In the context of a crisis of ecological imperialism that produces climate injustices, neo-imperial and capitalist forces continue to imperil Black and racialized communities through coercive debts, economic displacements, and land dispossession that are spurred by uneven socio-ecological disasters.
Drawing on Black geographies and plantation economic frameworks, this talk examines case studies of recent climate-related disasters in the Caribbean. It questions the onto-epistemic and political nature of economic assessments of damage and losses related to these disasters drawing attention to their neo-liberalized foundations and policies that further colonial and plantocratic violence in these "racialized" disaster zones.
These post-disaster loss and damage assessments promoted by corporate, financial and international development agencies create epistemic silences that circumscribe reparatory justice claims that link indigenous expulsions and plantation slavery to contemporary ecological disasters.