Summary
Joshua Busby will talk about his new book States and Nature: The Effects of Climate Change on Security (Cambridge: 2022) and explore why climate change leads to negative security outcomes in some places and not others. He will draw from paired cases in his book, examining why drought led to famine in Somalia but not neighboring Ethiopia in the 2010s, why drought contributed to civil war in Syria but not neighboring Lebanon in the 2000s, and why Myanmar experienced such widespread mortality after exposure to a severe cyclone but neighboring Bangladesh and India did not in recent years. He will explore how state capacity, political inclusion, and foreign aid intersect to lead to different dynamics in different contexts.

Bio
Joshua Busby is a Professor at the LBJ School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas-Austin. In 2021-2022, he served as a Senior Advisor for Climate at the U.S. Department of Defense. He is the author of numerous peer-reviewed papers and think tank articles on climate change and security including his most recent book States and Nature: The Effects of Climate Change on Security (Cambridge University Press, 2022). He has a PhD in Government from Georgetown University.