COP28 Reflections

Being here at COP28 has been exhilarating, exhausting, and somewhat overwhelming.

The first few days have been a logistical challenge in navigating an Expo City swarming with 70,000 people rushing to meetings, events, actions. This is the ultimate FOMO environment—Fear of Missing Out—with every hour presenting an avalanche of opportunities to participate, present, observe, network, and ask questions about every aspect of climate change. My phone died from sheer exhaustion in trying to document this experience. And through it all, I have asked myself what can I offer here, and what is my relationship to climate change work. Before I came, I believed in climate change without really thinking too closely about it. I felt guilty about every plastic bag that entered my home and then hoped that writing stories about seeds and food sovereignty would somehow be a big enough contribution towards a healthier planet.

But COP28 is an immersion in all aspects of climate change, from politics to humanity to the arts.

I hadn’t thought about what capping our warming climate to 1.5 degrees C means in terms of persuading a global community to agree to and implement a solution. Some panels delineated the harsh reality we’re creating with each day we remain on the path that has brought us to this place. I heard heartbreaking stories of young people who don’t want to bring children into this world, babies dying of malnutrition, communities devastated by drought and flood.

But there were also many stories of hope, of projects that reclaim, reforest, rebuild, of innovative youth-led initiatives, and a resurgence of Indigenous communities offering their traditional ecological knowledge as a pathway forward. A panelist from Africa, Ali Mohamed Adam, spoke beautifully of the prayers and ceremonies that were part of his people’s agriculture, how they had retained their cultural knowledge for each of their plants, and placed a priority on passing this knowledge to the next generation. What I heard was an echo of similar teachings that I had learned from our tribal elders in Minnesota: remember that plants and animals carry life, which makes them sacred. And when we hold the earth with this level of loving care, inflicting harm becomes unthinkable.

But where do we start when it all feels so urgent? Navigating COP28 feels like the lens on a camera, zooming out to see global policies, focusing in for a close-up to individual action. It helps to remember, as a government staff person explained today, that when you feel like change is moving too slowly, imagine the years-long, fraught process of finding consensus on each point among all 196 member countries. See the near miracle of what has been achieved while remembering that big change is slow, hard work. And then think about what it means on a global scale to phase out fossil fuels in order to achieve the Paris Agreement goals, and what it means on an individual level. Are we ready to swap our cars for electric? Can we afford the change? Can we afford not to change?

One thing is certain, we cannot afford to look away from this issue.

It’s not just the United Nations problem to fix, nor can we rely on technology to dream up solutions so that we can all go on with life as usual. 1.5 degrees is a game changer. It’s also an opportunity—and we know that means some hard work is involved—to shift from the individualistic, colonized values that have allowed people and land to be used as commodities, to an Indigenous understanding that is rooted in community, respect, and honoring the sacred nature of everyone around us.

And there are a lot of heroes in this work to inspire us, from the Indigenous women like Aunt Ivy who mothers a flock of Indigenous youth attending the conference, to the leaders of small countries proudly wearing traditional garb, speaking their languages, and standing up for their people. Youth from around the globe who are insisting on their place in this work. Even Al Gore, the politician, is now a man on fire, leading global policy work that provides accountability in measuring progress toward reducing emissions.

While I may not yet have a clear answer to my own role, one thing is clear: as a writer, my eyes have been opened to a new understanding of the world, and my work is to find the words to express it.

Diane Wilson is a Dakota writer, educator, and bog steward, who has published four award-winning books as well as numerous essays. Her novel, The Seed Keeper, received the 2022 Minnesota Book Award for Fiction, and her memoir, Spirit Car: Journey to a Dakota Past, won a 2006 Minnesota Book Award and was selected for the 2012 One Minneapolis One Read program. She has also published a nonfiction book, Beloved Child: A Dakota Way of Life, a middle-grade biography, Ella Cara Deloria: Dakota Language Protector, and co-authored a picture book—Where We Come From. Wilson is a Mdewakanton descendent, enrolled on the Rosebud Reservation. She is the former Executive Director for Dream of Wild Health, an Indigenous non-profit farm, and the Native American Food Sovereignty Alliance, a national coalition of tribes and organizations working to create sovereign food systems for Native people.

Diane is a Climate Generation Window Into COP delegate for COP28. To learn more, we encourage you to meet the full delegation and subscribe to the Window Into COP digest.

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