ABSTRACT
Indigenous Environmental Justice (IEJ) offers the necessary space and distance from which to examine the legitimacy, applicability, and effectiveness of dominant global and nation-state political, legal, and scientific mechanisms. It presents a decolonial way forward. This chapter takes IEJ perspective to reexamine climate change adaptation in Nepal. The chapter recognizes: (1) Indigenous conceptions of justice do not separate environmental concerns from spiritual ties to the land, mountain, air, and water; and (2) social, political, and economic survival of Indigenous communities are vital features of IEJ. It draws upon ethnographic insights on climate change activities and lived realities from the high mountains of Nepal based on fieldwork conducted between 2009 and 2023. The first part of the chapter examines Nepal’s core climate policies and reveals the development aspirations of the Nepali state’s conception of climate change adaptation and the future it envisions. The second part distinguishes institutional adaptation from the everyday adaptation at the local level in Khumbu. The chapter concludes that an IEJ-informed climate change policy would be built on the principles of relationality, respect, and reciprocity without ignoring the longstanding relationship between the place and its peoples.
