With apologies for cross-posting.
RGS-IBG Annual Conference 2010, London 1-3 September 2010
*
*Session: The Political Geography of Climate Change*
*Session Organisers: Drew Foxall (Oxford University) and Nicholas
Howarth (Oxford University)
Intersecting energy security, economic development and tensions relating
to international trade, state and non-state actors are increasingly
being forced to familiarize themselves with both the environmental and
political conflicts arising from climate change. The recent 15^th
Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Climate Change (COP15) in
Copenhagen in December 2009 highlighted both the urgency and strength of
global concern regarding the global risks climate change, but also the
limitations of the institutions available to reconcile competing
interests and promote cooperation. On a more superficial level, the
international media has also been focused on attacks by climate sceptics
on the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change’s inclusion of
non-peer reviewed research on the risks of the melting of the Himalayan
glaciers and controversial anonymous cyber attacks on the University of
East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit.
In this vein, the journal ‘Political Geography’ devoted an entire issue
to exploring the links between climate change and violent conflict
(Volume 26, Issue 6). In the issue’s opening article, “Climate Change
and Conflict”, Ragnhild Nordås and Nils Petter Gleditsch lamented the
lack of firsthand, peer-reviewed research on climate and conflict,
noting that “statements about security implications have so far largely
been based on speculation and questionable sources” (p. 628). This
session in part picks up where that issue left off.
Climate change is a fruitful area of research for both human and
physical geographers, as well as for others, not least because of the
increasing importance of climate change and mitigation policy to global,
national, and local affairs. In this session we aim to bring together
those working on what might be termed the ‘Political Geography of
Climate Change’. We welcome relevant abstracts on any topic related to
this purposefully broad theme. Possible topics might include:
- What are the spatial politics of climate change?
- How are climate change discourses created, circulated and consumed at
varying scales?
- What would a subaltern and class-based view of climate geopolitics
look like?
- What are the implications of climate change for world security?
- Where do political geographies emerge from as part of the climate
change paradigm?
- How can climate change be re-scaled and embodied through political
geography?
Please submit your abstracts (of max. 200 words) to both session
organisers by 1 March 2010.
If you have any questions please contact the organizers;
[log in to unmask] or [log in to unmask]
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Drew Foxall
Christ Church
OXFORD OX1 1DP
http://www.geog.ox.ac.uk/graduate/research/dfoxall.html
Political Geography Research Group (RGS-IBG)
http://polgrg.wordpress.com/
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