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1.
This article develops a new framework for understanding environment-conflict relations, on both theoretical grounds and through a qualitative historical analysis of the links between water and conflict in the states of Sudan and South Sudan. Theoretically, the article critiques the dominant emphases on ‘scarcity’, ‘state failure’ and ‘under-development’ within discussions of environmental security, and proposes an alternative model of environment-conflict relations centring on resource abundance and globally-embedded processes of state-building and development. Empirically, it examines three claimed (or possible) linkages between water and conflict in the Sudans: over trans-boundary waters of the Nile; over the links between internal resource scarcities and civil conflict; and over the internal conflict impacts of water abundance and development. We find that there exists only limited evidence in support of the first two of these linkages, but plentiful evidence that water abundance, and state-directed processes of economic development and internal colonisation relating to water, have had violent consequences. We conclude that analysts and policymakers should pay more attention to the impacts of resource abundance, militarised state power and global political economic forces in their assessments of the potential conflict impacts of environmental and especially climate change. 相似文献
2.
The ‘Anthropocene’ concept provides a conceptual framework that encapsulates the current global situation in which society has an ever-greater dominating influence on Earth System functioning. Simulation models used to understand earth system dynamics provide early warning, scenario analysis and evaluation of environmental management and policies. This paper aims to assess the extent to which current models represent the Anthropocene and suggest ways forward. Current models do not fully reflect the typical characteristics of the Anthropocene, such as societal influences and interactions with natural processes, feedbacks and system dynamics, tele-connections, tipping points, thresholds and regime shifts. Based on an analysis of current model representations of Anthropocene dynamics, we identify ways to enhance the role of modeling tools to better help us understand Anthropocene dynamics and address sustainability issues arising from them. To explore sustainable futures (‘safe and operating spaces’), social processes and anthropogenic drivers of biophysical processes must be incorporated, to allow for a spectrum of potential impacts and responses at different societal levels. In this context, model development can play a major role in reconciling the different epistemologies of the disciplines that need to collaborate to capture changes in the functioning of socio-ecological systems. Feedbacks between system functioning and underlying endogenous drivers should be represented, rather than assuming the drivers to be exogenous to the modelled system or stationary in time and space. While global scale assessments are important, the global scale dynamics need to be connected to local realities and vice versa. The diversity of stakeholders and potential questions requires a diversification of models, avoiding the convergence towards single models that are able to answer a wide range of questions, but without sufficient specificity. The novel concept of the Anthropocene can help to develop innovative model representations and model architectures that are better suited to assist in designing sustainable solutions targeted at the users of the models and model results. 相似文献
3.
Energy system pathways which are projected to deliver minimum possible deployment cost, combined with low Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions, are usually considered as ‘no-regrets’ options. However, the question remains whether such energy pathways present ‘no-regrets’ when also considering the wider environmental resource impacts, in particular those on land and water resources. This paper aims to determine whether the energy pathways of the UK’s Carbon Plan are environmental “no-regrets” options, defined in this study as simultaneously exhibiting low impact on land and water services resulting from resource appropriation for energy provision. This is accomplished by estimating the land area and water abstraction required by 2050 under the four pathways of the Carbon Plan with different scenarios for energy crop composition, yield, and power station locations. The outcomes are compared with defined limits for sustainable land appropriation and water abstraction.The results show that of the four Carbon Plan pathways, only the “Higher Renewables, more energy efficiency” pathway is an environmental “no-regrets” option, and that is only if deployment of power stations inland is limited. The study shows that policies for future low-carbon energy systems should be developed with awareness of wider environmental impacts. Failing to do this could lead to a setback in achieving GHG emission reductions goals, because of unforeseen additional competition between the energy sector and demand for land and water services in other sectors. 相似文献
4.
Cultural ecosystem services caught in a ‘coastal squeeze’ between sea level rise and urban expansion
Sea level rise and urbanization exert complex synergistic pressures on the provision of ecosystem services (ES) in coastal regions. Anticipating when and where both biophysical and cultural ES will be affected by these two types of coastal environmental change is critical for sustainable land-use planning and management. Biophysical (provisioning and regulating) services can be mapped using secondary data. We demonstrate an approach to mapping cultural ES by engaging stakeholders in iterative participatory mapping of personally and communally valuable cultural ES. We identify hotspots where highly valued cultural ES and high values for biophysical ES co-occur and generate spatially-explicit projections of sea level rise and urban expansion through 2060 to quantify impacts of the ‘coastal squeeze’ on ES. We study Johns Island, South Carolina, USA as an example of a vulnerable community in a low-lying region experiencing both rising water levels and a rapid influx of new residents and development. Our projections of environmental change through 2060 indicate that on Johns Island, cultural ES face disproportionately greater risk of decline than biophysical ES, with almost three quarters of the island’s cultural ES affected. We find that hotspots for cultural ES, such as community heritage sites and scenic vistas of oak-lined roads and marshes, rarely co-occur (only 3% area) with biophysical ES such as high values of carbon sequestration and agricultural production. This confirms the importance of engaging with local stakeholders to map cultural ES and puts them on a more level playing field with biophysical ES in decision-making contexts. Projected declines and limited overlap between biophysical and cultural ES highlight the need for tighter coordination between conservation and community planning, and for including locally valued cultural ES in assessments of threats posed by the ‘coastal squeeze’ of sea level rise and urban expansion. 相似文献
5.
《Climate Policy》2013,13(5):516-526
This article proposes a shift to a paradigm that is more extensive than the current narrow focus on North—South climate change technology transfers, towards a more inclusive ‘global’ paradigm. An implication of the paradigm shift is that there should be a concomitant expansion of the policy agendas of the international climate and trade regimes. The traditional North—South paradigm of technology transfer ignores the increasing importance of developing countries as sources of advanced climate-friendly technologies, and therefore ignores South—North and South—South transfers. Further, whereas the North—South paradigm has emphasized developing countries' intellectual property rights policies as barriers to technology transfers, the ‘global’ paradigm focuses attention on trade and investment policy barriers, including developed countries' policies that inhibit technology transfer from developing countries. The analysis is relevant to international negotiations in the post-2012 climate regime, and is also relevant to the future development of the trade regime—not only at the multilateral level in the WTO, but also at the regional and bilateral levels. 相似文献
6.
This article examines the perception of climate change, in relation to 21 other socioeconomic and environmental problems, on the part of 132 respondents to a survey conducted in the city of Nairobi, Kenya. Factor analysis, used to condense these interrelated problems into a few dimensions, identified two overriding threats: the first being to socioeconomic security, and the second to the physical environment. Threats to socioeconomic security explained 76.6% of the variance in the rating of environmental and socioeconomic problems facing Nairobi, with very high factor loadings from corruption, unemployment, crime, street children, garbage, transport, poverty, pollution of Nairobi River, HIV/AIDS and immorality/promiscuity. Threats to the physical and living environment explained 22.2% of the variance in the rating of environmental and socioeconomic problems facing Nairobi. We were led to conclude that the respondents did not perceive climate change as being a significant problem in Nairobi. The global concern about climate change appeared like a mere drop in the oceanic context pervaded by problems of poverty, unemployment, crime and corruption, etc. which Nairobi faces, as does Kenya as a whole. Our conclusion is partially reflected in the priorities of the Kenyan government, which focus on poverty alleviation, the fight against crime and graft, improved access to education, and on addressing health problems; it also poses a challenge to the climate change community to find ways to making interventions relevant to local socioeconomic reality facing a developing country city like Nairobi. There may be a need to reconsider ‘whose reality counts’ (borrowing from Robert Chambers, Whose reality counts? Putting the first last, Intermediate Technology Publications, London, p 122, 1997) in addressing climate change: should protracted Kyoto protocol negotiations be given priority or should a long lasting solution be sought to socioeconomic problems facing developing world cities such as Nairobi? We recommend that the ongoing efforts at integrating climate risk management, as components of climate-sensitive sustainable development, be studied in many settings, with a focus on the developing world which is the most vulnerable, in order to inform decision-making and development of intervention measures. 相似文献
7.
Today's global society is economically, socially and culturally dependent on minerals and metals. While metals are recyclable, terrestrial mineral deposits are by definition ‘non-renewable’ over human timescales and their stocks are thus finite. This raises the spectre of ‘peak minerals’ – the time at which production from terrestrial ores can no longer rise to meet demand and where a maximum (peak) production occurs. Peak minerals prompts a focus on the way minerals can be sustainably used in the future to ensure the services they provide to global society can be maintained.As peak minerals approaches (and is passed in some cases), understanding and monitoring the dynamics of primary mineral production, recycling and dematerialisation, in the context of national and global discussions about mineral resources demand and the money earned from their sale, will become essential for informing and establishing mechanisms for sustainable mineral governance and use efficiency into the future. Taking a cross-scale approach, this paper explores the economic and productivity impacts of peak minerals, and how changes in the mineral production profile are influenced not only by technological and scarcity factors, but also by environmental and social constraints. Specifically we examine the impacts of peak minerals in Australia, a major global minerals supplier, and the consequences for the Asia-Pacific region, a major destination for Australia's minerals.This research has profound implications for local and regional/global sustainability of mineral and metal use. The focus on services is useful for encouraging discussion of transitions in how such services can be provided in a future more sustainable economy, when mineral availability is constrained. The research also begins to address the question of how we approach the development of strategies to maximise returns from mineral wealth over generations. 相似文献
8.
Ans Kolk 《Climate Policy》2015,15(1):170-176
While research has generated very useful insights, usually at the macro level, regarding the multifaceted nature of environmental innovation and regulation, the characteristics and drivers peculiar to international companies have remained underexposed in the policy-related literature on clean technology transfer and development. This article aims to help open the ‘black box’ of business, also as input for future policy making, by discussing aspects that influence corporate responses: sector-specific and company-specific peculiarities as well as those related to country contexts (both origin countries and host countries for companies). Most of the climate-related investments in ‘developing’ countries turn out to have been geared to a few emerging economies, generally involving established technologies with limited transfer, and a major role for developed-country utilities, particularly from Europe. Despite these limitations, there is a base with experience being built up, and a potential for extension to lesser-developed areas, but that requires market co-creation by joint business and governmental efforts. As viable business models are largely lacking, the article suggests three main modalities, ranging from fully commercial to primarily publicly funded, involving different types of actors and countries. Gearing policies more towards corporate realities and reaping the international momentum of sustainable energy might also further climate goals. 相似文献
9.
《Global Environmental Change》2007,17(2):281-295
Floods, windstorms, drought and wildfires have major implications for human health. To date, conceptual advances in analysis of vulnerability and adaptation to climatic hazards from the environmental and social sciences have not been widely applied in terms of health, though key progress is being made particularly in relation to climate change. This paper seeks to take this conceptual grounding further, examining how key themes relate to health concerns, exploring connections with existing health literatures, and developing an organising framework to aid analysis of how vulnerability to health impacts varies within society and how actors make decisions and take action in relation to climatic hazards and health. Social science research on this theme is challenging in part because of the complex mechanisms that link hazard events to health outcomes, and the many-layered factors that shape differential vulnerability and response within changing societal and environmental contexts (including the dual effect of hazards on human health and health systems, and the combination of ‘external’, ‘personal’ and ‘internal’ elements of vulnerability). Tracing a ‘health impact pathway’ from hazard event through health risk effects to health outcomes can provide a research tool with which to map out where the different factors that contribute to vulnerability/coping capacity come into effect. 相似文献
10.
One-third of all food produced in the world is lost or wasted, which has negative consequences for societies and the environment. Thus, curbing food waste is critical to securing human well-being and protecting the environment. This study examines the drivers of household food waste decisions by investigating the activation and deactivation of moral norms and introducing the concept of the ‘good provider’ in an augmented norm-activation model (NAM). A survey of 643 consumers in Australia and Singapore explores the ‘good provider’ norm as a driver of food waste behaviours in both cultures. For Australians, ‘good provider’ norms suppress intentions to avoid food waste, most likely to provide for the immediate family, which can be a motive that overrides moral concern about food waste in an individualistic culture. For Singaporeans, ‘good provider’ norms do not suppress food waste intentions, possibly due to the value placed on thrift by a long-term-oriented culture. The paper significantly extends the previous research on norms, culture and sustainable consumption and provides policy and practical implications for curbing food waste in different cultural contexts. 相似文献
11.
Swidden (also called shifting cultivation) has long been the dominant farming system in Montane Mainland Southeast Asia (MMSEA). Today the ecological bounty of this region is threatened by the expansion of settled agriculture, including the proliferation of rubber plantations. In the current conception of REDD+, landscapes involving swidden qualify almost automatically for replacement by other land-use systems because swiddens are perceived to be degraded and inefficient with regard to carbon sequestration. However, swiddening in some cases may be carbon-neutral or even carbon positive, compared with some other types of land-use systems. In this paper we describe how agricultural policies and institutions have affected land use in the region over the last several decades and the impact these policies have had on the livelihoods of swiddeners and other smallholders. We also explore whether incentivizing transitions away from swiddening to the cultivation of rubber will directly or reliably produce carbon gains. We argue that because government policies affect how land is used, they also influence carbon emissions, farmer livelihoods, environmental services, and a host of other variables. A deeper and more systematic analysis of the multiple consequences of these policies is consequently necessary for the design of successful REDD+ policies in MMSEA, and other areas of the developing world. REDD+ policies should be structured not so much to ‘hold the forest boundary’ but to influence the types of land-use changes that are occurring so that they support both sustainable livelihoods and environmental services, including (but not limited to) carbon. 相似文献
12.
The sustainability transitions literature seeks to explain the conditions under which technological innovations can diffuse and disrupt existing socio-technical systems through the successful scaling up of experimental ‘niches’; but recent research on ‘grassroots innovations’ argues that civil society is a promising but under-researched site of innovation for sustainability, albeit one with very different characteristics to the market-based innovation normally considered in the literature. This paper aims to address that research gap by exploring the relevance of niche development theories in a civil society context. To do this, we examine a growing grassroots innovation – the international field of community currencies – which comprises a range of new socio-technical configurations of systems of exchange which have emerged from civil society over the last 30 years, intended to provide more environmentally and socially sustainable forms of money and finance. We draw on new empirical research from an international study of these initiatives comprising primary and secondary data and documentary sources, elite interviews and participant observation in the field. We describe the global diffusion of community currencies, and then conduct a niche analysis to evaluate the utility of niche theories for explaining the development of the community currency movement. We find that some niche-building processes identified in the existing literature are relevant in a grassroots context: the importance of building networks, managing expectations and the significance of external ‘landscape’ pressures, particularly at the level of national-type. However, our findings suggest that existing theories do not fully capture the complexity of this type of innovation: we find a diverse field addressing a range of societal systems (money, welfare, education, health, consumerism), and showing increasing fragmentation (as opposed to consolidation and standardisation); furthermore, there is little evidence of formalised learning taking place but this has not hampered movement growth. We conclude that grassroots innovations develop and diffuse in quite different ways to conventional innovations, and that niche theories require adaptation to the civil society context. 相似文献
13.
This article introduces and evaluates the implications for global environmental change of the rising power and authority of big brand companies as global environmental governors. Contributing to the private governance literature and, in particular, addressing the gap in this research with respect to the political implications of individual firm ‘buyer power’, the article provides evidence and analysis of how big brand sustainability is altering the power relations within global supply chains, and the governance prospects and limits of this trend. The authors argue that recent brand company efforts through their global supply chains, while still a long way off from their goals, are achieving environmental gains in product design and production. Yet, these advances are also fundamentally limited. Total environmental impacts of consumption are increasing as brand companies leverage corporate sustainability for competitive advantage, business growth, and increased sales. Big brand sustainability, while important, will not on its own resolve the problems of global environmental change. In conclusion, the article highlights the importance of a co-regulatory governance approach that includes stronger state regulations, sustained advocacy, more responsible individual consumerism, and tougher international legal constraints to go beyond the business gains from big brand sustainability to achieve more transformational, ‘absolute’ global environmental progress. 相似文献
14.
《Climate Policy》2013,13(6):593-611
Following the conclusion of the official work of the Ad Hoc Group for the Modelling and Assessment of Contributions to Climate Change (MATCH), this article considers the politically more sensitive aspect of the Brazilian proposal, namely the issue of differentiating (historic) responsibility for, and not merely (causal) contribution to climate change. Its aim is (1) to highlight the fact that, while related, the two issues (‘contribution to’ and ‘responsibility for’) are fundamentally different and should not be confused, and (2) to propose a methodology for calculating shares of responsibility as opposed to the shares in causal contribution arrived at through the MATCH results. Two conceptions of responsibility (‘strict’ or ‘limited’) are applied in order to operationalize the notion of ‘respective capabilities’ given in Article 3.1 of the UNFCCC. The key message resulting from the calculations is that causal contribution—while an important indicator of (environmental) relevance to the problem—must not be confused with the moral responsibility for it. The rather large difference between the responsibilities at the two extremes of the scale under both conceptions gives pause for thought as to what sorts of burdens can justly be demanded in any application of the UNFCCC principle of common but differentiated responsibilities, whether in the context of the Brazilian proposal or beyond. 相似文献
15.
Meeting the food needs of the growing and increasingly affluent human population with the planet’s limited resources is a major challenge of our time. Seen as the preferred approach to global food security issues, ‘sustainable intensification’ is the enhancement of crop yields while minimizing environmental impacts and preserving the ability of future generations to use the land. It is still unclear to what extent sustainable intensification would allow humanity to meet its demand for food commodities. Here we use the footprints for water, nitrogen, carbon and land to quantitatively evaluate resource demands and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of future agriculture and investigate whether an increase in these environmental burdens of food production can be avoided under a variety of dietary scenarios. We calculate average footprints of the current diet and find that animal products account for 43–87% of an individual’s environmental burden – compared to 18% of caloric intake and 39% of protein intake. Interestingly, we find that projected improvements in production efficiency would be insufficient to meet future food demand without also increasing the total environmental burden of food production. Transitioning to less impactful diets would in many cases allow production efficiency to keep pace with growth in human demand while minimizing the food system’s environmental burden. This study provides a useful approach for evaluating the attainability of sustainable targets and for better integrating food security and environmental impacts. 相似文献
16.
Rivers as municipal infrastructure: Demand for environmental services in informal settlements along an Indonesian river 总被引：1，自引：0，他引：1
In many developing world cities, where municipal infrastructure lags urban growth, lower-income communities may compensate by relying on local waterways to meet basic needs for water, sanitation, and recreational space. Access to these environmental services is possible because residents settle in floodplains, but thus entails elevated exposure to several water-related hazards, especially flooding. We examine this complex relationship in the neighborhoods of Bukit Duri and Kampung Melayu on the Ciliwung River in Jakarta, Indonesia. Based on a spatially referenced household survey, we analyze and map the patterns of use of six environmental services provided by the river: direct sanitary use, recreation, harvesting plants, groundwater use, solid waste disposal, and sewage disposal. Using spatial interpolation and regression methods, we identify the most probable areas where services are being used and analyze possible influences on this behavior. We find that proximity to the river significantly influences households’ behavior toward the river, as do infrastructure-related variables and neighborhing households’ behavior, while household demographic factors appear less significant. These results indicate that many households rely on multiple environmental services, and that residents most reliant on these services are also at greater risk of water-related hazards, service disruption (e.g., a decline in water quality), and potentially, eviction. This pattern of floodplain development is prevalent in many low-income countries, and a better understanding of how informal settlements rely on environmental services can be used to assess their vulnerabilities and inform more sustainable courses of development. 相似文献
17.
It is often argued that the growth of major emerging powers, such as China, India, Russia, and Brazil, will have a transformative effect on the world economy and politics, but the implications of their rise on sustainable development diplomacy have remained understudied. Do these new powers have the potential to exercise leadership and address the stalled performance on the sustainable development agenda? Drawing on theories of leadership in multiparty negotiations and the empirical study of two major emerging powers’ coalitions, BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) and BASIC (Brazil, South Africa, India, China), this article assesses their leadership potential in sustainable development diplomacy. It finds that emerging powers are already engaging in policy coordination in the sustainable development realm, have begun to use their influence to create incentives for other actors in the system and have been conducting skillful diplomacy to develop their coalitions and forge consensus in global policy-making. However, exerting actual global leadership would require building a stronger policy agenda. One area with particular potential for emerging powers to exert leadership is the clean energy arena of sustainable development diplomacy. 相似文献
18.
Anthony S. Kiem 《Global Environmental Change》2013,23(6):1615-1626
This paper reviews historical and existing drought and water policy in Australia in order to gain a sense of the strengths and weaknesses in enabling effective adaptation to climate change. In particular, (a) the social, economic, and environmental costs and benefits of water trading and (b) the limitations of using ‘market-based’ instruments (MBIs), like water trading, for adapting to drought and water security related climate change impacts are investigated. It was found that water trading has potential as a climate change adaptation strategy with many benefits experienced in previous and current versions of water trading. However, there are also limitations and those negatively impacted by water trading are hit hard. These social impacts of water trading have not been thoroughly investigated and are not well understood. Significant uncertainty also exists around the impacts of water trading on the environment (e.g. changed hydrological regimes, underestimation of sustainable environmental flows etc.). Proper quantification of these impacts is needed, however, it is a complex task given Australia's large hydroclimatic variability and the current lack of understanding as to how to optimise water needs of the environment, humans, agriculture and other industries. It appears that ‘cap and trade’ quantity-based MBIs such as water trading will eventually do what they are designed to do (i.e. reallocate a resource to ‘high value’ users). However, given that the ‘low value’ users in this case are agriculture and town/urban water supply (not including drinking water) and the ‘high value’ users are mining, manufacturing, and electricity production (i.e. high greenhouse gas emissions), do we really want the water trading MBI to achieve its objective? And, what would the social and environmental ramifications of such a shift in water use within Australia be? These questions, along with the limitations and potential implications of using water trading (and MBIs in general) as a climate change adaptation tool, must be carefully considered if past Australian drought and water policy failures are not to be repeated. 相似文献
19.
By 2030 Indonesia aims to reduce its CO2 emissions by 29% while maintaining a 7% annual GDP growth rate, thus making “green economy” a reality. Based on a review of literature and secondary data and interviews with key informants, this article examines the gap between these national ambitions and the reality on the ground, with particular attention to the challenges of multi-scalar environmental governance. It first introduces the green economy concept and discusses the main green growth policies and initiatives at the national level. The article then examines green growth ambitions at the provincial level in East Kalimantan province. Our findings suggest that existing plans to further expand oil palm plantations are at odds with provincial efforts to reduce emissions. This highlights a key paradox we identify at the heart of the green economy concept as it is developing in Indonesia: between a development trajectory based on resource extraction and agro-industrial development, and ‘green’ aspirations linked to environmental protection and greenhouse gas emissions reductions. We conclude that the main challenges to address these contradictions are related to the lack of coordination between different governance scales and a political economy that is not conducive to reforms in the land-based sector. There is a need to align investment, planning, and green growth policies, based on a strong political commitment and an awareness of social and environmental trade-offs. On a more general level the article shows that the green economy concept refers to a form of environmental governance in which authorities and interests may overlap and come into conflict at different scales. Hence, differing priorities may lead the material expression of the green economy to diverge significantly from policy as it is initially laid out. 相似文献
20.
《Global Environmental Change》2003,13(3):223-228
The United Nations World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD), held in Johannesburg in August 2002 was the fourth environmental ‘mega’ conference since the first held in Stockholm in 1972. Its aim was to discuss how much progress has been made since the Earth Summit in Rio in 1992 and plan further action for the future. This paper first reviews the history and evolution of the environmental ‘mega conferences’ and outlines six core functions which they seek to perform. These are: setting global agendas; facilitating ‘joined-up thinking’; endorsing common principles; providing global leadership; building institutional capacity; and legitimising global governance through inclusivity. Using this evaluative framework, the outcomes, achievements and disappointments of the Johannesburg summit are discussed, along with an evaluation of the future role of such mega-conferences. The paper concludes that environmental mega-conferences do serve an important function in contemporary environmental governance, even though they are not the panaceas that some had originally hoped they might be. In many ways WSSD was a wasted opportunity for progress—politicians lacked the will for adopt ambitious action plans, which frustrated and disappointed participants in the vibrant civil society summit which accompanied the official meeting. The sustainable development agendas have now been set and consolidated, and the task facing politicians is to implement the agreements. This will be achieved and monitored in different fora to the mega-conferences that had originally opened the debates. The task now is for the UN to incorporate the views of citizen's groups and NGOs, and build on bottom-up activism, at the same time as top-down governmental decision-making. 相似文献