[hopos-g] New Perspectives on the History of the International Biological Programme (1964 - 1974), Barcelona November 21-22 , 2025

['Daniele Cozzoli' via hopos-g@vt.edu]

New Perspectives on the History of the International Biological Programme (1964 - 1974)

Barcelona, November 21-22, 2025

 

 

Convenor: Daniele Cozzoli, Pompeu Fabra University

Organisers: Mauro Capocci, University of Pisa; Daniele Cozzoli, Pompeu Fabra University; Fabio De Sio, Klinikum, Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf.

 

This workshop invites scholars to critically examine the history of the IBP (International Biological Programme), which was carried out between 1964 and 1974. The organisers aim to use the workshop to prepare a special issue proposal for a leading international journal on the history of the IBP.

The IBP emerged from discussions among Sir Rudolph Peters, president of ICSU (International Council of Scientific Unions), Giuseppe Montalenti, president of IUBS (International Union of Biological Sciences) and C. H. Waddington, who succeeded to Montalenti as President of the IUBS. After the success of the IGY in 1959 they aimed to set up an analogous programme for biological sciences. Although there were different aims and visions beyond the IBP, it was finally established that its aim was to study “the biological basis of productivity and human welfare,” therefore encompassing disciplines and fields of study which had been separated hitherto.

The IBP studied how the biosphere “can be 'harnessed' by attempting to discover the biological bases of productivity and human welfare.” Within the IBP 7 programmes were originally established:  Conservation of Terrestrial Communities (CT); Human Adaptability (HA); Productivity of Freshwater Communities (PF); Productivity of Marine Communities (PM); Production Processes (PP); Productivity of Terrestrial Communities (PT); Use and Management of Biological Resources (UM). Two more programmes, Environmental Physiology (EP) and Systematics & Biogeography (SB) were added in 1965. Finally, an International Information Centre for the Ecology of Small Mammals was created in Warsaw, at the Institute of Ecology of the Polish Academy of Sciences. To disseminate results and information two publications were launched: IBP News, a quarterly publication in English and Biosphere, a four-page journal in French and English. The project should have lasted until 1972, but was extended until 1974. After a four-year planning phase (1964 to June 1967) the operational phase spanned from June 1967 to 1972, followed by a five-year dissemination phase.

 

 

The workshop will take place in Barcelona at Pompeu Fabra University, on 21-22 November 2025 in hybrid format. The organisers will cover accommodation and travel expenses of participants. 

 

We invite scholars to send an abstract of max 250 words by 15 September 2025 to daniele...@upf.edu on any aspect of the history of IBP. Proposal may concern one of the projects developed within the framework of the IBP, an area of research, the contribution of a national representative or of individuals. 

 

We are particularly interested in proposals addressing the following topics:

 

- the relations between the IBP and other initiatives in the field of human ecology and environment;

- the role the Soviet Union played in orienting the IBP’s aims towards human welfare;

- the tensions between the different aims and perspectives within the IBP initiative

-  the relations between agriculture and fisheries within the IBP;

- the IBP, the European Integration process and the scientific relations between East and West Europe;

- the role IBP played in shifting or erasing disciplinary boundaries. Indeed, the IBP meetings were often in-between symposia and technical meetings, producing handbooks and technical reports, which played a part in cross-disciplinary dialogue;

- how IBP modified national research agendas. Certain countries, like the Scandinavian countries and a number of East African countries (Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania) formed federations within the IBP;

- data centres of IBP

 

Confirmed speakers:

 

- Mauro Capocci, Università di Pisa 

- Daniele Cozzoli, Universitat Pompeu Fabra

- Vanessa Heggie, University of Birmingham

- Soraya, De Chadarevian, University of California Los Angeles

- Fabio De Sio, Klinikum, Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf

- Doubravka Olsakova, Academy of Science of the Czech Republic 

- Laurence Roche Nye, Université Paris Nanterre - CRPM 

 

 

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