Pacific Adaptation to Climate Change

Seminar paper from the year 2013 in the subject Politics - International Politics - Topic: Development Politics, grade: A-, University of Miami (Department of International Studies), course: The Role of Foreign Aid in Development, language: English, abstract: This works sets out to place climate change in the context of its contemporary consequences by reference to the Pacific Adaptation to Climate Change program (PACC). This is important because, contrary to conventional discourse, complications and damages caused by climate change have already started to materialize. The PACC program will thus be outlined against the backdrop of this particular condition. There will be a description of PACC's intended outcomes as well as of its stated priorities, which will both be related to the countries' problems vis-à-vis climate change. Moreover, the funding mechanism underlying PACC will be delineated, providing an indication in terms of the United States' financial involvement. The theoretical framework employed to situate PACC from the perspective of the United States will focus on a three-dimensional approach featuring diplomacy, security and humanitarian concerns, which all have interlocking implications. Since the PACC countries do not constitute a significant economic region, commercial imperatives were discarded. However, it is apparent that the PACC program could function as a pilot project in terms of improving climate change resilience, which may then be applied elsewhere. Therefore, it may have a wider significance with regard to the relationship between climate change and development.