Category Archives: General

General

Postdoc on dynamic models of vulnerability in drylands and coastal zones

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The Law and Governance Group focuses on the role of law and governance in the domains of food and natural resources is looking for a post-doc to work on a collaborative project with the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency (PBL) and CERES Research School in the domain of global environmental change :

The post-doc will work in a team with another postdoc on analysis of vulnerability patterns on building bridges between system dynamic models and qualitative case-studies by attempting to upscale lessons learned from local case-studies through Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) and by down-scaling Integrated Assessment Models (IAMS) through cluster analysis of model outcomes. Both strands of the project come together in analyzing patterns of vulnerability. The project will focus on drylands and coastal zones. The post-docs will work in close collaboration with a team of experts from CERES research school and the PBL. The postdoc will be responsible for the down- scaling of Integrated Assessment Models.

The research is carried out in Wageningen and partly at the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency in Bilthoven, and should lead to a development of methodology and a number of high quality publications.

You have a PhD degree in social or natural sciences; a strong interest in and experience with modeling (preferably system dynamics), sensitivity for qualitative research, experience with research on (global) environmental change, and interdisciplinary work. You are a team worker and have excellent writing and communication skills and a proven ability to publish cutting-edge scientific papers in peer-reviewed journals and an excellent command of English

Additional information can be obtained from: Prof dr ir J.W.M. van Dijk (han.vandijk@wur.nl) ( tel +31 317  482960/482957) and Drs M. Kok (marcel.kok@pbl.nl) (tel: +31 30 274 3717)

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2011 Smith Fellowships Annoucement

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I had a Smith Fellowship during my post-doc and it was a good experience.  The 2011 call is open now, and they are open to individuals who want to extend the social-ecological frontiers of conservation biology.

The Society for Conservation Biology is pleased to solicit applications for the David H. Smith Conservation Research Fellowship Program. These two year post-doctoral fellowships enable outstanding early-career scientists to improve and expand their research skills while directing their efforts towards problems of pressing conservation concern for the United States.

Each Fellow is mentored by both an academic sponsor who encourages the Fellow’s continued development as a conservation scientist, and a conservation practitioner who helps to connect the Fellow and her/his research to practical conservation challenges.

Fellows will spend up to four weeks per year during their fellowship attending orientation and training events. These offerings provide opportunities to cultivate professional networks and to gain better understanding of applied research needs. Fellows will participate as a group in three or more of these Program-sponsored meetings, conferences, or professional development events each year.

The Program especially encourages individuals who want to better link conservation science and theory with pressing policy and management applications to apply. We envision that the cadre of scientists supported by the Smith Fellows Program eventually will assume leadership positions across the field of conservation science. Fellows are selected on the basis of innovation, potential for leadership and strength of proposal.

The deadline for receipt of application materials is 24 September 2010. The Program expects to select four Fellows in January 2011 for appointments to start between March and September 2011. Fellowship awards include an annual salary of $50,000, benefits, and generous travel and research budgets. For detailed proposal guidelines, please visit http://www.conbio.org/smithfellows/apply/. Questions may be directed to Shonda Foster, Program Coordinator, by emailing sfoster@conbio.org.

General, Networks, Visualization

Hunza landslide lake

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In early January of 2010 a huge landscape destroyed the village of Attabad and dammed the Hunza river in Northwest Pakistan.  The landslide dam resulted in the rapid growth of a new lake that has flooded a key road and many villages.   NASA’s Earth Observatory website has images (and an early image) showing the flooding.

From NASA EOS acquired June 1, 2010. False colour - Red shows vegetation.

The lake as now overtopped the landslide dam, its the overflows erosion of this dam is threatening thousands of peope who live downriver.  The Boston Globe has collected an fantastic set of photos of this disaster on its The Big Picture.

Women, who lived near a lake created after a landslide in Hunza district, cut barley in a field in Seeshghat village in Hunza district of northern Pakistan May 24, 2010. (REUTERS/Abrar Tanoli)

David Petley a Geography professor at Durham university in the UK runs a weblog monitoring the conditions at the dam.

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Vulnerability Modelling Post-docs in Netherlands

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Marcel Kok lets me know that there are:

Two post-doc positions at Wageningen University and the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency (PBL) for the analysis of patterns of vulnerability.

Within the framework of a collaborative project with the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency (PBL = Planbureau voor de Leefomgeving) and CERES Research School in the domain of global environmental change we are looking for two postdoc s Vulnerability analysis (M/F).

The post-docs will work in a team on analysis of vulnerability patterns on building bridges between system dynamic models and qualitative case-studies by attempting to upscale lessons learned from local case-studies through Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) and by down-scaling Integrated Assessment Models (IAMS) through cluster analysis of model outcomes. Both strands of the project come together in analyzing patterns of vulnerability. The project will focus on drylands and coastal zones.

http://www.academictransfer.com/employer/WUR/vacancy/4624/lang/en/
http://www.academictransfer.com/employer/WUR/vacancy/4625/lang/en/

General

Undermine Nature/Culture dichotomy – Bruno Latour visits Stockholm

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As you might know, some of us at the Stockholm Resilience Centre are quite inspired by actor-network theory (ANT), an “infralanguage” to help us undermine the Nature/Culture (or Social/Ecological) dichotomy; a dichotomy that has divided academia for a long time, but which interdisciplinary institutes like SRC is trying to overcome. One of the key developers of ANT is coming to Stockholm, Bruno Latour, to give a lecture at the Nobel Museum entitled: “May Nature Be Recomposed? A Few Questions of Cosmopolitics” (The Neale Wheeler Watson lecture, Tuesday, 16-18).

Bruno Latour<br />

In many ways, ANT is ‘a way of writing’ academic (ethnographic) accounts so as to treat humans and non-humans (including species, water currents, machines, documents etc.) in similar ways. A classic study is that of Callon (1986), in which a bunch of marine biologists strive to save the population of scallops by introducing controlled scallop production mobilizing both fishers, scallops, technology, and water currents (but they ultimately fails…).

In my own study of how a large green area of Stockholm got protected (and thus influenced the urban ecology of Stockholm), ANT inspired me to acknowledge that it was not only civil society activists that played a great role in managing to protect this green area, but also maps, buildings and species that got ‘enrolled’ into a protective story (Ernstson and Sörlin 2009). Others have used this in similar ways (e.g. Eden et al 1999). I believe more can certainly be done as we engage with this “infralanguage” (for instance how to understand the “politics of scale” in transformative change towards ecosystem management).

In his lecture, Bruno Latour will talk about “cosmopolitics”. Most people would associate this term with that of being an internationalist, somebody with backgrounds in a lot places and nations, and with an open attitude to different cultures and the formation of new collectives. However, I suspect the talk will be about other types of collectives, those that stretch over the Nature/Culture divide, and that even prove that this divide is nothing more than an illusion (although a powerful illusion indeed).

An intrerpretation of what Latour and others (especially Isabelle Stengers, Cosmopolitiques, vol. 1) understand as cosmopolitics is a “politics of the cosmos” that leads to the recognition of new “collectives”, a recognition that humans and non-humans are entangled and that we (the collective) need to respect this entanglement in order to live our lives. In our field of reserach, this idea has partly been captured in the concept “ecosystem services” (although in a more economistic fashion, see argument of a “social production of ecosystem services”; Ernstson, H., 2008, In Rhizomia. PhD Dissertation.Stockholm University, Stockholm.). Funny enough, and inspired by British geographers (Hinchcliffe, Whatmore et al 2005), I held series of lectures and a workshop with art and design students at the Stockholm School of Art and Design (Konstfack) on “Cosmopolitical Experiments“, i.e. how can designs evoke a sense of recognizing our entanglement with these other-than-human citizens that share our planet.

To SRC and the broader field of social-ecological studies, ANT and similar attempts to undermine long held dichotomies that constrains our thoughts, methods and theories, are exciting to explore and engage.

PS. The lecture at Nobel Museum will be broadcasted after the lecture on Tuesday, 16-18.

General

Excercise in nature improves well-being

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Robin Mejia reports on a review paper Green exercise may be good for your head in Environmental Science and Technology by Jules Pretty and Jo Barton (DOI 10.1021/es903183r).  They did a a meta-analysis of 10 studies and found that outside activity for as little as five minutes included mood and self-esteem.

Outdoor activities have been shown to have a positive impact on mental health and can be a valuable component of rehabilitation programs. For individuals struggling with addiction, participating in outdoor activities can provide a healthy outlet for stress and anxiety, as well as improve overall mood and self-esteem. Residential rehab programs, such as those offered at residential rehab in LA, often incorporate outdoor activities into their treatment plans. These programs recognize the importance of connecting with nature as a means of promoting overall well-being and encourage patients to engage in outdoor activities such as hiking, gardening, and yoga. By providing patients with the opportunity to engage in green exercise, residential rehab programs can help individuals on the path to recovery achieve a more balanced and healthy lifestyle.

… the group has studied the effects of different types of green exercise on a variety of populations, from gardening by visitors to university farms to walking and sailing activities for young offender groups, as well as walking by members of urban flower shows. This new analysis reviewed 10 of these studies, which involved a total of 1252 participants. In each study, mood and self-esteem were measured using two widely accepted scales. All types of green exercise led to improvements in the mental health indicators. Most surprising to the researchers was that the strongest response was seen almost immediately.“You get a very substantial benefit from the first five minutes. We should be encouraging people in busy and stressed environments to get outside regularly, even for short bits of time,” says Pretty. After that, increased green exercise continues to add benefit, but with decreasing returns. However, a full day of activity causes another spike in the level of benefit. Both healthy individuals and those managing mental health disorders have reported experiencing benefits from physical activity, with individuals dealing with mental health challenges often showing the most significant improvement in self-esteem. While some people explore various approaches, including CBD products like cbd vape juice, for potential pain and stress relief, it’s worth noting that the effectiveness of CBD in enhancing the benefits of physical activity or addressing mental health needs is an ongoing topic of research. Consulting with healthcare professionals remains important for making well-informed decisions about incorporating CBD products into holistic wellness strategies.

…

Frances Kuo, the director of the Landscape and Human Health Laboratory at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, notes that the new analysis looked at 10 studies with over 1000 participants, which raises the confidence that they’re seeing a valid pattern. Yet the studies were not randomized trials. “None of the studies involved taking people and assigning them to different ‘doses’ of nature; rather, they looked at how people who sought out nature on their own responded to nature.”

Still, the analysis may help those arguing that the built world should be designed to facilitate things such as walking near trees, not driving from garage to parking lot. “Planners and consultants can put this in front of policy makers and say this is serious research that’s been published in the scientific literature,” says Sullivan.

General

SEI looking for deputy director

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Stockholm Environment Insitute (SEI) is looking for someone to fill a combined leadership position as Centre Director for the Stockholm Centre and Deputy Director Operations Stockholm Environment Institute.  SEI is one of the partners of the Stockholm Resilience Centre, so there is the potential for this person to do a lot of resilience research.  The application is due May 19th.

The job ad is below:

The Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI) is an international research institute founded in 1989 by the Swedish Government on integrated research and knowledge generation for policy and decision support on sustainable development. It has research centres in Stockholm, Boston, York, Oxford, Tallinn, Bangkok and Dar-es-Salaam with about 180 staff. A significant part of SEI’s work is carried out in developing countries and the Institute applies an active diversity policy and operates in a global multicultural environment. The Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI) invites applications for a full-time combined position as Centre Director for the Stockholm Centre and Deputy Director Operations for the Institute. The position is located at the SEI Headquarters in Stockholm.

Features and responsibilities of the position as
The Centre Director is responsible for the operations of the SEI Stockholm Centre, by providing strategic and intellectual leadership, carrying out and supporting fund raising, and ensuring the long-term operational and financial viability of the Stockholm Centre including general administration, management and development of Centre staff.

Works as a Senior Research Fellow who formulates, develops, leads, manages and implements one or more externally funded research programmes/projects.

Features and responsibilities of the position as The Deputy Director for operations:

  • Supports the ED on operational issues across the SEI organisation, related to institutional and centre developments and management related tasks
  • Supports the ED in strategic fund raising and external representation
  • Serves on the SEI Executive Team and as such is part of the overall leadership of the Institute.

In an international organization with six research centers around the world, the position requires an experienced and dedicated individual with passion for sustainable development and strong cross-cultural communication skills.

General

Native language endangerment in BC

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Aboriginal languages in Canada are struggling to survive.  This is part of a global pattern.  About 3,000 of the world’s 6,000-7,000 languages are viewed to be endangered.  95% of languages are spoken by only 6% of the world’s people – 25% have less than 1000 speakers.

The First Peoples’ Heritage Language and Culture Council (FPHLCC), a British Columbia crown corporation to assist B.C. First Nations in their efforts to revitalize their languages, arts and cultures, has a produced a report (pdf) on the Status of B.C. First Nations Languages, which finds native languages in BC (map of languages) are seriously endangered.

Gitsenimx is the language with the most speakers  (1,219), all other have less than a thousand speakers, and only Tsilhqot’in and Dakelh have more than 500.

The report states:

  • Fluent First Nations language speakers make up a small and shrinking minority of the B.C. First Nations population
  • Eight languages are severely endangered and twenty two are nearly extinct
  • Most fluent speakers are over 65
  • The majority of classroom teaching is insufficient to create enough new fluent speakers to revitalize languages.

In the press release for the report Dr. Lorna Williams, Chair of the Board at the First Peoples’ Council and Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Knowledge and Learning at the University of Victoria explains:

British Columbia is home to 60% of the indigenous languages in Canada as well as distinct language families not found anywhere else in the world. The cultural and linguistic diversity of B.C. is a priceless treasure for all of humanity and this report shows that more must be done to protect it. With this report, we now have concrete evidence of what we have known for some time: all First Nations languages in B.C. are in a critical state.

I am encouraged by the many fantastic community-based language programs detailed in the report, but unfortunately, they are not enough to stem the loss. I sincerely hope this report is recognized as a call-to-action to save our languages before it is too late.

General

Books: Social demoncratic thought, peer review, and genetic engineering

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1) Henry Farrell on Crooked Timber asks for suggestion for The New New Left Book Club that considers “which books are useful for understanding where the ‘left’ are now.  He suggests:

  • Thomas Geoghegan – Which Side Are You On? Trying To Be For Labor When It’s Flat On Its Back
  • Rick Perlstein’s Before the Storm: Barry Goldwater and the Unmaking of the American Consensus
  • Tom Slee’s No One Makes You Shop at Wal-Mart
  • Mark Blyth, Great Transformations: Economic Ideas and Institutional Change in the Twentieth Century
  • Yochai Benkler, The Wealth of Networks: How Social Production Transforms Markets and Freedom

I’ve only read one of the books that he suggests, Tom Slee’s No One Makes You Shop at Wal-Mart. I thought Slee’s book was insightful and clear.  I adapted a number of examples of it for my adaptive management class at McGill.

2) Michèle Lamont’s book How Professors Think : Inside the Curious World of Academic Judgment examines how social scientists review each others proposed research:

Judging quality isn’t robotically rational; it’s emotional, cognitive, and social, too. Yet most academics’ self-respect is rooted in their ability to analyze complexity and recognize quality, in order to come to the fairest decisions about that elusive god, “excellence.” In How Professors Think, Lamont aims to illuminate the confidential process of evaluation and to push the gatekeepers to both better understand and perform their role.

3) The US National Academy has published its assessment of Impact of Genetically Engineered Crops on Farm Sustainability in the United States.  Their bottom line:

Many U.S. farmers who grow genetically engineered (GE) crops are realizing economic and environmental benefits — such as lower production costs, improved pest control, reduced use of pesticides, and better yields — compared with conventional crops, says a new report from the National Research Council. However, GE crops could lose their effectiveness unless farmers use other proven weed and insect management practices.

But they also state their is a lack of research on social impacts of GE crops, and along with improving social research they recommend:

  • Stakeholder group needed to document emerging weed-resistance problems and develop cost-effect practices to increase longevity of herbicide-resistant crop technology
  • Infrastructure needed on the water quality effects of GE crops
  • Public and private research institutions improve monitoring and assessment capacity to ensure GE technologies contribute to sustainable agriculture
  • Increased support for the development of ‘public goods’ traits through collaborative approaches to genetic engineering technology
General

Burning and Looting

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What caused the financial crisis?

Was the it the models, the expectations, correlated risks, non-transparency, dangerous financial innovation, or weak regulations?

It was probably all of the above, but recently it has become clear that the banks caused it as well.

While people have long observed that mismatched incentives, poor models, and lax regulation allowed and encouraged the banks to make mistakes, it has only recently become clear that some banks (+ hedge funds, etc) helped create the crisis by stimulating investment that fed the housing bubble so they could bet on it bursting.  Specifically, those who were betting on a housing bust enhanced the bubble by creating Collateralized debt obligations (CDOs) they wanted to bet against.  By continually creating and buying these CDOs they almost certainly enhanced the bubble, causing a bigger burst and made more money on the bust.  The extent to which this actually promoted the bubble has only recently become clear.

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