Managing The Global Commons Decision Making And Conflict Resolution In Response To Climate Change

A workshop was convened to develop a better understanding of decision-making matters concerning management of the global commons and to resolve conflicts in response to climate change. This workshop report does not provide a narrative of the proceedings. The workshop program is included, as are the abstracts of the papers that were presented. Only the introductory paper on social science research by William Riebsame and the closing summary by Richard Rockwell are reprinted here. This brief report focuses instead on the deliberations of the working groups that developed during the workshop. 4 figs., 1 tab.

The complexities involved in social dilemmas and ecological troubles today challenge scientists to conduct analyses of cultural phenomena that push the boundaries of disciplines and blur the line between theory and practice. Problems are not so much to be solved as they are to be explained, predicted, and navigated. Luther P. Gerlach, Ph.D., Professor Emeritus of Anthropology at the University of Minnesota, has exercised immense influence on social science, policy, and practice to accomplish these challenges. Professor Gerlach is highly regarded within and beyond anthropology for two areas of outstanding research: groundbreaking work on social movements and pioneering studies of local-global environmental conflict, i.e. the conflict between local social, political, and economic control versus global ecological and economic interdependence. This volume's Preface traces Professor Gerlach's intellectual biography and the peer-reviewed chapters indicate the far-reaching impact he and his research continue to have on academic and applied science. Topics cover theories and methods as well as timely case studies in: -Global climate policy -Language and social movements -Environmental and ecosystem management -Public debate, environmental justice, and risk construction -Complexity theory and organizations -Cultural expression and archaic hunting methods -Energy use -Political economy and witch-killings -Public health.

Lists citations with abstracts for aerospace related reports obtained from world wide sources and announces documents that have recently been entered into the NASA Scientific and Technical Information Database.

Quotas have been used in international environmental agreements for at least a century and, in tandem with incentive approaches, should continue to be crucial to realizing a sustainable environment. This text is a critical examination of quotas both as regulatory tools and as products of negotiation. It reviews the main features of environmental problems, the regulatory options and criteria used to judge them, and the various ways of explaining negotiated outcomes. Quotas in the management of fisheries, other resources, freshwater and marine pollution, and air pollution are also described. Selected examples are considered in detail to provide an understanding of how quotas were developed in scientific, political, economic and social context. An assessment of the key features of quotas in practice leads to the identification of an emerging approach, the negotiation of constrained local quotas. The approach is a practical way to balance efficiency and fairness in complex negotiations, without sacrificing environmental effectiveness.

Exploring how climate change has configured the international arena since the 1950s, this book reveals the ways that climate change emerged and evolved as an international problem, and how states, scientists and non-governmental organizations have engaged in diplomatic efforts to address it. Developing amidst the Cold War, decolonization and a growing transnational environmental consciousness, it asks how this wider historical context has shaped international responses to the greatest threat to humankind to date. Thinking beyond the science of climate change to the way it is received and responded to, Ruth Morgan shows how climate science has been mobilised in the political sphere, paying particular attention to the North-South dynamics of climate diplomacy. The privileging of climate science and the mobilisation of climate scepticism are explored to consider how they have undermined efforts to remedy this planetary problem. Studying climate change and international history in tandem, this book explains the origins of the debates around this environmental emergency, the response of political leaders attempting to address the threat, and the barriers to creating an international regime to resolve the climate crisis.