S Climate Change

Presentation by Hartmut Graßl: "Die CO2-Last in der Atmosphäre ist für die Menschheit bedrohlicher als viele andere Konflikte - The CO2 load in the atmosphere is more threatening to humanity than many other conflicts" - Presentation Session Part 1

Record failed by technical reason

no abstract

Presentation by Marilyn Medina: "Facing the Challenges on Weather Forecasting:  From Mythology to the Evolving Science of Meteorology" - Presentation Session Part 2

Record failed by technical reason

Given the advent of extreme weather disturbances caused by climatic changes, the national weather agency has recognized that this challenge will become part of the Filipino way of life. Weather forecasters must not allow people to become helpless sitting ducks in the face of imminent devastations. Capacity should match the growing challenges of the future.  
Looking back on the different myths, lore, and beliefs on occurrences of natural hazards prevented the community to decide on which warning to follow.  It is in this regard that this study was conceptualized to elevate the level of competence of the national weather agency in forecasting the weather and informing the people with the warnings on occurrence of imminent destruction. Providing robust intellectual, technical and political leadership to effectively inform the people about how they could protect themselves and face disasters from a position of strength was undertaken. Interviews, survey of cultural beliefs,  Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) were done to establish the effectiveness of enhanced weather forecasting in the community.  Presenting this study will go a long way in upgrading the competence of the organization that will redound to more Filipino lives being saved in the future.

Presentation by Fritz Reusswig: "Facing unpleasant futures: Climate change, democracy, and higher education. Working with contradictions" - Presentation Session Part 3

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The paper will explore the connection between the current climate crisis, the political character of a society, and higher education. The main thesis is that while democratic societies, mostly exemplifying a particular variety of capitalism, are entangled in the contradiction between non-sustainable growth and sustainability goals, they perform better in environmental terms than their non-democratic counterparts. And their higher education system generates more and more influential sustainability science. While there is no guarantee for a sustainability transition in democracies, the probability is higher that they can reach it given the multi-actor and multi-level character of it.

Presentation by Nooshin Torabi: "Does it even exist? Transformational climate change responses in metropolitan Melbourne, Australia" - Presentation Session Part 4

Record failed by technical reason

Transformational climate change responses (CCRs) is required if we aim to achieve our mitigation and adaptation aspiration without compromising well-being of socio-ecological systems in the face of extreme climatic events. While transformative mitigation sounds more straightforward (dismantling fossil fuel industries), those adaptation measures are harder to grasps. This is because they require a fundamental shift in our value systems and governance structure. Analysing of the climate change responses of The Northern Alliance for Greenhouse Action (NAGA) councils, nine local governments, champions of CCRs in Metropolitan Melbourne, I examine the transformative nature of CCRs these councils developed. Results revealed that transformative adaptation measures are hardly visible in local government climate change strategies. On the contrary, incremental adaptation strategies (e.g. networking, knowledge sharing) are prevalent. Mitigation responses, however, are more inclined towards transformative responses. This finding calls for a critical and timely change in the CCRs pedagogy in higher education to train practitioners with a higher-order thinking for a systematic and structural change required for transformative adaptation measures.