Climate Change at Amache

Climate change is reshaping the world around us. It brings devastating consequences for people, wildlife, and ecosystems everywhere—including at Amache. But the story of climate change isn’t over, and people’s actions will shape what the future looks like. If people work together to respond to climate change now, we can protect the places we love for future generations.

As we face the threat of climate change, we can learn from history. People have faced existential threats before, and stories of how they responded can teach us crucial lessons about what we want to emulate, and what we want to avoid. At Amache, stories of deep injustice, alongside stories of resilience and courage, can help us reflect on how we want to move forward in a world shaped by climate change.

Climate Change & Executive Order 9066

On February 19, 1942, President Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, which resulted in the unjust incarceration of over 120,000 Japanese Americans. They were forcibly removed from their homes along the West Coast and sent to incarceration camps across the country, including Amache.

Roosevelt signed this executive order in a culture of panic following the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. The attack had led to intense anger and fear against Japan and its people. In their panic, US government officials and many other Americans started directing their feelings at Japanese Americans, building on anti-Asian sentiment that had been rampant throughout the 20th century.

In times of fear, it can be easy to make snap judgments that bring out the worst in people. Anxiety about the future can make it seem logical to protect an “us,” at the expense of a “them,” and hard to see the repercussions of the decisions that are made. But from the perspective of history, we can see those repercussions, and we know that decisions made on those grounds are deeply unjust.

This story can show us how people today could fall into fear-based thought patterns that seem to justify terrible decisions. Climate change is an existential threat: just like the uncertainties of war, it can trigger anxieties about the future. Rising temperatures and changing weather threaten the world as we know it. If we’re not careful, fear around what the future might hold could cause people to make unjust choices, protecting themselves at the expense of others.

In 1988, under President Ronald Reagan, the US government made a formal apology for the incarceration of Japanese Americans. They pointed to three central failures that allowed for the executive order to be enacted: racial prejudice, wartime hysteria, and a failure of political leadership. Each of these failures still has resonance today. As we respond to climate change, we have to consider what each of them tell us about how people might react in times of crisis.

How can we learn from past failures, and move towards a more just future?

Racial prejudice

Executive Order 9066 was motivated by anti-Asian sentiment and racism against Japanese people. Widespread racial prejudice allowed for an embrace of the “us” versus “them” mentality that justified incarceration to many non-Japanese people. Today, racist policies and patterns of prejudice mean that the impacts of climate change, like extreme heat and destructive weather, are most severe for people of color. How do we make sure that climate policies acknowledge these injustices and are inclusive of everyone?

Wartime Hysteria

The wartime hysteria that led to the incarceration of Japanese Americans serves as an important reminder of how fear can allow societies to justify unjust decisions. Climate change may bring many impacts that exacerbate people’s fears: resource scarcity like food and water shortages, large numbers of climate refugees, and costly extreme weather events. Executive Order 9066 shows us that fear can fuel racism and exclusionary policies. How can we combat divisive narratives to choose hope over fear?

Failure of political leadership

During World War II, political leadership failed to uphold the rights of Japanese Americans. They acted without considering the constitutional civic and human rights of Japanese Americans, leading to widespread injustice. Their failure reminds us how important it is for people to hold leaders accountable. As we act on climate change, how can we ensure that our civic leaders safeguard the rights of all communities?

You don’t have to respond to inhumanity with inhumanity. Like you can do something beautiful and humane in response. Like you can build a garden in your prison.

—Dr. Bonnie Clark, co-director of the Amache Community Archeology Project

Gardens provided a place of comfort, tranquility, and normalcy to the gardeners and other incarcerated people.

Courtesy of Sonoma State University

Climate Change & Amache’s Gardens

Life in the incarceration camps was hard. Ordinary people were removed from their daily lives and put in crowded spaces, with little privacy and constant surveillance by armed guards. Despite these hardships, incarcerees responded to their situation with strength and resilience. Many people drew from the Japanese concept of gaman, meaning “to endure the seemingly unbearable with patience and dignity.”

For many incarcerees, gaman looked like putting in effort to make their daily lives at Amache as livable as possible. Creating a sense of normalcy, carrying on traditions, and finding moments for beauty all fostered the emotional strength to persist day after day in harsh conditions. One way in which people did this was through gardening. Cultivating personal and ornamental gardens, using principles of traditional Japanese gardening, allowed people to bring humanity and hope to themselves and their communities, even though they were imprisoned.

“Hope was literally planted into the soil—hope for a seed to sprout, a tree to shade, a flower to bloom.”

—Dr. Clark, in her book Finding Solace in the Soil

This idea of “building a garden in your prison” is a testament to resilience and endurance. It shows the ways in which bringing beauty and culture into hard times can help people keep the strength to endure a bad situation, and work towards a more livable tomorrow.

This story of people responding to hardship and injustice has a lot to teach us when it comes to climate change. As we face the impacts of the climate crisis, there will be hard times. Many people will be displaced from their homes and communities—and many of these people will be marginalized people, who, statistically, have contributed the least to greenhouse gas emissions¹. In the face of this, it’ll be important to maintain cultural identity, a sense of humanity, and emotional strength to persist in an uncertain future.

As we respond to climate change, how can we learn from Amache’s gardeners and their gardens?

Gardening

At Amache, gardeners grew vegetable crops to provide food for the camp. Today, vegetable gardens can be an important way to fight climate change. Cultivating plant life stores carbon. Eating vegetables from your garden can also help reduce emissions from food transportation and large-scale agriculture. Planting local plants can also support the health of the ecosystems around you, making the area more resilient against extreme conditions from climate change.

Cultural connections

Strong communities help people stay resilient to climate change and climate disasters². Working to preserve cultural identity and traditional practices can help people feel connected to their community, even when they’re displaced from their homes. At Amache, gardeners incorporated principles of traditional Japanese gardening with the materials and plants available to them in Colorado. Maintaining cultural traditions, even in new, harsh conditions, can help foster community. How can we maintain community and cultural traditions today, in the face of climate change?

Cultivating beauty

The threats posed by climate change make many people feel anxious and scared about the future. It’s important to connect with the world around you and find pockets of peace. Taking time to cultivate and appreciate beauty, like through gardening, can be helpful. Responding to climate change can sometimes feel like an onslaught of impacts to fight against. Finding beauty, especially beauty in nature, can be a good way to focus on what’s worth fighting for. How can you find and cultivate beauty in the world around you?

How is climate change impacting Amache now?

Temperature

Climate change has already made temperatures rise at Amache. Since 1970, average annual temperatures at Amache have already gotten about 2°F warmer³.

Temperatures will keep going up in the future—but exactly how much depends on us. By 2099, the average temperature at Amache could be up to 9.2°F higher than it was before the year 2000. But if people reduce our greenhouse gas emissions, we could limit that rise to 5.1°F or even less⁴.

That might not sound like a lot, but small changes can have big impacts. It can be helpful to think of it like the human body: the difference between feeling fine and having a fever is only a few degrees.

Archeology

Archeological scatter is protected at Amache. As climate change progresses and weather becomes more severe, artifacts will be exposed to more extreme conditions and damaged.

More intense and more frequent droughts, as well as more fires, also threaten “witness trees”--trees that were planted by incarcerees and still grow at Amache today.

Roads

The roads to and around Amache are dirt roads. With more extreme weather and intense storms, road washouts are more likely, making the site less accessible and traveling more hazardous.

Doing our part

Planning for change

At Amache, we’re including climate change in our planning. As we plan for site infrastructure, how can we make it more sustainable? How can we keep the site’s archeology as safe as possible in extreme weather? What kinds of protection do visitors and volunteers need when visiting Amache in conditions of extreme heat or storms? These are all questions on park staff’s minds as we make decisions for the future.

Reducing our carbon footprint

The National Park Service is working to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions across the country. The 2023 update of the Green Parks Plan lays out goals for all parks to achieve more sustainable operations and a greener visitor experience. Explore the Green Parks Plan, and learn more about climate change response in the National Park Service.

Doing your part

Everyone has a role to play in our response to climate change. Think about what resources you have or what you enjoy doing. Is there a connection between those things and climate action?

Here are some ways you can make a difference in your life and your community:

• Share your thoughts on climate change with people around you. Tell them why you care and what you’re doing. Your voice matters, especially with those you know.
• Reduce your carbon footprint and encourage others to do the same.
• Be an active citizen and share your opinions about climate change with your government representatives.
• When you see injustice that mirrors a lesson in history, speak up about it! Learn about climate justice and consider how you can help your community work towards a better future.

• Spending time outside can improve your health and wellness and help you build resilience and community even during hard times. Remember to take care of yourself and others and take time to connect to the world around you.

References

1. IPCC 2023

IPCC. 2023. Summary for Policymakers. In: Climate Change 2023: Synthesis Report. Contribution of Working Groups I, II and III to the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [Core Writing Team, H. Lee and J. Romero (eds.)]. IPCC, Geneva, Switzerland, pp. 1-34, doi: 10.59327/IPCC/AR6-9789291691647.001

2. Payton et. al 2023

Payton, E.A., A.O. Pinson, T. Asefa, L.E. Condon, L.-A.L. Dupigny-Giroux, B.L. Harding, J. Kiang, D.H. Lee, S.A. McAfee, J.M. Pflug, I. Rangwala, H.J. Tanana, and D.B. Wright, 2023: Ch. 4. Water. In: Fifth National Climate Assessment. Crimmins, A.R., C.W. Avery, D.R. Easterling, K.E. Kunkel, B.C. Stewart, and T.K. Maycock, Eds. U.S. Global Change Research Program, Washington, DC, USA. https://nca2023.globalchange.gov/chapter/4/

3. Applied Climate Science Lab

Applied Climate Science Lab, University of California Merced. n.d. Climate Toolbox - Climate Mapper. https://climatetoolbox.org/tool/Climate-Mapper.

4. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. n.d. Climate at a Glance. https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/access/monitoring/climate-at-a-glance/.

5. Lempert et. al 2018

Lempert, R., J. Arnold, R. Pulwarty, K. Gordon, K. Greig, C. Hawkins Hoffman, D. Sands, and C. Werrell, 2018. National Climate Assessment 2018, Chapter 28: Reducing Risks through Adaptation Actions. https://nca2018.globalchange.gov/chapter/28/

This article was written with the frameworks from the History and Hope for Climate Action interpretive toolkit.