Mapping the Climate–Care Nexus in the WANA Region: A Scoping Review

Abstract

This scoping review examines the care–climate justice nexus in the West Asia and North Africa (WANA) region through a feminist political economy lens. Drawing on 37 English-language academic and grey literature sources (2000–2025), it finds that climate change, conflict, displacement, and austerity significantly intensify women’s unpaid and informal care work, yet care remains largely absent from climate policy, adaptation frameworks, and environmental governance. The literature is dominated by descriptive and institutional approaches, with limited structural analysis and minimal visibility of grassroots care practices. The review argues that care must be understood as essential social infrastructure for climate justice, revealing how climate and care crises are mutually constitutive and rooted in the same extractive and unequal systems, and calls for care-centered climate research, policy, and advocacy in the WANA region.