CRRC, American Councils and ARISC are pleased to announce the 18th and final talk of the Spring/Summer 2024 Tbilisi Works-in Progress series!
The talk will take place in hybrid format in-person at CRRC Georgia and online.
“The Role of Climate Vulnerabilities on Post-Conflict Reconstruction and Peacebuilding: A Comparative Historiography of Georgia and Abkhazia”
Rowan Baker, Yale University
Wednesday, August 7, 2024 at 18:30 Tbilisi time (10:30 EST)
It has been over 30 years since the war between Georgia and Abkhazia. While the conflict itself is stagnant, the implications of unofficial peace are ongoing. To this day, Georgia remains the country with one of the greatest proportions of its population living in internal displacement, with those who have remained in Abkhazia without recognition in the global legal and economic system. This post-conflict instability has left both Georgia and Abkhazia’s population particularly vulnerable to climate change. Those displaced and those who remain continue to be more economically and infrastructurally susceptible to climate induced environmental shocks. This research begins to address the understudied role of climate and environmental vulnerabilities of both inter-state and inter-community peacebuilding and post-conflict reconstruction. Examining the historical underpinnings, community narratives, and inter-state dialogue leading up to the present, this study begins to employ a social constructivist approach to comparative historiography, utilizing community based oral histories, government and stakeholder interviews, and archival research to better understand the physical and mental realities enabling or prohibiting peace.
Rowan Baker holds a B.A. in International Development Studies and Russian Studies from UCLA and is currently pursuing a Master’s in Environmental Science at Yale University. Her primary interests lie at the intersection of political ecology, psychological anthropology, and comparative historiography. Rowan’s research examines the individual in community and state contexts, examining the mutually reinforcing interplay of the physical and mental processes of memory, emotions, and intergenerational transmission. Within the scope of these frameworks, her work at Yale addresses questions of displacement, environmental change, and resolution within the post-Soviet context, in particular between Georgia and Abkhazia, and Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. Previously, Rowan served as a Fulbright Research Grantee to Georgia, a Policy Fellow for the U.S. Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe, and Research Director for the Stanford U.S.-Russia Forum. She has spent over 35 months in Moldova, Kazakhstan, and Georgia as a NSLI-Y, Boren, CLS and Fulbright scholar respectively.
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Works-in-Progress is an ongoing academic discussion series based in Tbilisi, Georgia, that takes place at the CRRC office at Chavchavadze Ave. 5 and online. It is co-organized by the Caucasus Research Resource Centers (CRRC), the American Councils for International Education: ACTR/ACCELS, and the American Research Institute of the South Caucasus (ARISC). All of the talks are free and open to the public.
In observation of the spirit of the Chatham House Rule, the talks will not be recorded, and we courteously request that the other participants refrain from recording and/or distributing recordings as well. The opinions expressed in WiP talks are those of the speakers alone, and do not necessarily reflect the views of CRRC, ARISC or of American Councils.
