Social Vulnerability Index By Gender to Climate Change

Vulnerability is a socially constructed phenomenon influenced by institutional and economic dynamics. Social vulnerability is product of social inequalities. This paper makes the estimation of social vulnerability to climate disasters by gender in Mexico, based on the estimation of a vulnerability index and correlation with climate disasters from 2003 to 2010.

The estimation vulnerability index by gender is based on different findings in literature on vulnerability, mainly “New Indicators of Vulnerability and Adaptive Capacity, which provides factors to determine the social vulnerability”, Adger, et al., (2004), and also correlations with effects of weather events over the past in Mexico. Natural disasters are differential impact on the territory and sex, depending on regional social vulnerability. It is expected that the most socially vulnerable regions are most affected by adverse climatic events.

This research identified similar vulnerable index cluster to women and men in 2000 and 2010 in southern Mexico, Veracruz, Puebla, Guerrero, Oaxaca and Chiapas, and Estado de México just 2010. The evidence concluded that there is a relationship between the index of social vulnerability and natural disasters in Mexico, and a similar spatial distribution of the social vulnerability of women and men.