First event of the ESG Project's Speaker Series with the Decabonization Working Group: Steven Bernstein & Matthew J. Hoffmann (University of Toronto): Disruption and Stability in the Pursuit of Decarbonization (12 April, 2-3pm CET)

[Höhne, Chris]

Dear colleagues,

We cordially invite you to the first event of the Earth System Governance (ESG) Project's Speaker Series with the Decabonization Working Group (ESG Project's Climate Governance Task Force). 

Steven Bernstein & Matthew J. Hoffmann (University of Toronto): Disruption and Stability in the Pursuit of Decarbonization (12 April, 2-3pm CET)

Efforts to pursue decarbonization face a stability-disruption dilemma. To be effective, they must both disrupt the carbon-locked in status quo and they need to generate stable path pathways to low (no) carbon economies and societies. This is a difficult needle to thread. Initiatives that are seen as ‘too disruptive’ may struggle to achieve the necessary political support to scale up and become durable. Yet, too many initiatives that are touted as ‘solutions’ to climate change are not fully disruptive of carbon lock-in and are thus insufficient to prevent or counteract the climate crisis. In this talk we discuss the source and nature of the stability-disruption dilemma and explore how the concept and politics of just transition may offer ways to successfully navigate it.  

Speakers:

• Matthew Hoffmann is a Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Toronto Scarborough and co-director of the Environmental Governance Lab. His research and publications explore the politics of decarbonization, climate change and, and just transition.  He also regularly comments on global environmental affairs in the media. Professor Hoffmann is a lead faculty member in the ESG network and chair of the board of directors for the environmental NGO, Green Economy Canada. 
• Steven Bernstein is Distinguished Professor of Global Environmental and Sustainability Governance at University of Toronto, Co-Director of the Environmental Governance Lab, and a lead faculty member in the ESG network. His research spans the areas of global governance and institutions, global environmental politics, IPE, and policy studies. He is the author or co-editor of several books and author of over 80 scholarly articles and book chapters. His current research projects investigate transformative policies and initiatives to achieve decarbonization (with Matthew Hoffmann), coherence and incoherence in global sustainability governance, and questions of change at the intersection of International Relations and Global Environmental Politics theory and research. He also holds an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Copenhagen.

Please register here for the event.

 

About the new “Decarbonization” Working Group

The “Decarbonization” Working Group is part of the ESG Project’s “Task Force on Climate Governance”. It gathers researchers from various disciplines who are interested in studying climate mitigation, the different potential pathways towards decarbonizing societies and its drivers and hurdles. The working group is currently launching an ESG Speaker’s Series and plans to grow its activities over time, organizing events at Earth System Governance (ESG) conferences or writing joint papers for journals.

 

We welcome all scholars interested in studying climate mitigation and decarbonization. If you are interested in joining the working group, please fill out this form.

 

Feel free to contact the coordinators:

Chris Höhne, Freie Universität Berlin, Germany, chris....@fu-berlin.de

Valeria Zambianchi, University of Leuven, Belgium & Utrecht University, Netherlands, v.zamb...@uu.nl

 

Best regards,

Chris (on behalf of the “Decarbonization” Working Group)

 

 

_______________________________________
Dr. Chris Höhne
Research Associate
DFG Reinhart Koselleck Project "TRANSNORMS"
Otto Suhr Institute of Political Science
Freie Universität Berlin

Ihnestr. 26, 14195 Berlin, room 203
chris....@fu-berlin.de