Transformation of Political Violence in the Anthropocene guest lecture April 10th

Political Violence

Syria, Ukraine, Sudan, Israel, Gaza — political violence is back on the agenda of (global) politics.

One reason why violence transforms may have to do with environmental change, but what is our current knowledge of how political violence transforms in and as a reaction to the Anthropocene? The talk will present as a first step the evolution of a highly matured research field that focuses on the causal chains of how climate change might or might not lead to new conflict patterns. In a second part, the argument will be presented that the current transgression of planetary boundaries is by itself a form of political violence that includes a) the setting up of specific structures through capitalist practices; b) the actions of radical land defenders and the reactions of repressive state and non-state entities; and c) the “maladaptation” that often occurs when mitigation or adaption projects have unintended consequences. In a final step, these dynamics will be illustrated in the case of India, where a new geopolitics of the Anthropocene is now unfolding.  

Introducing the speaker, Markus Lederer

Prof. Markus Lederer is a Professor of Political Science with a focus on International Relations at Technical University Darmstadt, Germany. His research focuses on institutional and geopolitical questions of global climate politics. Current projects analyze the international architecture of the Paris Agreement and the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, with lock-in effects of multi-level institutional change in emerging economies (particularly India and Indonesia), the politics of tropical forest protection, the geopolitics of renewable energy, climate change and biodiversity, and the role of radical environmental social movements in climate politics. 

Discussants: Simon Bush & Frank Biermann

Prof. Simon Bush is Professor and Chair of the Environmental Policy Group at Wageningen University. His research focuses on the global dimensions of sustainable marine and aquatic food governance, as well as links between sustainable food, energy, and climate, with multiple research projects in these areas. He is a member of the Academic Board of Wageningen University, co-director of the Wageningen Centre for Sustainability Governance, and is member, inter alia, of the Standards Oversight Committee of the Global Aquaculture Alliance.

Prof. Frank Biermann is a research professor of Global Sustainability Governance with the Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development at Utrecht University. His research focuses on global institutions and questions of planetary justice in the sustainability domain. He is the founder and first chair (2008-2018) of the Earth System Governance Project, a leading global research network of sustainability scholars. He currently directs a European Research Council (ERC) Advanced Grant project on the steering effects of the Sustainable Development Goals.

Session Chair: Aarti Gupta

Prof. Aarti Gupta is a personal professor of global environmental governance at the Environmental Policy Group at Wageningen University. Her research focuses on questions of transparency and accountability in global climate governance and on anticipatory governance of novel technologies. She is the PI on an NWO project on transformative transparency in global climate governance, a member of the Scientific Steering Committee of the international Earth System Governance research alliance, and advisor to the Global Challenges Foundation.