“Adolescence is a time to support young peoples’ access to information, to education, to skills and to services that can result in a healthy and safe transition into adulthood,” said Sarah Barnes, Project Director of the Maternal Health Initiative, at a recent Wilson Center event on engaging youth and protecting their sexual and reproductive health and rights. “It’s time to make adolescents a priority,” said Barnes.

It is imperative that countries adopt a human security approach to achieve “freedom from hazard impacts”—nationally through a scientific disaster risk reduction strategy and internationally through climate diplomacy.

This summer, Iraqi citizens in Basra demonstrated in the streets to protest a serious public health crisis caused by polluted water. The condition of their water infrastructure was deplorable after years of devastating wars, corruption, and droughts and regional hydropolitics. More than 100,000 people have reportedly been poisoned by polluted water, while recent estimates warn that some 277,000 children are at risk of diseases, such as cholera due to rundown water and sanitation facilities at schools.

President Donald Trump has in many ways worked as President Barack Obama’s foil, rolling back legacy environmental protection regulations and questioning the merit of environmental causes. However, since taking office, his administration has also taken a hard policy line against wildlife crime, continuing and even furthering Obama’s momentum.

Once the same country and demographic twins, Bangladesh and Pakistan have diverged greatly in demographics since Bangladesh’s independence in 1971. Richard Cincotta and Elizabeth Leahy Madsen take a look at how despite the country’s vulnerability to extreme weather, sea-level rise, and Islamic extremism, Bangladesh’s bulge of working-age adults with relatively small proportions of seniors and young children offers potential for sustained development.

Visitors to Norway often remark on the number of men pushing prams around its streets. This summer, those pram-pushing days are growing longer, and not just because of the endless sun. Fathers of children born on or after July 1 will get 15 weeks non-transferable parental leave, rather than the already-generous 10 previously available.

For this World Cities Day, the UN’s theme calls for “building sustainable and resilient cities.” Cities across the Global South are assessing their physical preparedness against future shocks. Can cities that leave out—or often push out—poor workers claim resiliency? These moves are, in fact, weakening any preparedness. The foundations of truly sustainable and resilient cities lie in their residents’ abilities and agency.