ABSTRACT
Nepal faces a number of broad and interconnected challenges to addressing human and ecological well-being. Climate change, demographic pressure, and weakened institutional capacity have exacerbated socioeconomic inequality within the country and have left rural and urban communities vulnerable to both anthropogenic and environmental stressors. While these challenges pose a threat to the security of the country, environmental and human security discourse is absent from the policy-maker arena. This chapter utilizes fieldwork experience and an analysis of peer-reviewed literature, government reports, and media articles to synthesize the broader environmental security context in Nepal and to examine four case studies that directly link environmental and human systems: Nepal’s decade-long civil war, waste management and pollution, natural disasters, and the Indian blockade. The cases illustrate how the degradation of the environment has weakened government capacity to provide critical services and has entrenched marginalized and low-income groups in poverty. The conditions facing Nepal mirror those facing other fragile countries around the world. Addressing broader security challenges in the South will require greater coordination between policy-makers, academics, and military personnel to promote climate-resilient development and to protect vulnerable climate “hotspots.”
