Chapter 4 Leveraging Vanua : Metaphysics, Nature, and Climate Change Adaptation in Fiji Francisco Gelves-Gómez and Shannon Brincat Abstract Conceptions of Nature are infused with metaphysical ideas across all cultural systems. This is no less so in Fiji, where ideas of nature are infused with meanings across a rich tapestry of traditional iTaukei beliefs/practices and faith systems. Yet the question of whether these metaphysical ideas offer a means by which communities can harmonise the human and nature relationship, especially in terms of climate change adaptation, remains unexplored. This chapter exam- ines this question by, firstly, outlining the underlying metaphysical systems within Fijian communities, explaining how these metaphysical systems view human/nature relationships. Secondly, we look to how these metaphysical systems are currently acknowledged within Fiji’s climate adaptation policies, focusing on the Fiji National Climate Change Policy (2018–2030) and the Fiji’s Climate Change Bill proposed in 2019. We argue that a more consistent appreciation of the metaphysical content of vanua may help develop more socially relevant adaptation strategies for iTaukei communities. Introduction Conceptions of Nature are infused with metaphysical ideas across all cultural systems. That is, the abstractions of metaphysical thought serve as the footing for everyday practices, providing the foundation for worldviews within which commu- nities mostly operate. Indeed, Alfred North Whitehead (1925) argued that every science belies a metaphysics, or something we could call more broadly a cosmology. F. Gelves-Gómez · S. Brincat (B ) School of Law and Society, University of the Sunshine Coast (USC), Maroochydore, QLD, Australia e-mail: sbrincat@usc.edu.au F. Gelves-Gómez e-mail: fgelvesg@usc.edu.au F. Gelves-Gómez Environmental Social Sciences Research Group, School of Ecosystem and Forest Sciences, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, VIC, Australia © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 J. M. Luetz and P. D. Nunn (eds.), Beyond Belief, Climate Change Management, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-67602-5_4 59