Our nine-part “Choke Point: Tamil Nadu” series with Circle of Blue has been a must-read on the conflicting demands for water, food, and energy in the South Indian state. In May’s most popular post, S. Gopikrishna Warrier introduces us to Chennai’s tech-savvy social entrepreneurs, who are providing the city’s residents with real-time information on the risk of flooding. (The ninth and final post in the series was published yesterday; catch up on all of them at “Choke Point: Tamil Nadu”).

Wilson Center Director, President, and CEO Jane Harman and WWF President and CEO Carter Roberts put their weight behind growing momentum to ensure water stays on the radar for U.S. foreign policymakers in one of last month’s most-read stories.

John Oldfield called it: last month’s most popular story was once again on the U.S. Global Water Strategy. The Wilson Center’s Sherri Goodman, Ruth Greenspan Bell, and Nausheen Iqbal, like Oldfield before them, urged the new administration to take seriously the development of the strategy, due later this year, and provide “stronger American leadership” on global water issues.

The first U.S. Global Water Strategy is due in October, and despite a tumultuous start to the year, the U.S. government shouldn’t let this opportunity to demonstrate global leadership pass, says John Oldfield in last month’s most popular story.

If 2015 was the year of international cooperation, 2016 seems to have been about withdrawing from external entanglements and re-focusing on national priorities, as the global displacement crisis ground on, terror attacks battered liberal governments, and fighting in the Middle East continued.

Climate change isn’t a political issue in many countries, but it is in the United States. If that trend continues much longer, American service members may find themselves at “the intersection of politics and events” as they confront the consequences of climate change head on in the form of increased instability and humanitarian disasters, says Edward J. Erickson in a special issue of the U.S. Marine Corps Press Journal.

What happens when melting ice reveals buried nuclear waste from a foreign power originally there at the behest of a colonial power? Greenland may find out in the years ahead, according to research by Jeff and William Colgan about a Cold War-era U.S. military base long thought buried beneath an ice cap.

Water wars? Climate conflict? Population pressure? The strains placed by humanity on ecosystems around the world are gaining more and more attention. Policymakers and community leaders are adjusting in countless ways, from fishing villages in the Philippines to the White House in Washington, DC. Last month’s most popular posts tracked these stories from a number of angles.