TY - JOUR
T1 - Racial formation, coloniality, and climate finance organizations
T2 - Implications for emergent data projects in the Pacific
AU - Anantharajah, Kirsty
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2021.
PY - 2021
Y1 - 2021
N2 - This commentary explores the potential consequence of latent racial formation in emergent climate finance data projects and draws from ethnographic research on climate finance governance conducted in Fiji. Climate finance data projects emerging in the Pacific aim to ease the flow of finance from the Global North to the South. These emergent data projects, such as renewable energy resource availability and investment mapping, are imbedded in the climate finance organizations that fund, develop, and use them. Thus, the commentary explores climate finance organizations through the lens of Ray’s (2019) theory of racial organizations, highlighting the ways in which important climate-related resources are mediated through racial and colonial schemas. The racial mediation of two key resources are spotlighted in this discussion: the finance itself and knowledge. Given that the Pacific region is at the coalface of climate change’s existential effects, the just allocation of resources is imperative. In interrogating the ways in which emergent data projects may deny these resources based on hidden racial schemas, the paper cautions against new and old forms of colonization that may be mobilized through even well-meaning techno-benevolent fixes (Benjamin, 2019).
AB - This commentary explores the potential consequence of latent racial formation in emergent climate finance data projects and draws from ethnographic research on climate finance governance conducted in Fiji. Climate finance data projects emerging in the Pacific aim to ease the flow of finance from the Global North to the South. These emergent data projects, such as renewable energy resource availability and investment mapping, are imbedded in the climate finance organizations that fund, develop, and use them. Thus, the commentary explores climate finance organizations through the lens of Ray’s (2019) theory of racial organizations, highlighting the ways in which important climate-related resources are mediated through racial and colonial schemas. The racial mediation of two key resources are spotlighted in this discussion: the finance itself and knowledge. Given that the Pacific region is at the coalface of climate change’s existential effects, the just allocation of resources is imperative. In interrogating the ways in which emergent data projects may deny these resources based on hidden racial schemas, the paper cautions against new and old forms of colonization that may be mobilized through even well-meaning techno-benevolent fixes (Benjamin, 2019).
KW - Fiji
KW - Pacific
KW - Racial formation
KW - climate finance
KW - data projects
KW - postcolonial
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85109029092&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1177/20539517211027600
DO - 10.1177/20539517211027600
M3 - Comment/debate
SN - 2053-9517
VL - 8
JO - Big Data and Society
JF - Big Data and Society
IS - 1
ER -