ESRC Climate Change Leadership Fellowships

What are the Climate Change Leadership Fellowships?

Climate change has contributed to a rise of both policy and research debates, within the UK and internationally.

These six leadership fellows propose innovative approaches and application of leading edge social science to addressing key research issues in mitigating and/or adapting to climate change.

The Climate Change Leadership Fellows are:

• Prof Harriet Bulkeley, Durham University - Urban Transitions: climate change, global cities and the transformation of socio-technical systems

Urban Transitions is a three year project examining the ways in which cities around the world are responding to climate change. Home to over half of the world's population, cities are significant sources of the greenhouse gases that lead to climate change and are also vulnerable to the impacts of a changing climate. The project analyses how cities are addressing climate change through their energy and housing systems, and the social and technical factors that are shaping the possibilities for urban transitions in the face of a changing climate.

• Prof Peter Newell, University of East Anglia (now moved to University of Sussex) - The Governance of Clean Development

This innovative research programme focuses on the governance of clean development, principally in the area of energy, and aims to generate insights into which features of the actors, institutions, and policy-making processes involved in clean development at the national and international are resulting in effective outcomes in terms of climate action and developmental benefits, which are not, and why. By employing a combination of research and outreach activities the project seeks to push forward current research and practice on the politics of clean development.

• Prof Simon Caney, University of Oxford - Equity and Climate Change

Climate change raises many ethical questions (including, for example, how to treat future generations, how to assess the impacts of climate change and who should bear the burden of combating climate change) but the ethical challenges posed by climate change need fuller evaluation than they have received so far.  This research project addresses this lacuna and develops a justice-based framework for thinking about climate change.

• Dr Karen Turner, University of Stirling - Investigating the pollution content of trade flows and the importance of 'environmental trade balances' in addressing the problems of climate change

Addressing the issue of climate change is a hot topic amongst policy makers and the public alike. The addition of carbon labels on food, not only in our supermarkets, but now becoming introduced to well known fast foods restaurants reminds us that accounting for carbon content is a concern for both consumers and producers. See story on LWEC website.

Karen Turner recently published a special report from Fraser of Allander Institute in partnership with PwC on 'Energy and Pollution', This brings together academic research on a range of energy and climate issues including: accounting for carbon generation; the ‘rebound effect’; climate change policy; and the future energy generation mix in Scotland. You can read the report here http://www.strath.ac.uk/frasercommentary/specialissues

For more information contact karen.turner@stir.ac.uk

• Prof Nick Pidgeon, Cardiff University - Risk Perception, Climate Change and Public Engagement

Understanding what people think about climate change is important for developing better communication and dialogue between the science community, policy makers and various sectors of the public. The fellowship aims to investigate (a) the extent to which public perceptions of climate change and its risks are indeed changing (or not) in both the UK and internationally and (b) to provide recommendations for risk communication and public engagement about climate change risks. Read Nick's latest paper here

• Prof Elizabeth Shove, Lancaster University - Transitions in practice: climate change and everyday life

This climate change leadership fellowship addresses the need for new ways of framing problems of climate change, consumption and demand. To date, governments have sought to improve the efficiency with which contemporary 'standards' of everyday life are maintained. It is now clear that policy and governance actors have to go further and that systemic transitions in practice - in patterns of sociability and mobility, and of comfort, cleanliness, food provisioning and leisure - are also required.

Elizabeth Shove recently introduced an extraordinary lecture and exhibition of ideas at the British Library (Jan 2011), attended by around 200 people. Elizabeth says 'the exhibition is available online and in terms of impact etc. the WWF are wanting to use part of it in various exhibitions they are running this spring.' To see the exhibit go to http://www.lancs.ac.uk/staff/shove/lecture/lecture.htm

PROGRAMME FACTS AND FIGURES

Start and end dates: 01/10/2008 to 31/05/2012