Governing Pastoral Resilience: Climate Change and Uncertainty in Uganda’s Karamoja Sub-region

Abstract

Uganda’s Karamoja sub-region is an area heavily impacted by climate variability, resource competition, and environmental degradation, showcasing the adaptive capacities of pastoralist and agro-pastoralist communities. Moving beyond conventional narratives that blame rangeland vulnerability solely upon the extremes of environmental exposure, I employ a political ecology framework here to illuminate how ecological volatility follows from policy-driven structural shocks. In Karamoja these include state-led exercises of forced disarmament and forced year-round settlement. Macro-level governance and development programming have traceable effects in micro-level livelihood outcomes: in this region the measurable impacts include declining livestock productivity and increasing food insecurity. Simultaneously, increases are observed in local adaptability strategies; these include diversity of livelihoods, flexibility in grazing tactics, and variation in social networking. Apart from the obvious ways that uncertainty is propelled by climate change itself, it is important to focus upon the power dynamics, institutional factors, and pastoral economic structures that shape a community’s integrity and adaptability.