Last year a Kiribati man, Ioane Teitiota, claimed asylum in New Zealand, stating that his home island, which is on average just two meters above sea level, was becoming uninhabitable thanks to rising seas. So-called “king tides” routinely wash over entire portions of the archipelago.

For years, the Chepang people have lived off the land in Nepal’s forested central foothills. Communities cleared trees to start small subsistence farms, harvested the surrounding area for firewood, and eventually moved on after the wood, soil, and water were depleted.

As the war in Syria shows no signs of letting up, a recent article in Middle Eastern Studies put forward the hypothesis that the brutal conflict was triggered by government mismanagement of the country’s recent drought, which lasted from 2006 to 2010. It’s a story we’ve heard before.

As policymakers respond to the threat of climate and environmental change, the concept of resilience has found itself at the center of discussion. Few scientists and policymakers, however, can come to a consensus on how to define, evaluate, and build resilience.

Sudan’s pastoralists gained infamy during the conflict in Darfur last decade, when outsiders described the violence as a result of competition between climate-stressed, semi-nomadic herders and sedentary farmers. But Sudan’s pastoralists may not be as fragile as previously thought and could even hold the key to survival for similar groups in Africa, said a panel of experts at the Wilson Center on November 13. [Video Below]

“Leave enough for everyone.” That’s what my mother used to tell us at dinner. However, the holiday season reminds me that human nature is far from innately moderate in consumption. With Black Friday as a kickoff, consumers will spend more than $600 billion by Christmas in the United States alone. As I witness droves of shoppers running through malls and stores, I wonder if their desire is driven by some insatiable appetite for their favorite products or something more fundamental about human nature.