Relevance of the Sixth IPCC Assessment Report to Indigenous lived realities

This article contributes to Indigenous literature on Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Assessment Reports (ARs) for an exploration of the science–policy–politics interface at the global scale. It presents findings from the systematic review of the latest AR6, conducted by the Knowledge Justice Collective, that examined Indigenous content in the report and the scientific knowledge base AR6 is based upon. It shows that paying attention solely on numerical increases of Indigenous content rather than the uneven Indigenous representation in the IPCC knowledge base produced in the English language by researchers largely in environmental science-related disciplines at elite institutions limits our understanding of the nuances of Indigenous lived realities in the ARs. Therefore, without an intervention at the knowledge base level, Indigenous Peoples and Indigenous Peoples’ Knowledges will continue to be legible only through extractive relationships in the IPCC AR processes while continuing to promote epistemic Eurocentrism.