The Declaration of a Climate Emergency in Medellín: Trajectories of Risk, Disaster, and Community Action in Commune 8 (2020–2023)

Abstract

This article analyzes risk and disaster management on the outskirts of Medellin’s Commune 8 (the neighborhoods of El Faro, El Pacífico, and Altos de la Torre) and its integration into the climate change agenda following the 2023 emergency declaration. Through a qualitative case study spanning the 2020–2023 period, the tensions between technical institutions and hillside social movements are documented. The study demonstrates that linking local risk to the global discourse on climate change enabled the Hillside Movement to institutionalize Inclusive Climate Action as a platform for political struggle. This process reveals a structural contradiction: while communities must make their vulnerability visible to demand state attention, the state imposes technical-legal barriers, which individualize the disaster, by accentuating socio-spatial inequality and the perception of institutional negligence. The most significant finding is the capacity of popular sectors to reframe the technical language of the “emergency” into a strategic struggle, which links the climate crisis with historical demands for decent housing and the right to remain on their land.