We are an interdisciplinary research group investigating flood resilience and coastal adaptation in the territories of the Coast Salish Peoples, (popularly known as the South Coast of B.C.) with generous funding provided by PICS.

Our Values:

  • Reconciliation

    • Decolonization

    • Place-based Learning

    • Relationship-Building; and Reciprocal Engagement

    • Respect for Self-Determination

  • Multiple ways of Knowing and Relating to the World

    • Two-Eyed Seeing

    • Interdisciplinarity

    • Mosaic Thinking; Learning; and Doing

  • Land, Water, and People

    • Stewardship

    • Community

    • Intergenerational Care

    • Healing / Restoration

    • Systems Thinking and Restoration

How do we act on our values?

  • Reconciliation

    • Acknowledge and learn about historic injustices and systemic violence, especially in the local context.

    • Identify more equitable climate adaptation processes.

    • Resist extractive research and partnership practice by learning/ understanding/ employing decolonial research methodologies.

    • Support self-determination and initiatives of importance as defined by partner Nations.

  • Multiple ways of Knowing and Relating to the World

    • Recognize difference as an integral component to rigorous research methods where varying positionalities, ways of knowing, and skills strengthen process and outcome.

    • Ensure Indigenous perspectives and principles are central to the research process.

    • Encourage team members to explore their positionality as researchers to challenge our own biases.

    • Confront racist and exclusionary attitudes and research practices at both individual and institutional levels (even if/when that poses risks to the credibility of institutions that we are affiliated with.)

  • Land, Water, and People

    • Center care as both a process and solution by considering multi-generational impacts of our research and proposals on human and more-than-human communities.

    • Look for ways to usefully heal/ restore lands and water from a place of respect and Indigenous leadership.

    • Consider systems-thinking across time and space to examine interconnectedness.

Values Statement

Values are the meanings given to behavior and events based on what is considered desirable. These meanings influence how situations are interpreted, perceived, and acted upon. As such, what is considered appropriate, effective, and successful adaptation is determined by what people, groups, sectors, and decision-makers deem important. Values change as the physical and political conditions of the world change; therefore, climate change and the research it engages are constant processes of re-evaluation.

Living with Water makes explicit the values which guide our approach to adaptation while encouraging an evolution of these values as we learn more from the communities we collaborate with, especially the Host Nations on whose traditional and unceded territories our project focuses on.

Living with Water also recognizes that while adaptation science and policy have always been guided by values, the content and influence of these values have not been made explicit. Modern research paradigms have excluded Indigenous and local knowledges, leaving out important opportunities to redefine and co-define benefits across society, especially around climate adaptation.

We value the rights and knowledge systems of Indigenous Peoples as critical to researching and developing equitable climate adaptation plans. We commit to pay special attention to the relations of power and histories that have excluded Indigenous knowledges, perspectives, and priority-setting in regional and municipal contexts.