and damages strain government response capacity. Over time, this repetitive pattern of damage, response and rebuilding has contributed to economic instability and reinforces structural dependence on external humanitarian support.

How a climate security plan could make a difference

Strengthening climate security requires coordinated national policies, community-driven adaptation strategies, and sustained regional and international cooperation. A separate strategy focused on climate security would support this by providing a coherent framework that aligns climate change, development planning, environmental management and national security priorities.

Such a strategy would strengthen coordination across government institutions, clarify responsibilities and ensure that emerging climate threats are recognised and addressed as core national security issues rather than isolated sectoral challenges. In doing so, it would better position Vanuatu to manage complex and interconnected risks while safeguarding the country’s long-term resilience, sovereignty and sustainable development.

There are three key areas where a national climate security plan could focus resourcing:

1. Human mobility, relocation and social stability

Climate-induced internal human mobility is increasingly common in Vanuatu as coastal communities seek to relocate to higher ground due to erosion, flooding and storm surges. While relocation improves physical safety, it introduces complex governance and social challenges.

Land in Vanuatu is predominantly held under customary ownership and is deeply linked to identity and cultural heritage. The movement of communities into new areas can place pressure on land arrangements and may trigger disputes between host and relocating communities. Without well-designed relocation governance frameworks, these tensions risk undermining social cohesion and community stability.

Climate change is also accelerating rural-to-urban migration towards Port Vila and Luganville. Rapid urban population growth has contributed to the expansion of informal settlements, where access to employment, housing, water and sanitation is often limited. These pressures increase social inequality and youth unemployment, creating further risks to social stability.

2. Disaster response and national security capacity

Disaster management is a central pillar of national security in Vanuatu, and places a high burden on national response institutions, including the National Disaster Management Office and sectoral ministries.

Strengthening disaster resilience through early warning systems, resilient infrastructure and local response capacity is therefore not only a humanitarian priority but also a strategic investment in national security.

The country requires hundreds of millions of US dollars annually to address the escalating costs associated with the increasing frequency and intensity of climate-induced disasters. Current estimates suggest climate-related loss and damage now exceed US$500 million per year (approximately VT59 billion), underscoring the severe and ongoing economic burden on the nation

3. Customary governance and community leadership

A national climate security plan must centre customary governance systems and community leadership, which provide local security. Chiefs, churches and community organisations play a critical role in managing land, supporting disaster recovery, and maintaining social order and cohesion during crises.

These local systems often provide immediate support during relocation processes, conflict resolution and social protection for vulnerable households. Indigenous knowledge also contributes significantly to climate adaptation practices, including traditional agriculture and natural resource management. Strengthening these community-based approaches represents an “inside-out” security model that integrates local knowledge with formal government systems.

Preparing for the opportunities and challenges ahead

Vanuatu’s experience demonstrates that climate resilience, social cohesion and sustainable development are interconnected pillars of security. As climate risks intensify, the country’s integration of traditional governance, community leadership and modern policy frameworks offers valuable lessons for the Pacific and the global community.

The 30th Conference of the Parties (COP30), held in Belém, Brazil in 2025, reinforced that without meaningful global action, the future stability of nations like Vanuatu is not only a development concern but a fundamental security challenge. Commitments to increase adaptation finance, a key outcome of the meeting, provide important opportunities for Vanuatu to strengthen resilience infrastructure and community adaptation programs.

A dedicated national climate strategy would help the country leverage these opportunities and translate high-level commitments into actionable priorities. It would also reassure communities that the government is proactively mitigating risk for vulnerable populations in the face of the country’s greatest security threat.

Mike Sam Waiwai is studying a Master of Climate Change Policy at the Crawford School of Public Policy at the Australian National University. He previously served as Vanuatu’s Director for Climate Change. His views are his own.

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Views expressed via the Pacific Wayfinder blog are not necessarily those of the Pacific Security College. Read our publishing policy.

While climate change is well-acknowledged as a security issue in the Pacific, the relationship between climate change and conflict is one that needs greater attention.

The idea that the impacts of climate change will create the conditions for conflict is an intuitive one. According to the International Committee of the Red Cross, 14 of the 25 countries deemed most vulnerable to climate change are mired in conflict. In countries such as Sudan and Syria, grievances over resource scarcity, loss of food and water security, loss of land and forced displacement appear to be key drivers of conflict risk.

The consensus among experts is that climate change acts as a ‘threat multiplier’ for conflict. If the underlying conditions for conflict – such as pre-existing inequalities, weak institutions and historical grievances – are already simmering away, the impacts of climate change may turn things up to boiling point. Recent research argues that the climate-conflict nexus is complex and context specific, with climate change contributing to conflict risk, but often via indirect pathways.

There is growing evidence that actions to mitigate and adapt to the impacts of climate change can also increase the risk of violent conflict and social and political confrontation. Such actions can aggravate existing grievances, limit access to land and resources, and impact negatively on human security. Political ecologist Kieren Rudge points to the presence of a military-adaptation complex in Guam, where the adaptation actions of the US military produced further ecological degradation and obstructed effective climate change action. Such evidence supports calls for mainstreaming conflict sensitivity and peacebuilding into climate policy and action.

Climate change and geopolitical conflict

The recently released UK government assessment on global ecosystems and national security found that cascading risks of ecosystem degradation are likely to include geopolitical instability, economic insecurity, migration and increased inter-state competition for resources. These findings highlight that we must look beyond local matters and also pay attention to the interactions between geopolitical conflict and climate change.

The 2026 Global Risks Report found that environmental concerns are being deprioritised in the face of declining multilateralism and geoeconomic confrontation. As former Fiji military Commander Rear Admiral Viliame Naupoto told the Shangri-La Dialogue in 2019, “I believe there are three major powers in competition in our region … there is the US … there is China [and] the third competitor is climate change. Of the three, climate change is winning”.

The transition to a post-fossil fuel world is deeply geopolitical, and mirrors the broader geostrategic tensions between China, the US and its allies.  The transition to a decarbonised world will rely on certain critical minerals, the geopolitics of which includes control over critical mineral supply and the processing and clean technology manufacturing.

Australia has taken legal action to challenge Chinese efforts to increase investments in its rare earth minerals industry. The thawing of Greenland’s ice is creating conditions for a ‘mineral gold rush’, which has prompted President Donald Trump to claim the US needs to own the territory to prevent Russia and China from taking it. The US-Ukrainian signed critical minerals agreement is also considered a tool for pressuring Russia into peace negotiations.

The weakening of the global rules-based international order is another geopolitical issue that impacts the climate-conflict nexus. As French President Emmanuel Macron observed at Davos, “a world without rules …and a world without collective governance means we are killing the very structures that enable us to address the collective problems the world faces, such as climate change”.

A peace-oriented approach

While there are documented cases of violent disputes associated with the impacts of climate change in the Pacific, new research on the climate-conflict nexus in the Fiji, Vanuatu and the Solomon Islands shows that neither temperature extremes nor climate-related disasters affect conflict risk. The findings suggest that the Pacific could be resilient to the climate-conflict nexus.

Pacific communities do have a long history of practicing cooperation and conflict resolution that have helped them deal with acute crises.

The Wokbaot wetem kalja project demonstrated how communities in Vanuatu maintain cultural safety nets through reciprocal networks. Through evoking historical customary relationships, communities evacuated due to volcanic eruptions on Ambae Island were able to access lands on neighbouring islands until it was safe to return.

Case studies on climate mobility in the Pacific show that collective resilience is a strength used to respond to climate change and to navigate immobility and mobility.

Recommendations emerging from these case studies include adopting a transnational policy approach capable of supporting communal and collective strengths, as well as maintaining cultural practices which contribute to collective resilience and wellbeing when staying in place.

At a bilateral level, the government of Fiji has offered land to other Pacific Island governments whose people may be forced to move due to the impacts of climate change, while the Falepili Union Treaty between Australia and Tuvalu is grounded in the traditional values of good neighbourliness, duty of care and mutual respect.

Traditional practices of promoting and sustaining peace are explicitly recognised in the recently endorsed Blue Pacific Ocean of Peace Declaration, in which Leaders committed to “cultivating a culture of peace grounded in the Pacific Way, drawing on the depth and diversity of our cultural practices and indigenous knowledge systems”.

Supporting and strengthening the integration of traditional Pacific conflict resolution practices into climate security priorities and existing regional peace and conflict mechanisms could be key to diffusing any potential climate-conflict nexus in the Pacific.

Perhaps the most important climate-conflict risk facing the Pacific, therefore, lies not with localised violence but with the geopolitics associated with the shifting global order and the energy transition.

While today’s geopolitical tensions are weakening the existing international rules-based order, including the Paris Agreement, we should acknowledge that this order has itself also contributed to these risks. Indeed, the Pacific Islands have an acute sense of the systemic violence and injustice of climate change and the climate regime.

As Vanuatu Minister Ralph Regenvanu commented during COP30 in Belem, “The UNFCCC process is a consensus-based process, and that is the problem with it…we’re seeing these people blocking progress for the entire humanity.”

In the face of this climate injustice, the Pacific has been leading the way in advocating for more ambitious climate action such as through Vanuatu’s successful bid for an Advisory Opinion from the International Court of Justice.

Therefore, addressing climate-conflict nexus may demand a well-thought-out engagement strategy that fosters Blue Pacific unity and connects with like-minded partners to rebuild the foundations of the multilateral system to meet the challenges posed by the climate crisis.

Timothy Bryar is the Programme Advisor, Climate Mobility at the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat.

Jamie Tarawa is the UNDP Climate Security Advisor to the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat, seconded via the UN Climate Security Mechanism.

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Views expressed via the Pacific Wayfinder blog are not necessarily those of the Pacific Security College. Read our publishing policy.

A decade after the Paris Agreement, global emissions continue to rise and the world is set to overshoot 1.5°C.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is clear. Even with rapid mitigation, ocean warming, intensifying cyclones and sea level rise will continue for decades, locking in profound ecological and social consequences for the Pacific.

Pacific leaders have long identified climate change as the region’s single greatest threat to the security, livelihoods and wellbeing of their peoples.

Recent climate security risk assessments across the Pacific show that climate change rarely acts as a direct cause of insecurity. Instead, it reshapes risk environments by interacting with livelihoods, land and ocean systems, social cohesion, mobility, and governance, amplifying vulnerabilities across interconnected dimensions of security.

In Papua New Guinea’s Highlands, climate-linked crop failures and environmental shocks are aggravating disputes over land and natural resources, particularly where service delivery is weak and social fragmentation is high.

In Tuvalu, salinisation of underground freshwater supplies, driven by sea level rise, is undermining water and food security, with implications for cultural continuity, identity and long-term habitability.

In the Republic of the Marshall Islands, declining nearshore fisheries compromise food security and livelihoods, increase reliance on imported food, strain customary governance and social cohesion, and reduce coping capacity during shocks, heightening risks of insecurity in coastal and atoll communities.

These challenges expose the limits of narrow security framings and point toward the need for a comprehensive understanding of security.

Climate change as a security issue?

Framing climate change as a security issue has increasingly been used to elevate political attention to its risk. By 2007, climate change was being debated in the UN Security Council. What started as an attempt to expand the boundaries of security to include environmental risks has helped elevate attention to the existential risks posed by climate change.

Linking climate change to ‘security’ remains contested for good reason. We must not underestimate the power of the word ‘security’. Security framing elevates issues, shapes what is seen and ignored, dictates whose fears matter, whose futures are negotiable, and which responses are considered appropriate.

These tensions are sharpened by a stark imbalance. Global defence spending surged to US$2.7 trillion in 2024 (the largest increase since 1988) while climate finance continues to fall short of stated commitments. Could even a fraction of defence spending, applied to climate action and resilience, be the most powerful tool we have for communities most impacted by climate change?

Either way, given the scale and pace of the climate crisis, some degree of securitisation may be necessary to overcome political inertia, provided it broadens rather than constrains what security is understood to protect.

The risks of a narrow security lens

There is a mismatch between how climate related insecurity manifests and how security risks are conventionally understood and managed through traditional security lenses. Many of the most acute risks, including slow onset environmental degradation, loss of livelihoods, climate-induced displacement, erosion of social cohesion, and governance stress, fall outside the traditional remit of security institutions.

When climate security is framed primarily around the protection of the state, it tends to prioritise instability, migration and geopolitical turbulence, while drawing attention away from the structural drivers of planetary heating, including high-consumption economic models, corporate power and militarisation itself.

An example of this is NATO’s 2022 Strategic Concept, which describes climate change as “a defining challenge of our time” and a “crisis and threat multiplier” capable of exacerbating conflict, fragility and geopolitical competition. It includes commitments to decarbonise military operations but remains silent on the broader political economic drivers of climate change.

A primary concern in the Pacific is that climate security viewed principally through traditional security lenses will sideline those most affected. Such approaches may mask the root causes of insecurity within Small Island Developing States (SIDS). And in doing so undermine more effective, context responsive pathways to climate resilience, peace and security. Or worse, recasting affected communities themselves as sources of risk.

Towards a broader understanding of security in the Pacific

The Pacific’s own Boe Declaration Action Plan (2019) illustrates a deliberate shift toward a broader understanding of security, explicitly recognising the multiple domains through which climate change threatens and interacts with Pacific societies.

Strategic Focus Area 1 positions climate change as a standalone regional security priority and adopts a broad set of referent objects, spanning state security (sovereignty and maritime zones), human and community security, environmental concerns, and cultural and ontological security grounded in relationships between people, land and ocean.

Climate security also features indirectly in Strategic Focus Areas 2 and 3, particularly through commitments to livelihoods, wellbeing and disaster response. Strategic Focus Area 3, through environmental security, addresses pollution, biodiversity loss, IUU fishing and illegal resource extraction as threats to stability.

Ontological security (present descriptively throughout but not explicitly stated) frames security around the continuity of relationships linking people, land, ocean, ancestors and authority. Insecurity arises therefore from disruptions to the social, cultural and ecological relationships through which identity, legitimacy and order are sustained over time. Scholars of Pacific thought describe this as a social world organised through connection rather than separation.

Ecological, and especially ontological, security struggle for traction precisely because they encounter the limits of state- based understanding of security. Accepting ecological and ontological security as key to climate security challenges a state-led, defence-focused view of climate security.

The Pacific’s broad understanding of security offers a model of global best practice for identifying and addressing climate security priorities in inclusive ways. While defence, policing and foreign affairs institutions remain important, climate-related insecurity in the region often emerges through land, ocean, water, livelihoods and social cohesion.

Effective responses therefore benefit from a whole-of-society approach, with stronger coordination across communities, customary authorities, climate and environmental agencies, local government, women’s organisations, faith leaders, civil society and the development community.

Where to next?

Taking a more comprehensive perspective to climate security also raises questions about tackling the structural forces of inequality and demanding justice (no small task!). The International Court of Justice Advisory Opinion amplifies what the Pacific has said for decades, declaring that climate harm engages duties under human rights law, customary law, the law of the sea and environmental law, and that failing to act with due diligence is not just negligent but wrongful.

Understanding the peace and security implications will help the region continue to strive for a proportionate response and provide a way to contextualise how climate intersects with the many structural inequalities facing SIDS in the region. Indeed, as UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres stated recently, peace with justice not only means peace between nations, but also peace with nature.

But it is also about charting bold, self-determined responses to impacts that are already unfolding, and those yet to come, through an expanded concept of security.

Pacific Islands Forum Leaders are clear that climate change is the region’s single greatest threat precisely because, as Rev Prof Upolo reminds us, it is a global multifaceted threat with multiple convergences across all other issues.

Jamie Tarawa is the UNDP Climate Security Advisor to the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat, seconded via the UN Climate Security Mechanism.

Timothy Bryar is the Programme Advisor, Climate Mobility at the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat.

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Views expressed via the Pacific Wayfinder blog are not necessarily those of the Pacific Security College. Read our publishing policy.

When the International Court of Justice (ICJ) handed down its advisory opinion on 24 July 2025, I felt a wave of quiet relief.

As someone who has been reporting on this story from the beginning, I knew how much thought, diplomacy and heart had gone into reaching this moment.

For Pacific Island nations, especially Vanuatu, the University of the South Pacific students and their legal allies, this was never about financial gain. It was about global accountability and affirming the Pacific’s moral and legal right to be heard in the climate conversation.

And yet, almost immediately, skepticism surfaced.

Some commentary questioned whether Vanuatu was simply seeking future compensation. This assumption is not only wrong, but also deeply dismissive.

From the start, Vanuatu and its supporters understood the case would result in a non-binding advisory opinion. But what they also appreciated is that legal opinions carry weight. And when that opinion comes from the world’s highest court, unanimously delivered by 15 distinguished judges, it holds even greater significance.

The ICJ bench included jurists from every continent, reflecting the diversity and credibility of the Court. Their unanimous ruling declared that states have obligations under international law, environmental law, and human rights law to prevent and respond to climate harm. It affirmed that failure to act could constitute a wrongful act, a phrase that will now echo in climate litigation around the world.

This ruling didn’t appear out of thin air.

This campaign, which began in a university classroom in Vanuatu in 2019, attracted extraordinary global support. In March 2023, 132 countries co-sponsored the resolution at the United Nations General Assembly, requesting the ICJ’s opinion. That alone was a diplomatic feat.

But what followed made history: 96 countries and 11 international organisations participated in oral proceedings before the Court. During the written phase, more than 150 submissions were filed, making this the most participated advisory case in ICJ history.

These are not the numbers of a fringe campaign. This was a coordinated, informed and well-respected effort backed by legal scholars, environmental scientists, diplomats and frontline communities.

For me, the ICJ’s opinion was an emotional moment because it affirmed what Pacific peoples have been saying for years: we are not invisible. We are not voiceless. And we are not passive. We are leading, even as rising seas threaten our homes, cultures and future generations.

This ruling is also a call to development partners and regional actors. Take the Pacific seriously. We no longer accept being managed or spoken for. The climate crisis is escalating, destroying homes, flooding ancestral lands and displacing our people. We need partnership, not paternalism.

The ICJ ruling is a springboard for the next chapter of climate justice. Even if some believe the legal route was idealistic or symbolic, it now forms a solid legal and moral foundation for the global climate movement.

What we need now are solution-based conversations, built on shared responsibility.

It’s also worth remembering that centuries ago, powerful nations left their shores to claim land and resources, calling it survival. Today, the Pacific is fighting to survive too. But we’re not claiming, we are protecting. We are using the tools of diplomacy, law and advocacy to safeguard our islands, our children and our future.

To reduce this powerful movement to a search for compensation is to misunderstand what justice looks like in the 21st century. This is not about money. It’s about truth. It’s about climate justice, sovereignty and survival.

And this time, the world is listening.

Florence Leah Lowonbu is a ni-Vanuatu journalist, currently based in Brisbane. She is an Australia Awards scholar supported by the Australian Government. The views and opinions expressed in this article are her own and do not necessarily reflect those of the Australian Government or the Australia Awards program.

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Views expressed via the Pacific Wayfinder blog are not necessarily those of the Pacific Security College.

This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0). Read our publishing policy.

In times of disaster and climate crisis, people with disabilities are often the first to be forgotten and the last to be helped. Despite facing unique risks, such as inaccessible evacuation shelters, lack of accessible information, and mobility challenges, persons with disabilities are still excluded from planning, response and recovery efforts.

This exclusion is not just unjust; it is a violation of fundamental rights. 

Inclusive disaster risk reduction and climate action is a right, not a privilege. The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) affirms this by requiring states to ensure the protection and safety of persons with disabilities in situations of risk, including disasters and climate change.

Community development must be shaped by the CRPD, not only to meet international obligations but to build truly resilient and just societies. Disability inclusion must move from tokenism to transformation, embedded in every stage of climate and disaster planning. 

Since 2020, Nuanua o le Alofa (NOLA), the national advocacy organisation of persons with disabilities in Samoa, has taken concrete steps to realise this vision. Through the establishment of its Disaster Response and Preparedness Unit, NOLA has played a key role in policy development, accessible communication and community capacity building, ensuring that no one is left behind in times of crisis. 

Living on the frontlines 

Across the Pacific, climate change is not a distant threat – it is a daily reality. Rising sea levels, severe cyclones, flooding and droughts continue to disrupt livelihoods and displace communities. For persons with disabilities, these challenges are multiplied.

Accessible transport is often non-existent during evacuations. Information on early warning systems is rarely available in formats such as braille, sign language or easy-to-read materials. Community shelters may lack basic accessibility features, leaving many behind in times of emergency. 

During one disaster preparedness training in a coastal village, a woman with a mobility impairment told us she was forced to stay behind during a cyclone because no one thought to include her in the evacuation plan. At another event, a blind man revealed that he relies entirely on family members for warnings – if they’re not there, he’s left unaware.

These stories are not rare; they reflect deep and widespread exclusion. 

In response to these urgent gaps, NOLA’s Disaster Response and Preparedness Unit has made a significant impact. The unit has influenced national policies to be more inclusive, strengthened partnerships with government agencies and local actors, and provided accessible trainings and resources.

More importantly, it has empowered persons with disabilities to understand and claim their rights, and trained stakeholders to identify and remove barriers in disaster and climate services. This model is showing the Pacific, and the world, what inclusive resilience truly looks like. 

The way forward 

Climate justice must be disability-inclusive. To get there, we must centre the voices and lived experiences of persons with disabilities. Too often, decisions are made for them rather than with them. Their expertise, rooted in daily experiences of navigating inaccessible environments, is invaluable in shaping effective, inclusive climate and disaster policies. 

Governments and partners must ensure persons with disabilities are not just consulted but are active decision-makers in climate and disaster planning. Consultations must be conducted in accessible formats and languages, and sustained beyond one-off events.

Emergency communication should be available in braille, sign language, audio and easy-read versions. Shelters, transportation and public infrastructure must be universally designed. 

NOLA’s work provides a practical, rights-based framework that other Pacific nations can replicate and adapt. Investing in organisations of persons with disabilities, such as NOLA, is essential to making climate action inclusive, sustainable and just. When we empower those most at risk to lead, we strengthen resilience for everyone. 

Now is the time to act – together, with and for persons with disabilities. 

Mataafa Faatino Masunu Utumapu is a prominent Samoan disability rights advocate and the General Manager of Nuanua O Le Alofa (NOLA), the national advocacy organisation for persons with disabilities in Samoa.

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Views expressed via the Pacific Wayfinder blog are not necessarily those of the Pacific Security College.

This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0). Read our publishing policy.