GECHS

Vulnerability and Climate Change

oystek — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 12:29:13 +0000

The Department of Human Ecology in the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences at Rutgers University would like to make a tenured or tenure track appointment, beginning in September 2010, in the general area of the human dimensions of vulnerability and adaptation. The successful candidate would be expected to develop a research program in the general area of human vulnerability and adaptation to climate change. The candidate would also be expected to teach graduate and undergraduate courses in his/her substantive area of expertise. A PhD in one of the social sciences or in an interdisciplinary Environmental Studies program would be required at the time of appointment. Applicants should send a letter of introduction, a curriculum vitae, and a writing sample to by March 10th , 2010. Three letters of recommendation should be sent to the same electronic address. Rutgers University is an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity Employer. The University and the School/Department of Human Ecology have a strong commitment to achieving diversity among faculty and staff, and strongly encourage women and minorities to apply.

APN’s Call for Poster Presentation Abstracts in Global Change Research!

oystek — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 11:44:59 +0000

The APN invites you to submit poster presentation abstracts for the Networking Poster Session that will be held on 17 March 2010 on the occasion of the APN 15th Inter-Governmental Meeting (IGM) and Scientific Planning Group (SPG) Meeting, which is officially being hosted by the Ministry of Environment, Government of the Republic of Korea, at the APEC Centre for Climate Change, Busan, Republic of Korea. The Session will provide up to 20 young scientists with an opportunity to display and present their research work to invited esteemed members of the scientific and policy communities from within and outside of the Asia-Pacific region. Winning poster will have the opportunity to present a 20-minute PowerPoint presentation to the 15th IGM/SPG Meeting on Friday, 19 March 2010.
For more information on this Call and to view eligibility criteria and guidelines for abstract submission, you may check this out:

http://www.apn-gcr.org/en/gcannouncements/CallForPosterPresentationAbstracts-GCR.pdf
http://www.apn-gcr.org/en/gcannouncements.html

You may also contact Dr. Linda Anne Stevenson (lastevenson@apn-gcr.org) should you have further queries. Please also note that abstracts must be received by Saturday, 20 February 2010, midnight (Japanese Standard Time) to be considered.

Book announcement: Global Environmental Change and Human Security

oystek — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 12:38:46 +0000

Edited by Richard A. Matthew, Jon Barnett, Bryan McDonald and Karen L. O’Brien

Foreword by Geoffrey D. Dabelko

In recent years, scholars in international relations and other fields have begun to conceive of security more broadly, moving away from a state-centered concept of national security toward the idea of human security, which emphasizes the individual and human well-being. Viewing global environmental change through the lens of human security connects such problems as melting ice caps and carbon emissions to poverty, vulnerability, equity, and conflict. Global Environmental Change and Human Security examines the complex social, health, and economic consequences of environmental change across the globe.

Contributors: W. Neil Adger, Jennifer Bailey, Jon Barnett, Victoria Basolo, Hans Georg Bohle, Mike Brklacich, May Chazan, Chris Cocklin, Geoffrey D. Dabelko, Indra de Soysa, Heather Goldsworthy, Betsy Hartmann, Robin M. Leichenko, Laura Little, Alexander López, Richard A. Matthew, Bryan McDonald, Eric Neumayer, Kwasi Nsiah-Gyabaah, Karen L. O’Brien, Marvin S. Soroos, Bishnu Raj Upreti

Book announcement: “Climate Change in the 21st Century” by Stewart J. Cohen with Melissa W. Waddell

oystek — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 13:19:28 +0000

Understanding the world’s biggest crisis – and why it’s not just an environmental problem.

Climate Change in the 21st Century goes beyond climate modeling to investigate interdisciplinary attempts to measure and forecast the complex impacts of futureclimate change on communities, how we assess their vulnerability, and how we plan to adapt our society. The book explores the impact of climate change on different ecosystems as well as what the social and economic understanding of this phenomenon can tell us; it also links discussions of climate change with the global discourse of sustainable development.

Oslo Summer School at University of Oslo, “Security and Environmental Change”, Lecturer: Professor Simon Dalby

oystek — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 11:48:56 +0000

Oslo Summer School in Comparative Social Science Studies is taking place July/August 2010. Several courses will be held, but the course
“Security and Environmental Change” by Professor Simon Dalby taking place 26 – 30 July will be of special interest to our community.

Online application will be available in January 2010 and the application deadline is 15th of May 2010.

2010 International Climate Change Adaptation Conference

oystek — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 15:11:17 +0000

The Climate Adaptation Futures Conference will be held 29 june - 1 July 2010 at the Gold Coast Convention Centre , Queensland, Australia. The conference will be one of the first international forums to focus solely on climate impacts and adaptation and it will bring together scientists and decision makers from developed and developing countries to share research approaches, methods and results. It will explore the way forward in a world where impacts are increasingly observable and adaptation actions are increasingly required.

Abstracts must be received by January 18, 2010

Call for Papers: Association of American Geographers (AAG) Annual Conference

Kirsten Ulsrud — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 14:07:33 +0000

The Annual Conference of the Association of American Geographers (AAG) will be held on April 14-18, 2010, in Washington D.C. GECHS SSC-member Joni Seager (Bentley University) is co-organising a paper session on “Gender and Climate Change – Pitfalls, Possibilities and Realities”, with Farhana Sultana (Syracuse University). Sponsors are Cultural and Political Ecology Specialty Group (CAPE), Development Geographies Specialty Group (DGSG), and Geographical Perspectives on Women Specialty Group (GPOW).

Geographers are uniquely situated to engage with the ways that nature-society relations are differentiated along gender lines, bringing fresh perspectives and critical lenses to the ways that climate change impacts and adaptation efforts are understood, experienced and acted up differently across axes of social differentiation, sites and scales. A gender perspective can thus provide insights to enrich existing debates, demonstrating the ways that drivers of climate change, vulnerability, resiliency, adaptation, policy-making, and decision-making are all bound up with various constructions of gender and difference, which have important outcomes in the ways that climate changes come to affect people and places. This session seeks to engender climate change debates and bring critical geography perspectives into conversation with the dominant narratives around climate change, related impacts, mitigation, and adaptation. Papers are invited that engage with such concerns.

Please send abstracts of no more than 250 words to both organizers by 15 October 2009. For more information on the AAG conference, please visit the conference website. Please note that there is no funding to assist attendance to the AAG conference.

Call for papers: Climate Change, Social Stress and Violent Conflict

Kirsten Ulsrud — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 14:45:20 +0000

The international conference Climate Change, Social Stress and Violent Conflict, will be organized at the Klima Campus at Hamburg University, November 19-20, 2009. The workshop aims to bring together national and international experts to explore and discuss main elements of the current “state of the art” in terms of knowledge on security implications and conflict potential of climate change. Furthermore participants will explore research needs, both with respect to problem analysis and methodologies. Besides providing a snapshot of the current debate, it aims at building connections among individuals and research groups that can provide a basis for establishing an international network on climate security and conflict.

These are some of the guiding questions for the conference:

What are the major causal chains between climate change and violent conflict, and what is the empirical basis for these linkages, revisiting previous assessments of environmental conflict?

Which approaches, methods and theories are helpful for the analysis of the links between climate change, social stress and violent conflict?

Is it adequate to call climate change a threat to national or international security?

Are broader security conceptions (such as environmental or human security) useful for evaluating the violence risks of climate change?

What is the likelihood, potential damage and resulting risk for violent conflict of water and food scarcity, mass migrations and natural disasters induced by climate change?

Deadline for submission of abstracts is August 31, 2009. Send abstracts of maximum one page to: ClimateSecurity@uni-hamburg.de (Subject line: Abstract Climate Conflict Conference). The conference organizer is KlimaCampus, Universität Hamburg.

GECHS Synthesis themes in IHDP Update

Kirsten Ulsrud — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 14:08:57 +0000

The GECHS project is currently in its synthesis phase, and therefore a special issue of IHDP UPDATE Magazine has been dedicated to important themes in the process of synthesising 10 years of research on human security and global environmental change. The GECHS Synthesis Conference was organised June 22-24 2009, at the University of Oslo, Norway, as part of this synthesis process. At this conference, the new role for “human dimensions” research on human security in a rapidly changing world was discussed. Building on these multiple perspectives and a wide range of thematic and geographical expertise, the IHDP Secretariat and GECHS co-published this special issue of the IHDP UPDATE magazine, No. 2 2009, which is available for download here.

Book: Adapting to Climate Change – Thresholds, Values, Governance

Kirsten Ulsrud — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 11:52:23 +0000

GECHS chair Karen O’Brien is co-editor of this comprehensive book on adaptation to climate change, with Neil Adger, University of East Anglia and Irene Lorenzoni, University of East Anglia. The book presents the latest science and social science research on whether the world can adapt to climate change. Written by experts, both academics and practitioners, it examines the risks to ecosystems, demonstrating how values, culture and the constraining forces of governance act as barrier to action. The book includes historical, contemporary, and future insights into adaptation to climate change. It covers adaptation issues from different perspectives: climate science, hydrology, engineering, ecology, economics, human geography, anthropology and political science; and contains contributions from leading researchers and practitioners from around the world.