Navigating justice tensions in managed retreat

Under intensifying climate change, purposeful permanent movement of people away from hazardous areas has gained salience as a possible – albeit controversial – adaptation strategy. Many people involved in this process, here called managed retreat, agree it should be “just”, yet agreeing on what justice means in practice is extremely difficult. Importantly, the researchers and practitioners framing, designing, and implementing retreat policies and programs have pluralistic visions on many issues relevant to procedural, distributive and recognition justice. To date, the resulting justice dilemmas have included five key tensions: whether retreat should always be voluntary or not, whether communities or governments should initiate, whether the most exposed or most historically marginalized should be prioritized, whether retreat is a net harm or benefit, and whether retreat should be a “measure of last resort” or not. Here we present the results of an empirical study of researcher and practitioner perspectives on these five justice tensions, drawing on focus groups, surveys, and discussions with 39 individuals professionally engaged in retreat research, policy, and practice. Participants’ views on justice tensions varied based on differences in moral reasoning, linked to personal traits (i.e., professional identities, knowledges, and values) and retreat imaginaries (i.e., the particular example a participant has in mind, including who and how wealthy a retreating person is, where and how they will retreat, and their historical relationship to place). We found researcher and practitioner views on justice in managed retreat are highly context specific, both temporally and spatially. We also found that when participants reflected on the context specificity of their retreat imaginaries and engage in dialogue about their moral reasoning with others, they become more open minded, see more nuance, and in some cases change their minds. Intentional reflection and dialogue making implicit perspectives visible can facilitate more transparent discussion of how to advance justice aims in retreat policy and practice.