Back to agendaABSTRACT
Speakers: ICREA Research Professors Mario Giampietro and Giorgos Kallis, both from ICTA-UAB
When: 2nd of March 2021, 18:00h
Where: Zoom
Abstracts:
Mario Giampietro
The Uncomfortable Knowledge Hub (https://uncomfortableknowledge.com/) is one of the results of a 4-year EU project (http://magic-nexus.eu/) having the goal of checking the robustness of the narratives used by the European Commission to frame and solve sustainability problems. The UKH flags the blunder of using “scientific evidence” to inform policy. At the moment the proposed efficient environmentally friendly innovations for a circular bioeconomy, a quick decarbonization of the economy, a more sustainable CAP, are based on policy legends (socio-technical imaginaries).
* Giampietro M & Funtowicz SO 2020, ‘From elite folk science to the policy legend of the circular economy’, Environmental Science & Policy, vol. 109, pp 64-72. DOI: 10.1016/j.envsci.2020.04.012
Giorgos Kallis
One of the prevalent policy legends in climate and environmental policy is that green growth is possible – i.e. continuous economic growth is not only compatible with, but also necessary for, sustainability. However, when looking at the latest data on resource use and carbon emissions empirical records disprove the knowledge claim about the possibility of absolute decoupling (separating GDP growth from environmental damage). Addressing sustainability challenges requires going beyond ‘fairy tales of growth’ where technology and markets will solve soon and smoothly all environmental problems. This strategy avoids the need of grappling with the tough social and institutional changes at stake.
* Hickel J & Kallis G 2019 ‘Is Green Growth Possible?’ New Political Economy 25(7576):1-18 DOI: 10.1080/13563467.2019.1598964
The reflection from the colloquium: the social construction of ignorance
How is it possible that young scientists cannot say in public that the circular economy is absurd since it goes against the principle of thermodynamics (complex adaptive systems must be open)? How is it possible that sobering stories – “Houston we have a problem” – trying to identify the real nature of sustainability problems are getting neither attention nor funding?
* Steve Rayner, 2012. Uncomfortable knowledge: the social construction of ignorance in science and environmental policy discourses. Economy and Society 41(1): 107-125.
