On July 4th weekend, devastating flash floods ripped through south Central Texas, resulting in the deaths of over 100 people, including at least 27 children at a summer camp. As the news media profiled the survivors’ families and speculated on the factors leading up to this loss of life, Elliot Ramo, a researcher on our Landscaping and Assessment team, decided to zoom out and take a broader look. They embarked on a rapid narrative landscaping project to surface the harmful and helpful narratives that emerged in the aftermath of the disaster and produced a deck with their findings, which is viewable here. While our research generally spans two months and includes a survey of scholarly research and interviews with individuals with relevant lived experience, the scope of this analysis was more narrow, given our focus on immediate responses to the floods. We encourage those who want to delve deeper into climate justice narratives to note and start by referencing the work of Black and Indigenous organizers who have produced some of the most well-developed justice narratives on these issues.
For climate and immigrant justice organizers, climate catastrophe and democratic decline are deeply intertwined, since the aftermath of a climate catastrophe historically has brought on a flurry of policy proposals that chip away at healthcare, housing, voter rights, and more for the communities most impacted. Perhaps no phrase encapsulates the twin crises of climate catastrophe and the not-so-gradual decline of U.S. democracy than the phrase “flooding the zone.” It evokes images of communities, surrounded like tiny islands, by debris and turbid water after hurricanes, tornadoes, storm surges, and more. Terms such as “flood zone” helped map out potential sites of damage, so communities might flee to safety, if possible. But mapping flood zones is only possible with a functioning, well-staffed and appropriately resourced National Weather Service. Providing shelter and aid for communities in flood zones is only possible with FEMA, or at least some form of federal funding that is prompt, nonpartisan, and distributed directly to those most in need. Eight months into the current administration, our federal response to climate disasters is halting at best, and our National Weather Service has been reeling from a different catastrophe. Which leads us to the phrase “flooding the zone.” Itself and its current connotation in politics: to overload the media system with an onslaught of aggressive, controversial policy decisions and an endless misinformation, making it difficult, if not impossible, to mount an effective response.
This analysis is part of Narrative Initiative’s ongoing work to catalyze alignment of climate and immigration movement communicators – specifically around narrative interventions on climate-based migration and climate resilience.
Our climate-related narrative work is carried out in coordination with other trusted movement actors, including National Partnership for New Americans, which leads in organizing climate and migration movement constituencies, and the Just Solutions Collective, which leads on policy work in this area.
Based on our analysis, here are some of the helpful narratives that emerged in the aftermath of the Texas floods:
-
Climate catastrophe and its solutions require holistic investments:
Some examples of proposed solutions cited in the data include: Community engagement and mutual aid (education on flood risks, public forums to share ideas, promoting mutual aid network); mitigation strategies (floodplain management, infrastructure projects (e.g., drainage), wetlands preservation); migration and mobility (managed retreat, compensation for relocation, flood-proof community development).
- Accountability is key to recovery: To heal from tragedy, repair damage to infrastructure, and restore communities’ faith in governing bodies and civic institutions, leaders must take accountability in the form of targeted, long-term solutions. Survivors of disaster have the right to hold elected officials accountable for harm caused by their negligence.
- Climate-driven migration is happening: Climate-based migration is not a distant threat; it’s not something happening exclusively in low-lying areas and remote islands. Climate-driven migration is real, it is happening, and even areas such as Ashville, NC and rural Texas are affected.
- There is an urgent, ethical, and moral need for action.
Regardless of our differing beliefs on climate science, our communities are suffering. People in positions of authority have a moral and ethical obligation to invest in solutions now.
- Emergency alerts are a short-term solution; we need more than that.
While emergency alerts are important, long-term solutions will help strengthen communities and build climate resilience.
- Climate resilience presents opportunities to rethink American ideals.
Building climate resilience is not only about infrastructural improvements that manage emergencies and mitigate risks but also about interpersonal and social changes within communities. This presents an opportunity to rethink “traditional” American ideals such as individualism, meritocracy, scarcity, and deservingness.
Climate justice and civic engagement towards a true, pluralistic democracy are inextricably linked. Our efforts to organize toward narrative power in one arena necessarily implicates the other. Although the challenges are immense, awareness of the narrative landscape can yield a stronger, more robust organizing strategy.
