In recent years ‘vulnerability assessment’ has gained a prominent position in the international climate-change policy arena. There are many social-scientific studies that examine various methods and approaches involved in assessing vulnerability. Rather than making another addition to this literature I examine how climate-change policies have been translated in Sri Lanka in order to identify vulnerable places and social groups by combining actor-network theory and the concept of ‘hazardscape’. In so doing I illustrate how concepts of climate-change vulnerability and hazards are, more often than not, translated in ways that fit within and reinforce existing official narratives of social and spatial disadvantage, rather than addressing new problems or dimensions that might emerge from the combined effects of changes in climate, economy, and society. I conclude by suggesting that the concept of ‘resilience’ needs to be highlighted within international climate-change policy because it offers smaller developing countries the possibility of going beyond mitigation and adaptation strategies and finding innovative ways of integrating traditional resource-use insights and approaches within Clean Development Mechanism projects.
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