In order to understand the nature of peripherality in Pacific Island communities and its potential for enhancing the design/communication of assistance for climate change adaptation, a series of 73 communities were visited in the Federated States of Micronesia and Fiji. Spaced out along core-periphery gradients in these archipelagic countries, a comprehensive questionnaire was administered in each community, data from which allowed the development/calculation of three ‘peripherality indices’ to capture community understanding of global climate change as well as their autonomous capacity for coping with environmental adversity.

It is clear that peripherality could be used in other geographical contexts, especially in developing countries, to map community diversity, identifying those that require most external assistance and those that require least. One thing became clear is how there are trends of increasing dependency (on funding and outside assistance) in most communities for coping with environmental adversity, including the effects of climate change. Given the likely funding futures, this trend is dangerous, even maladaptive, and should be reversed. It is in the interest of all actors to promote greater autonomy among such communities.