GECHS

A conference on climate change in South Asia will be organized at Rutgers University, New Brunswick, New Jersey, USA, April 16-17 2009. Climate change presents significant challenges for South Asia. Although the effects of climate change on social and environmental systems are likely to be highly uneven (even between communities within South Asia), impoverished regions and populations may bear the brunt of these changes. Therefore, addressing climate change within the South Asian context will require new types of social institutions, cooperative responses and new forms of governance. Papers are invited that address climate change issues within any country or region of South Asia. Preference will be given in paper selection to those that connect their topic to one or more of the broad conference themes of governance, equity, and social justice. For more information, see the conference website. Abstracts of 250 words or less should be sent to the conference organizers before September 15, 2008.

The International Ocean Institute, USA and the city of St. Petersburg, Florida, USA, are hosting a Coastal Cities Summit on November 17-20 2008, to address the complex challenges that coastal city leaders face as populations increase, resources are depleted, and the impacts of climate change are felt.  The Coastal Cities Summit intends to bring together 600-700 coastal city leaders, managers and academics to discuss environmental, social, economic, and public policy challenges and viable solutions. The 3 ½ day conference will focus on three themes: Climate Change, Risk and Vulnerability, and Sustainable Development.  The planners are soliciting speakers on areas that are particularly relevant to coastal cities: freshwater, pollution, energy, infrastructure, and port security.  All sessions are intended to give a long-needed voice to those who are on the front lines taking leadership on climate change, providing implementation and response plans and continuing to focus on protecting citizens from possible extreme events and human-induced degradation. Full details are available at the conference website.

Podcasts and presentations are out for the conference RESILIENCE 2008: Resilience, Adaptation and Transformation in Turbulent Times. GECHS chair Karen O’Brien gave the presentation Rethinking social contracts: building resilience in a changing climate. View her presentation on podcast here. This International Science and Policy Conference was organized in Stockholm, Sweden, 14-18 April, and approached society and nature as interdependent social-ecological systems, which are complex adaptive systems. Furthermore, the focus was on cross scale and dynamic interactions that represent new challenges for governance and management in relation to social-ecological systems and ecosystem services. 9 overall themes helped to shed light on the issues, and the overview can be found on the conference website.

In July 2008, Robin Leichenko and GECHS chair Karen O’Brien will launch the book Environmental Change and Globalization: Double Exposures. The book explores the connections between two of the most transformative processes of the twenty-first century, namely global environmental change and globalization. In the book, Leichenko and O’Brien present a conceptual framework for analyzing the interactions between these two processes, and they illustrate, through case studies, how these interactions create situations of “double exposure.” Drawing upon prominent recent and current environmental events - Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, recurring droughts in India, and the melting of the Arctic sea ice - the case studies each demonstrate a different pathway of interaction between globalization and environmental change. The double exposure framework not only sheds light on the challenges raised by these processes, but also possibilities for using the interactions to generate positive opportunities for action. The book can be ordered here.

The third International C.E.U. Congress will be held in Oslo, Norway the 14.-16. September 2008. At this congress, the science, policy, education and best practice in urban design in the context of climate change will be discussed. The congress welcomes government officials, planners, architects, social scientists, ecologists, developers, local community activists, and all other development stakeholders who feel a responsibility to contribute to more sustainable urban development. For more information, please see the conference website.