Hajja Naseem ’10
A mosaic of solutions
By Kiera O’Brien ’18
Hajja Naseem '10 never aspired to politics. “When I was younger, I always had so many ideas of what I wanted to be,” shares Naseem. “Being a state minister was never one of them!” Growing up in the Maldives under a 30-year dictatorship, she witnessed firsthand the maturation of a popular democratic opposition movement that eventually led to a peaceful transfer of power and the country’s first multiparty election in 2008.
At the time, she never imagined that she would one day serve her young democracy as Minister of State for Environment, Climate Change, and Technology; a position she held until fall of 2023 when her party lost re-election. Of her five years in office, Naseem reflects: “It was a transformative experience—I am relatively young, and a woman, in what is still a fairly conservative country. It wasn’t easy, and I never imagined it, but I’m proud of what I accomplished.”
As minister, Naseem not only oversaw all aspects of the small island nation’s domestic policies on climate and energy but also had the responsibility of serving as a climate diplomat for her country at the annual Conference of the Parties (COP) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. “All the jargon and the commas in the bilateral agreements have a direct impact on people’s lives, so even though it can feel very slow and very painstaking, and even though we need to be more ambitious, I’m very happy to have played a leadership role in these conversations.”
She is especially proud of her efforts as a chief negotiator for the Maldives as part of the Alliance of Small Island States. “It's really important to build collective capabilities and try to address the impacts of climate change with collective action,” emphasizes Naseem. In a 2023 op-ed published in advance of the COP in Dubai, Naseem wrote forcefully about the need to address the “loss and damage” caused by climate change that is already being faced by small island nations like the Maldives. She writes, “Despite our negligible contribution to global greenhouse gas emissions, Maldivians are disproportionately bearing the brunt of climate change's consequences.” And they are bearing them now.
“Loss and damage cannot simply be solved with a fund to offset the economic impacts of climate change. There are incalculable losses of culture, of homeland, losses that are not strictly economic,” Naseem explains. “Loss and damage demands that we develop a mosaic of solutions that account for multiple contexts, angles, and perspectives.” Such a framework, Naseem believes, is precisely “what we are taught at COA. This idea of building a ‘mosaic of solutions’ to address complex, multifaceted problems really sums up not only what I have been working on for the past five years as a minister, but also what I learned at COA.”
Since returning home to the Maldives from the latest COP in Dubai, Naseem has been enjoying a brief respite from her duties as a climate diplomat and considering her next steps following the 2023 election results. She hasn’t exactly been resting, however. She currently serves as a senior adviser on loss, damage, and climate negotiations for the International Peace Institute (NY, USA). She’s also been enjoying extra time spent with her daughter, three-year-old Arin. When I ask what advice she might give to other young climate negotiators and leaders, she doesn’t hesitate: “You have to find ways to create joy. It’s challenging work, and things don’t always work out, so it’s important to laugh, to have fun, where and when you can.”
