News
Sustainable Climate Action Requires new Mindsets
13 July 2020
The UN Climate Change Conferences regularly fail to adequately address climate change. Does this relate to how the conferences are designed and organised? Could developing a different culture of cooperation and communication help to make progress? Which mindsets and associated inner qualities might be conducive in this process? A new study and article by Professor Christine Wamsler and colleagues explores these questions. Inner dimensions and transformation can support people to live more sustainably and drive change
23 June 2020
A research initiative at LUCSUS examines how inner dimensions and transformation can support people to live more sustainably and drive change. Addressing (the causes and effects of) climate change is one of the most important societal challenges of our time. The demands for political action are becoming stronger from all levels of society, including individuals, social movements, businesses, and governmental and non-governmental organisations. Five forest myths obscure the path to transformational and sustainable forest governance
10 June 2020
Are financial instruments really the solution to deforestation and degradation? Do states truly manage forests for societal benefit? And to what extent are so-called sustainable forest governance initiatives really including local people in decision-making? These are some of the questionable myths that currently obscure the path to sustainable forest governance according to a new publication in the Journal Global Sustainability that three LUCSUS researchers have co-authored. New research points out key gaps in EU’s largest funding scheme, the Common Agricultural Policy
25 May 2020
Properly managed, the agricultural sector in Europe can contribute to many of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by improving food security, reducing poverty and enhancing biodiversity. But new research shows that indicators to measure key SDGs such as health and equality are entirely missing from the EU’s most expensive funding scheme. Interview with LUMES student Hanna Geschewski about the impact of the corona pandemic in Nepal
4 May 2020
LUMES student, Hanna Geschewski, has just come back to Sweden after she was temporarily stranded in Nepal during fieldwork for her thesis. In this interview, she reflects on the impact of the corona outbreak on her own studies, and on the society in Nepal, where the socio-economic consequences of global and national measures to slow its spread have hit many people hard.
Natural solutions to combat climate change may ignore power, marginalisation and local agency
15 April 2020
Natural solutions to combat climate change are perceived as beneficial to both nature and people simultaneously. But claims that natural solutions also bring about empowerment, gender equality and inclusion are problematic, especially when issues of power, agency and marginalisation are ignored. This is according to new research from LUCSUS. Reflections on what the coronavirus pandemic could mean for the favelas in Brazil by Ebba Brink
14 April 2020
Ebba Brink, postdoctoral researcher at LUCSUS, is doing research about climate change risk and adaptation in the favelas in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The current coronavirus pandemic has forced her to come back to Sweden, and move her research online. She reflects on how the outbreak has made the right-wing Bolsonaro government’s polarizing politics and disregard for science even more obvious, and on what a widespread outbreak of corona could mean for the favelas. Reflections on the impacts of the coronavirus on indigenous communities in the Amazon by Torsten Krause
14 April 2020
LUCSUS researcher Torsten Krause have been researching hunting, forest fauna and wild meat consumption, particularly in the Amazon, for the past three years. He is currently in Colombia, where his fieldwork was cut short due to the current coronavirus pandemic. In this interview, he reflects on the impacts of the coronavirus on vulnerable indigenous communities, and on the link between humanity's destructive interaction with the environment, and the emergence of new and potentially very dangerous diseases. World Water Day 2020: perspectives on water, agriculture, consumption and climate change
20 March 2020
Water is essential to all human life on earth. Today, over two billion people live in countries experiencing high water stress – risking both health and food security. As populations and the demand for water grow, this situation is likely to worsen.
New course on Climate Change and Society
19 March 2020
Climate change has become one of the defining social and environmental challenges of our time. In light of the public and political attention that the issue has gained, the need for informed and critical perspectives on this important topic is more urgent than ever. 