Part II: Sociological Perspectives on the Impacts of
Global Climate Change
A central finding of sociology is that unequal
power dynamics shape patterns of social
mobility and access to social, political, and
economic resources. An understanding of
inequality is one of the most powerful tools
that sociologists can bring to the study of
global climate change. It is widely documented
that the effects of global climate change will
not be equally distributed around the world,
and many of the countries least responsible
for the rise in greenhouse gases will be most
likely to feel its impacts in changes in weather,
sea levels, human health costs, and economic
hardships. These inequalities will be further
exacerbated by the unequal burdens inflicted
by climate-related disasters and limited disaster
response capacities. One important predicted
outcome of climate change is human migration
out of poorer regions and countries into more developed, less impacted areas; this environmental migration has
the potential to strain the resources and social fabrics of receiving societies and deplete the human capital in
sending communities. Variations in individual, community, and national vulnerability to the impacts of climate
change are only part of the structure of inequality in global climate change. As the 2007 IPCC report notes, there
is an unequal distribution of impacts and vulnerabilities to climate change associated with social class and age in
both developed and developing countries.^21 Furthermore, there is inequality between women and men, adults and
children, and present and future generations. The quest for prosperity drives the rapid economic growth of large
countries like China and India without whose cooperation, global mitigation efforts will fail. The unequal impacts
of climate change are coupled with inequalities of representation in global and national policy-making arenas
leaving global climate change policy efforts open to charges of bias. Below is a summary of sociological research
areas elucidating the link between social inequalities and the impacts of global climate change and promising
areas for future research.
(^21) “...vulnerability to climate change can be exacerbated by other stresses. These arise from, for example, current climate hazards, poverty
and unequal access to resources, food insecurity, trends in economic globalisation, conflict and incidence of diseases such as HIV/AIDS.”
IPCC, Climate Change 2007: Synthesis Report, Summary for Policymakers, p. 14.
Part II: Sociological Perspectives of the Impacts
of Global Climate Change