[Data Collection]

Abstract: Does exposure to natural disasters increase or reduce political activism? Although disasters can erode political trust and undermine civic engagement, they also create incentives and opportunities for states to extend their presence in institutionally underserved areas, such as urban slums and remote rural communities. Drawing on an original household survey and extensive qualitative fieldwork in Bihar and Gujarat—two Indian states facing acute climate risks—this project examines how exposure to slow-onset disasters, such as recurrent floods, sea level rise, and frequent drought, reshape citizen-state relations. Our findings suggest that disaster exposure stimulates political activism: households exposed to slow-onset events are more likely to participate in protests, attend community meetings, and engage in campaign work during local elections compared to unexposed households. These associations remain robust across multiple model specifications, including household and individual-level controls for socioeconomic status, ethnic identity, and migration incidence, as well as council fixed effects. These findings reveal how climate risk intersects with household political strategies to shape accountability mechanisms in contexts marked by weak formal institutions.