Climate change impacts add to livelihood challenges and can further increase inequality and poverty , whose root causes are social, institutional and governance related. Various regional clusters of high vulnerability  are also influenced by historical processes, such as colonialism and power relations that made people and countries vulnerable . Thus, vulnerability to climate change is not primarily linked to the degree of exposure to climate change impacts, but determined by societal structures and development processes that shape context and individual vulnerability , and values and lived experiences of climate hazards . Intersectionality approaches are central to grasping differential vulnerability  for past and present livelihood impacts of climate change . Assessing observed local conditions and livelihood impacts and shifts requires us to consider reinforcing social phenomena such as age, gender, class, race and ethnicity, which shape social inequalities and experiences of the world and also intersect with climate hazards and vulnerability .
IPCC
Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability
IPCC Report