Second Call for Papers: for the RGS-IBG Annual Conference, London, 30 August - 2 September 2016.
Examining ‘communities’ as a site of nexus: opportunities and challenges for energy transitions
Co-sponsors: Energy Geographies Research Group (EnGRG); Planning and Environment Research Group (PERG)
Convenors: Emily Creamer (University of Edinburgh); Gerald Taylor Aiken (University of Luxembourg); Bregje van Veelen (University of Edinburgh)
Framed within the broader context of the transition towards more sustainable, low-carbon societies, ‘community’ can be a rich site for exploring the tensions of ‘the nexus’. Not only does community offer a useful scale for examining holistic approaches to the management of energy transitions, it also serves as the site of an intriguing nexus between bottom-up activism and top-down energy policy implementation.
Governments frequently assume that state support for community-led low-carbon energy initiatives will be of inherent benefit at the local level; however, the incorporation of communities into official government climate change strategies raises many challenging questions about how this is being delivered in practice, for example:
- To what extent are community approaches delivering more sustainable outcomes (environmentally, economically and/or socially)?
- To what extent are local actors being empowered, rather than being co-opted as a regulatory tool of governance?
- What new, if anything, does nexus thought have to add to extant critiques of the role of community?
- What potential exists for lessons learned and solidarities formed between various community-as-nexus examples?
We welcome papers addressing these points and any others examining community-led, low-carbon energy transitions in the light of nexus thought.
The format of the session will be 4 x 15min paper presentations followed by 30min discussion with invited discussant. Prospective presenters should send abstracts of up to 250 words, along with paper title and presenter details, to Emily Creamer ([log in to unmask]) by Wednesday 10th February
For more details on the conference and registration details, please see: http://www.rgs.org/WhatsOn/ConferencesAndSeminars/Annual+International+Conference/Annual+International+Conference+2016.htm
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