Ahoy Friends,
Hop on board the Sustainability Working Group ship starting on Monday, November 2! Don't be a landlubber… it's all hands on deck for our lineup of warm-up week sessions starting in just a few days.
We're looking forward to meeting you soon!
Monday, 2 November – State of the Field Discussion (16:00 UTC)
This is our kickoff event! Come and discuss the ways in which the field of sustainability has evolved over the last year. What research questions have recently come to the forefront? What discussions and debates have arisen? What papers have left an impression? Tune in for an update on the State of the Field. We are pleased that our working group mentors, Jessica Hellmann and David Barkin, will join us to reflect on the state of the field from each of their unique perspectives.
Presenters: Jessica Hellmann, David Barkin, and Ariel Ibanez
Moderated by Ariel Ibanez, Dania Clarke, and Felipe Botelho
Thursday, 5 November (16:00 UTC) – Introduction & Icebreaker
Get to know the Sustainability Working Group! Hear what the group has been up to, and take the opportunity to introduce yourself to the others.
Moderated by Dania Clarke
Saturday, 7 November (13:00 UTC) – Environmental issues and degrowth answers
This session focuses on degrowth to solve environmental and social issues. Young scholars will present what they are currently working on, and receive feedback from peers.
Presenters: Julien Vastenaekels | Structural Obstacles to a Degrowth Transition: A Veblenian Perspective; Christopher Olk | Schumpeter for Degrowth? Towards a macro-model of sustainable creative destruction; Judyta Lubacha | Role of social movements in solving environmental issues.
Moderated by Edoardo Vignotto.
Saturday, 7 November (14:00 UTC) – Business, urbanizing and sustainability
This session focuses on the role on business in to build sustainability paths and sustainable urbanization. Young scholars will present what they are currently working on, and receive feedback from peers.
Presenters: Arijit Paul | Business model innovations for photovoltaic self-consumption; Lot Kaduma | Reimaginging Housing Development Through Modularization: A Pathway Towards Smart and Sustainable Urbanization; Rachel Alexander | Business Case Sustainability Initiatives & Global Production Network Upgrading: Garment Sector Experiences in Bangladesh.
Moderated by Felix Donkor.
Saturday, 7 November (16:00 UTC) – Theoretical debates and practical experiences of sustainable transitions
This session focuses on critical views of theoretical proposals and experiences in the field of sustainability research. Young scholars will present what they are currently working on, and receive feedback from peers.
Presenters: Elena Piedra | Climate extremes and crop diversification: adaptation to climate change in Brazil; Vinicius Muraro da Silva | Can Science Lead the Green Transition? STRN as an epistemic community; Matteo Seminati | The integration of smart solution in public transport: the case of Milan.
Moderated by Teresa Meira.
Saturday, 7 November (17:00 UTC) – Financing, sustainability and pandemic
This session focuses on the complex and non-lineal relationship between financing and sustainability in the context of COVID-19. Young scholars will present what they are currently working on, and receive feedback from peers.
Presentations by Kavitha Srikanth | The catch 22 of climate financing for developing countries; Ellen Quigley | Universal Ownership in the Age of COVID-19: Social Norms, Feedback Loops, and the Double Hermeneutic; Valéria Frajuca | Financial market and sustainability: a case study of the green bond emission by the BNDES (Brazilian development bank).
Moderated by Felipe Botelho Tavares
Sunday, 8 November (15:00 UTC) – Social & environmental issues in Latin America: Alternative views of development
What are the current tensions between extractivism and sustainability in Latin America?
Presenters: Sharom Cabrera-Montece | Analysis of the water crisis: towards a sustainability approach; Alejandra Saravia-López | The Governance of Water in Microecuences in Bolivia; Alelic Parra-Meneses | Environmental conflict in neo-extractivism. The Latin American fight against mega-mining; Xavier Viteri-Ramos | The incidence of oil exploitation in community development in the Ecuadorian Amazon.
Moderated by Ariel Ibanez
Tuesday, 10 November (17:00 UTC) – Climate-litigation and corporations (with Sustainability and Finance Law & Economics)
Can climate-litigations push companies towards decarbonization?
Panelists: Aditya Narayan Mishra (climate scientist and Ph.D. student at the University of Graz), Lydia Omuko-Jung (Climate lawyer and Ph.D. student at the University of Graz), and Andrew Behar (Chief Executive Officer of the shareholder advocacy firm As You Sow).
Moderators: Arijit Paul (business management scholar and post-doctoral researcher at the University of Graz) and Aritra Chakrabarty
Tuesday, 10 November (19:00 UTC)- Climate Implications at the Micro and Macro Levels
This session showcases the working papers of YSI scholars. Research on the climate-related impacts of water variability, in agriculture and floods, and public sentiments for achieving a green-growth equilibrium will be presented. Our mentor, Jessica Hellmann, will be providing feedback to the presenters.
Presenters: Martina Occelli | Rain does not fall on one roof alone; Haoluan Wang | Flood Your Neighbors: Spillover Effects of Levee Building; Marwil J. Dávila-Fernández | How do you feel about going green?
Moderated by Ariel Ibanez
Wednesday, 11 November (15:00 UTC)- Vegan food, innovation and sustainability
Join us for a cooking class and discussion about how to cook sustainably!
Presenter: Patieene Passoni | Fiscal austerity policies in the Brazilian economy: a structural decomposition analysis between 2010-2017
Moderated by Ariel Ibanez
Thursday, 12 November ( 17:00 UTC) – The next 50 years: Imagining and building pathways toward ecologically sustainable societies
This session is an input talk from our mentor, David Barkin PhD, an expert in sustainability, ecological economy, and local food systems. He collaborates with local communities in Mexico to advance projects for sustainable regional resource management. These projects are designed to promote local capacities for self-government and ecosystem management while consolidating their ability to improve their quality of life. David will highlight issues and questions for the future of the sustainability field.
Barkin, David and Sánchez Jiménez, Alejandra. The Communitarian Revolutionary Subject: New forms of social transformation. Third World Quarterly. 2020; 41(8):1421-1441. DOI: 10.1080/01436597.2019.1636370
Presenter: David Barkin
Moderated by Ariel Ibanez
Friday, 13 November ( 17:00 UTC) – Green Finance: From managing financial risks to financing sustainable development (with Sustainability and Keynesian Economics)
The urgency of the risks that climate change entails forces economists to take these risks into consideration; strategies for adaptation and mitigation to climate change must be implemented. Investments to make these changes are more urgent each year, and more so now that many countries have overlooked to their environmental goals to promote production and reduce the socioeconomic impact of the pandemic. The financing mechanisms to carry them out can generate large macroeconomic and financial imbalances, mainly in emerging and undeveloped economies, which are more affected by climate change.
Mentors/Presenters: Pablo Gabriel Bortz | Professor and Researcher; Maria Nikolaidi | Associate Professor in Economics
Moderated by Nicole Toftum
Friday, 20 November, 2020 – Project Brainstorm (15:00 UTC)
Have something you are interested in or curious about? A question you’d like to explore further? Learn how you can turn that into a YSI Project in your Working Group. Join and flesh out your ideas (however big or small) with help from those who did it before.
Moderated by Ariel Ibanez
The Sustainability Working Group Coordinators extend a huge thank-you to all of the hardworking volunteers/organizers who are making this plenary possible:
Aritra Chakrabarty, Felix Donkor, Teresa Meira, Nicole Toftum, Edoardo Vignotto