Religious Environmental Sensemaking in Climate-Induced Conflicts

This research article is about the African religious worldview in conservation of natural environmental resources using the Sengwer tribe as a case in point. The Sengwer are a hunter -gatherer tribe who inhabit the Cherang'any Hills forests in the northwestern part of Kenya. The current environmental situation in the area is worsening due to the destruction of the water catchment area, which threatens human existence in the region. Measures laid down by the government and various stakeholders to tackle environmental degradation have not yielded the expected results. This prompted research to ascertain the Sengwer religious worldview on natural resource conservation and the challenges they face in utilizing their indigenous religion to combat environmental crisis. The findings of the study established that the Sengwer religious worldview dovetails with environment conservation. The main components of the Sengwer worldview, the Supreme Being, ancestors, the universe, the community and their social system provided a framework for sustainable utilization and conservation of natural resources. The study identified the various challenges that the Sengwer face, and the measures they have taken to ensure that they can utilize their religion to tackle the environment crisis. This paper provides salient recommendations on how various stakeholders can partner with and utilizes the indigenous African religion in conservation efforts, and is expected to benefit government agencies, policy makers, and researchers in environment matters and religion.

African Journal of Biblical Studies, Translation, Linguistics and Intercultural Theology (AJOBIT), 2025

The coastal indigenous patches of forest serve as a testament to the role of Kauma Traditional African Religion in environmental conservation; however, colonialism led to the displacement of natives from their ancestral lands without considering their integrated resource management system. This caused a decline in their sense of stewardship for future generations. Colonial land policies exploited the political ecology of resource extraction, undermining Kauma culture and religion, and disrupting their environmental stewardship based on peaceful coexistence with nature. The Islamic sultan's rule had demarcated a ten-mile strip of coastal land for the sultanate, from where the British assumed the land was unoccupied, calling it "Terra nullius," or no man's land. Colonization silenced the voices of indigenous natives, which requires regaining control to protect the environment of Kauma land; however, this requires decolonizing environmental knowledge, as it depends on their stewardship for effective conservation. The study used cultural ecology theory. Globally, conservation agendas continue to dominate climate discussions, with mechanisms often unclear and driven by Western technocratic ideas. Worse, they tend to exclude local voices, offer limited economic benefits to Indigenous communities, and fail to address the root ecological damages at the local level. This gap is what the study aims to fill. It is the voices of indigenous peoples that require regaining and protecting their environment; however, this is subject to decolonizing environmental knowledge, philosophy, spiritual connection with nature, and community-based governance. This study will add to the ongoing decolonization of environmental knowledge conversations for effective addressing of climate change.

Livestock raiding has been a source of conflict amongst and between pastoral societies in Africa for hundreds of years. However, more recently, these raids have become more violent and have triggered much more organised retaliations. Many times raids themselves are perceived as motivated by ethnic dimensions. The following paper looks at tensions and conflict between Turkana and Pokot communities in rural Kenya. The paper first traces the historical context of cattle rustling and livestock raiding between pastoral communities within Kenya. It then identifies contemporary factors driving exacerbated tensions: access to resources, profiteering, and weapons proliferation. The paper further explores the systemic nature of the conflict through analysing livestock raiding as a conflict spiral dictated by negative reciprocal actions. The spiral is ultimately maintained due to mimetic violence structures that are in place. It then offers prescriptions and potential solutions to the conflict, which are centred on transcending the relationship from mimetic violence to mimetic peace and reconciliation. Ultimately, by empowering local pastoral communities in the form of multi-ethnic coalitions, and promoting broad-based interest groups, cultural transcendence can reverse the conflict spiral into a relationship of mutual reciprocity and mimetic peace.

This chapter explores the critical issue of climate change and its detrimental impact on peace and security in Northern Kenya. The region's fragile ecosystem and socioeconomic challenges make it highly vulnerable to the adverse effects of climate change. Disrupted rainfall patterns, prolonged droughts, and erratic weather events have significantly affected agriculture, pastoralism, and natural resources, leading to resource scarcity and intensified conflicts as communities compete for limited resources. These conflicts exacerbate ethnic and tribal tensions, threatening peace and stability. Climate change-induced displacement has emerged as a pressing concern in Northern Kenya. Desertification, prolonged droughts, and unpredictable weather patterns have compelled communities to leave their homes for alternative livelihoods and resources.

Religions: A Scholarly Journal, 2012

The worldview of a given people is a super structure upon which their patterns of behaviour are anchored because it is the ideological framework which underpins the way each society interprets and interacts with the world. In the case of the body of knowledge that is described as indigenous knowledge systems (I.K.S.), there is ample evidence that indigenous peoples in the world have a peculiar way of perceiving reality and this perception underpins their understanding and attitude towards human experiences including the environment. This paper contributes to the prevailing discourse about the usefulness or otherwise of I.K.S. to the conservation of the ecology. It examines the relevance of the indigenous spiritual lifeways and cosmovision of the Asante (also known as Ashanti) ethnie, in Ghana, West Africa, to ecological harmony and sustainability. It does so by exploring the Asante Sekyere community, which is a sub ethnic group of Asante. The study opines that Sekyere I.K.S. is rooted in an indigenous worldview which creates a link between spirituality and the environment. Nevertheless, this link, which aids the Sekyere to develop a strong affinity with nature and inevitably underpins their attitude towards the environment, has been weakened chiefly by the historic but prevailing phenomenon of Westernisation, because of the invasion of Western colonialism and its cultural ramifications.

Existing empirical studies indicate a considerable level of epistemological uncertainty concerning the rate and extent of climate change in the African region. In this regard, little research has demonstrated that traditional religious beliefs and practices can have an impact on environmental attitudes, especially; the relationship between African traditional religious persuasion and climate change attitudes given climate change is an emerging phenomenon. This is because African traditional religious belief systems and cultural practices directly shape public opinion, affects climate change policy in certain areas of traditional jurisdiction. The study therefore examined the role of Traditional African Religion practices among the Tiriki people of Vihiga County, Kenya in climate change mitigation. The methodology of this study was located within the framework for conducting empirical studies in Religious studies. The qualitative methods of collecting data was utilized, and since the scope of the study falls within the field of religion and environment, a brief history of climate change religion's entrance into attempt to address mounting climate change problems was provided. A Descriptive survey design was adopted where 10 key informants who are the custodians of the Tiriki culture were randomly selected from each of the seven wards (political units) of Hamisi constituency, the study area. Primary data was collected through oral interviews and focused group discussions. The study results revealed that since Abatirichi traditional religious and cultural practices are pegged on traditional forests as a place for their traditional shrines, home for their ancestors-'misambwa' and sacred trees, they are consciously aware of the harsh consequences of climate change like droughts, thus, unconsciously protect their traditional forests for fear of punishment from God or their ancestors-'misambwa'. The study concluded that, conservation of forests and bushes by Abatirichi is key to the preservation of their culture because the forests habour their spirits-'misambwa' and their strong protective herbs and sacred trees that are part and parcel of their daily life. That is, the Abatirichis' love for their traditional culture makes them preserve traditional and sacred trees and bushes which make them conserve forests, thus unconsciously playing a role in mitigating climate change

Scripta Instituti Donneriani Aboensis

Most of us are well aware of the environmental crisis of our day. Yet, scholars of religion or peace studies rarely consider en­vironmental issues when theorizing about violence. Why think about religion when we ponder environmental degradation? Religion provides a framework by which we can understand a group’s relationship to non-human nature and to actions on behalf of the environment. As is the case with human-to-human violence, religious ideology may also either encourage or discourage assaults on the environment. Taking religious traditions and actors into account, deepens our understanding of the contemporary environmental crisis and environmental struggles and movements, as is argued in this article.

2018

Pastoralists' communities in Kenya have been co-existed since their migration and settlement in the region. However, frequent conflicts have been experienced among these communities due to scarcity of natural resources and drought. Pastoralists in Kenya are concern with raising their livestock, moving the herds in search of scarce resources such as water and pasture. The root cause of pastoralist conflict in Kenya is scarcity of natural resources and drought. This has often been suggested to trigger conflict flare-ups and that there was a recent flare up in the year 2016. Many descriptions of the conflict suggest that drought is an underlying driver, however other factors have also been suggested, i.e., politics, availability of arms, cultural values, population, governance, and lack of income (Adano et al., 201. Hence this research project xii 1 CHAPTER ONE This chapter focuses on the background information about climate change and conflict in general. The second and third section discus the aims, objective of the studies and the research questions. The importance of the study is mentioned in the fourth section.

Journal of Studies in Social Sciences, 2013

The environmental crisis now encompasses the entire earth. Strangely enough, although the destruction of the sacred quality of nature by modern man dominated by a secularist perspective is directly responsible for this catastrophe, the vast majority of the human species, whether participating directly or indirectly in the havoc wreaked upon the natural environment, still lives within a worldview dominated by religion. The role of religion in the solution of the existing crisis between man and nature is therefore crucial. Furthermore, any discussion of religion and the order of nature, which is interested in healing the wounds of the earth and ameliorating the existing crisis now threatening man's terrestrial existence, cannot but take place on a global scale. In the same vein, there is the recognition that the earth is in danger from human activity and use and changes need to be made in order to sustain life on the earth. Most if not all of the environmental crises are caused by...

Journal of Peace Research, 2012

Many regions that are endowed with scarce natural resources such as arable land and water, and which are remote from a central government, suffer from violence and ethnic strife. A number of studies have looked at the convergence of economic, political and ecological marginality in several African countries. However, there is limited empirical study on the role of violence in pastoral livelihoods across ecological and geographical locations. Yet, case studies focusing on livelihood and poverty issues could inform us about violent behaviour as collective action or as individual decisions, and to what extent such decisions are informed or explained by specific climatic conditions. Several case studies point out that violence is indeed an enacted behaviour, rooted in culture and an accepted form of interaction. This article critically discusses the relevance of geographical and climatic parameters in explaining the connection between poverty and violent conflicts in Kenya’s pastoral ar...