Peace and justice studies major Ilinca Drondoe ’26 has created a three-part speaker series, “Climate Breakdown and the War System,” which will be held first at Wellesley and a second time at UMass Boston. She says she hopes the series will “bring attention to the often-overlooked connections between militarism and the climate crisis.”
Drondoe planned the series during her internship over the past year with feminist scholar Carol Cohn, founding director of the Consortium on Gender, Security, and Human Rights and a lecturer of women’s studies at UMass Boston. When planning the lectures at Wellesley, Drondoe reached out to Catia Confortini, professor of peace and justice studies.
The series’ panelists will address connections between the climate crisis, militarism, and war systems over the course of three separate events (the first took place at Wellesley September 17). They will dig into militaristic history and its impact on Indigenous territories and environments; the relationship between militarization and colonialism; fossil fuel and mineral usage demanded by war systems; and more. The series “aims to equip Wellesley students with interdisciplinary insights to analyze these intersectional issues through feminist, BIPOC, and environmental justice frameworks, illuminating the systems driving ecological collapse and inspiring more transformative approaches to climate action,” Drondoe says.
Diana Ojeda, professor of geography and international studies at Indiana University Bloomington, will give the second lecture in the series, “Mangrove Defense: Confronting Militarization and Dispossession at the Frontlines of Climate Change,” on October 29 at 5:30 p.m. in the Pendleton Atrium. On November 12 at 5:30 p.m. in the Pendleton Atrium, journalist Todd Miller will give the final lecture “Climate Disruption, Migration, and the Rise of Walls.”
The first event in the series featured Tiara Na’puti, assistant professor in the Department of Global and International Studies at the University of California, Irvine, who studies militarism and sovereignty in the Pacific Islands, specifically Guåhan/Guam. Na’puti talked about the turmoil the U.S. military has caused in Indigenous communities, territories, and environments. She emphasized the interconnected stories of Guam, Okinawa, and the Mariana Islands, showcasing the active resistance of local people toward militarization. Light disturbance, noise and vibrations, and the destruction of ecosystems and sacred burial sites are examples of the range of abuses and human rights violations caused by the U.S. military, she said. To end that, Na’puti said, “[w]hat we need to do is decolonize and demilitarize, [be]cause we can do it.”
Drondoe says she hopes students will leave these sessions “with an understanding of how all these stories of environmental destruction are interconnected and a part of these larger systems. But also, how there’s so much resistance and solidarity interconnected, that we can learn from each other.”
“[T]he systems of oppression can be terrifyingly vast,” Drondeo says, “but there is an encouragingly vast movement against it.” She hopes students will want to become a part of it.