PI: Cristina-Ioana Dragomir, Clinical Assistant Professor, New York University, Global Liberal Studies
Grant Amount: $2,500
Project Abstract: Twenty years ago, United Nations declared that natural disasters have a disproportionate impact on women. When communities are hit, many are forced to move. But often, the most marginalized members, especially women and girls, are not able to leave, and face multiple crises: environmental, sexual violence and exploitation. This project interrogates the intersection between environmental changes/catastrophes, gender and mobility. It looks at who moves, who stays, how are decisions made, and how they impact women and girls. Specifically, it seeks to answer: how are women from marginalized communities, like the Roma (Romania) and Adivasi (India), impacted by both environmental disasters and patterns of mobility?
To address this, I initiated a feasibility study in Roșia Montană, Romania and Tamil Nadu (Cauvery Delta)/West Bengal (Ghoramore), India where environmental challenges (floods and soil degradation) have been connected to poverty increase, farmers’ suicide and migration. However, to date, we have limited gender desegregated data of these phenomena. Similarly, although questions of gender rights have been articulated from many perspectives, rarely are they presented alongside joint imperatives of environmental challenges, with a focus on protecting women and girls, and their freedom of movement (or staying). I envision this work as a part of a large research project designing a risk-informed, gender sensitive platform, applying and analyzing vulnerability (individual sector and multisector), hazard exposure (individual-hazard and multihazard), and mobility/displacement data.