GECHS

Karen O’Brien, GECHS Chair, is a professor in the Department of Sociology and Human Geography at the University of Oslo, Norway. She is working on issues related to global environmental change, globalization, vulnerability, climate change adaptation, and human security. She is particularly interested in how societies both create and respond to change. Her research explores the ways that processes such as climate change, biodiversity loss and other large-scale environmental transformations interact with other global processes to exacerbate inequity, increase vulnerability and undermine sustainability. Moreover, she is interested in how integral theory and integral approaches can contribute to a better understanding of both the problems and solutions linked to climate change. Karen O’Brien leads the PLAN project on Responding to Climate Change: The Potentials of and Limits to Adaptation in Norway, and was also a Lead Author on the adaptation chapter for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fourth Assessment Report. Her publications include three books: Environmental Change and Globalization: Double Exposures (Oxford 2008); Coping with Climate Variability: User Responses to Seasonal Forecasts in Southern Africa (Ashgate, 2003, edited with C. Vogel); and Sacrificing the Forest: Environmental and Social Struggles in Chiapas (Westview, 1998), as well as articles published in Climatic Change, Global Environmental Change, Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change, and the Annals of the Association of American Geographers.

Recent Publications

Leichenko, R.M. and K.L. O’Brien. 2008 Global Environmental Change and Globalization: Double Exposures. New York: Oxford University Press.

Eriksen, S.E.H. and K.L. O’Brien 2007. Vulnerability, Poverty and the Need for Sustainable Adaptation Measures. Climate Policy 7: 337-352.

Klein, R.J.T., S.E.H. Eriksen, L.O. Næss, A. Hammill, C. Robledo, K.L. O’Brien and T.M. Tanner. 2007. Portfolio Screening to Support the Mainstreaming of Adaptation to Climate Change into Development Assistance. Climatic Change.

O’Brien, K.L., Eriksen, S., Nygaard, L. and Schjolden, A. 2007. Why Different Interpretations of Vulnerability Matter in Climate Change Discourses. Climate Policy 7: 73-88.

Dessai, S. O’Brien, K.L. and M. Hulme. 2007. Editorial: On Uncertainty and Climate Change. Global Environmental Change 17: 1-3.

O’Brien, K. and R. Leichenko. 2006. Climate Change, Equity and Human Security. Die Erde 137(3): 223-240.

O’Brien, K., S. Eriksen, L. Sygna, and L. O. Naess (2006). “Questioning complacency: Climate change impacts, vulnerability, and adaptation in Norway.” Ambio 35(2): 50-56.

O’Brien, K. (2006). “Are we missing the point? Global environmental change as an issue of human security.” Global Environmental Change-Human and Policy Dimensions 16(1): 1-3.

O’Brien, K., R. Leichenko, et al. (2004). “Mapping vulnerability to multiple stressors: climate change and globalization in India.” Global Environmental Change-Human and Policy Dimensions 14(4): 303-313.