As part of the new funding period starting in January 2026 of the Cluster of Excellence Bonn Center for Dependency and Slavery Studies (BCDSS), Professor Lisa Schipper (GIUB) serves as the Principal Investigator of the international research project “Path Dependency: Unpacking the Colonial Roots of Vulnerability to Climate Change”.
The project is grounded in the understanding that climate change is not only about greenhouse gas emissions, but also about failures in development, with climate change impacts being amplified by vulnerability rooted in deep-seated power inequalities. Taking a comparative case study approach, the research examines how and to what extent colonialism and subsequent colonial dependency are directly responsible for today’s climate vulnerability.
The study focuses on the legacy of different models of colonialism in Benin, Morocco, and Senegal (with reference to France), and includes a comparative case study of Ghana (with reference to Britain). Methods include qualitative interviews with key informants and development actors both within the countries and abroad (France and Britain), as well as the analysis of historical documents and archival sources.
By tracing the colonial roots of path dependency in development, the project seeks to provide empirical evidence on how historical inequalities continue to amplify the impacts of climate change in some of the world’s most vulnerable regions.
The project is funded within the framework of the Cluster of Excellence BCDSS, supported by the German federal and state governments. The BCDSS investigates profound social dependencies such as slavery, serfdom, debt bondage, and other forms of permanent dependency across epochs, regions, and cultures. Its research focus lies “beyond slavery and freedom”, aiming to overcome the binary opposition of “free” and “unfree”. Instead, the BCDSS proposes the concept of “asymmetrical dependency” to explore forms of bondage across time and space.