In Common

In this episode, Stefan Partelow interviews Kenny Wallen.

Kenny is an Assistant Professor of Human Dimensions of Fish and Wildlife at the University of Idaho. His professorship is a joint position with the Idaho Department of Fish and Game, so Kenny has one foot in academia and one in practice.  He received his Ph.D. from Texas A&M University in the Human Dimensions of Natural Resources; his M.S. at Oklahoma State University in Zoology; B.A. at Truman State University in Psychology.

https://www.human-element-lab.com/

 

Kenny’s Google Scholar page

https://scholar.google.de/citations?user=XT-t5bgAAAAJ&hl=de&oi=ao

 

Kenny’s university page

https://www.uidaho.edu/cnr/faculty/wallen

 

Research articles mentioned:

Wallen, K. E. & Romulo, C. L. Social norms: More details, please. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U. S. A. 114, E5283–E5284 (2017). https://www.pnas.org/content/114/27/E5283

Wallen, K. E. et al. Integrating team science into interdisciplinary graduate education: an exploration of the SESYNC Graduate Pursuit. J. Environ. Stud. Sci. 9, 218–233 (2019). https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13412-019-00543-2

Wallen, K. E. Focusing on structure and process to integrate and mainstream the social sciences in conservation. Conserv. Biol. 31, 724–726 (2017). https://conbio.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/cobi.12871

In this episode, Courtney and Michael interview Joe Ament. Joe completed his PhD at the University of Vermont where he researched monetary theory and policy in the context of social and ecological equity. His work currently looks at public banking at the national and local levels as well as central banking policy for combating climate change and income inequality.

In this conversation with Joe, we go deep into the concept of money to think about common money misconceptions, the role of money right now during the COVID-19 pandemic and current economic crisis and finally why it's so critical to think about the monetary system to design a just and sustainable future. 

If you are interested to learn more about Joe’s work, here are a couple recent publications:

Paper on Ecological Monetary Theory:

https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/3/923

Uneven Earth Article on the monetary system and the Green New Deal:

http://unevenearth.org/2020/01/public-money-for-environmental-justice/

 

Finding Sustainability Podcast

@find_sust_pod

https://twitter.com/find_sust_pod

 

Environmental Social Science Network

https://essnetwork.net/

https://twitter.com/ESS_Network

@ESS_Network

Michael and Courtney interview Cassandra Brooks, an assistant professor of environmental studies at the University of Colorado, Boulder. We talked about her path from rural New Hampshire to Maine and later on to California, and most of all her transdisciplinary involvement in the development of marine protection in the seas around Antarctica. Cassandra discussed her initial exposure to this space, what drew her to it, and how she and her colleagues have worked to establish marine protected areas in the Southern Ocean.

Cassandra's website: https://www.colorado.edu/envs/cassandra-brooks

A recent paper by Cassandra and colleagues on the policy development process in the Antarctic:

Brooks, C. M., L. B. Crowder, H. Österblom, and A. L. Strong. 2020. Reaching consensus for conserving the global commons: The case of the Ross Sea, Antarctica. Conservation Letters 13(1):289.

Cassandra's famous youtube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BNZu1uxNvlo

 

In this episode, Stefan Partelow interviews David Lam.

David is a PhD candidate at Leuphana University in Germany. His research focuses on the transferability and scalability of the transformational impact of sustainability initiatives. Before starting his PhD, David Lam studied Environmental Studies and Sustainability Science at Lund University and worked for three years as a corporate responsibility consultant for companies, federal ministries, and NGOs.

https://www.leuphana.de/en/institutes/ietsr/staff/david-lam.html

In the podcast we talk about a few different papers (links below) comprising David’s PhD research and thesis. This includes how sustainability transformations are fostered by local actors, but also how understandings of sustainability differs between actors. We also discuss a recent paper led by David on applications processes in the sustainability transformations literature. David has also conducted a review of local and indigensous knowledge, which leads us to discussion on plurality and the challenges on integrating different types of knowledge in transdisciplinary research processes.

Lam, D.P.M., Martín-López, B., Wiek, A. et al. Scaling the impact of sustainability initiatives: a typology of amplification processes. Urban Transform 2, 3 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1186/s42854-020-00007-9

Lam, D., E. Hinz, D. Lang, M. Tengö, H. von Wehrden, and B. Martín-López. 2020. Indigenous and local knowledge in sustainability transformations research: a literature review. Ecology and Society 25(1):3. https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-11305-250103

 

Finding Sustainability Podcast

@find_sust_pod

https://twitter.com/find_sust_pod

Environmental Social Science Network

https://essnetwork.net/

https://twitter.com/ESS_Network

@ESS_Network

This insight episode is taken from episode 024, Stefan’s conversation with Barry Ness.

Barry Ness is an Associate Professor at Lund University Centre for Sustainability Studies in Sweden. He is also the Director of the local interaction platform in Skåne for the Mistra Urban Futures project, and the editor-in-chief of Challenges in Sustainability. His current research interests include inter- and transdisciplinary approaches for both comprehending and addressing complex sustainability challenges.

https://www.lucsus.lu.se/barry-ness

He is also a researcher and work package leader for the Globally and Locally-sustainable Food-Water-Energy Innovation in Urban Living Labs (GLOCULL) project, focusing on creating an urban living lab approach for the food-water-energy nexus. Barry is also a project researcher in LUCID project and the TRANSFORM project.

https://jpi-urbaneurope.eu/project/glocull/

Much of Barry Ness' current research involves engagement with actors outside of academia. Currently, outreach efforts focus on how to improve the sustainability of craft beer production and consumption systems in southern Sweden, SustBeerLab, endorsed by Future Earth.

Barry’s Google Scholar page

https://scholar.google.de/citations?user=zRPHAlAAAAAJ&hl=de&oi=ao

Article on reflexivity mentioned in the podcast

https://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol23/iss4/art20/

Link to M.Sc. LUMES program

https://www.lumes.lu.se/

https://www.lucsus.lu.se/

 

Finding Sustainability Podcast

@find_sust_pod

https://twitter.com/find_sust_pod

Environmental Social Science Network

https://essnetwork.net/

https://twitter.com/ESS_Network

@ESS_Network

Michael and Stefan speak with Raul Pacheco-Vega. Raul is a professor in the Public Administration Division of the Centre for Economic Research and Teaching, CIDE (Centro de Investigacion y Docencia Economicas, CIDE, AC) based out of CIDE Region Centro in Aguascalientes, Mexico. We discussed his work on waste and waste pickers, wastewater, and bottled water as untraditional commons. We also spoke about the importance of making care work and life support systems visible, and his thoughts about fieldwork and ethnography under the spectre of the Covid pandemic.

Raul's personal website: http://www.raulpacheco.org/blog/

Paper on doubly engaged ethnography that Raul mentions:

Pacheco-Vega, R., and K. Parizeau. 2018. Doubly Engaged Ethnography: Opportunities and Challenges When Working With Vulnerable Communities. International Journal of Qualitative Methods 17(1):1609406918790653.

In this episode Michael spoke with Tiffany Morrison, a professor at the Arc Center of Excellence in Coral Reef Studies, associated with James Cook University in Queensland, Australia. They discussed Tiffany's analysis of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park, her thoughts on professional identity, the importance of critical case studies, and the value of polycentricity as an organizing governance concept.

Tiffany's website: https://www.coralcoe.org.au/person/tiffany-morrison

Youtube video on Tiffany's talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kMA1-pFZ5q8

Tiffany's papers that are discussed in the interview:

Morrison, T. H. 2017. Evolving polycentric governance of the Great Barrier Reef. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 114(15):E3013–E3021.

Morrison, T. H., N. Adger, J. Barnett, and K. Brown. 2020. Advancing coral reef governance into the Anthropocene. One Earth.

Mark Lubell's blog post on polycentricity that is mentioned: https://environmentalpolicy.ucdavis.edu/blog/polycentric-governance-concept-searching-theory

Michael and Stefan spoke with Jessica Cockburn, a Lecturer in Environmental Science at Rhodes University, in Grahamstown, South Africa. Jessica identifies as a "pracademic" who often works with local partners to explore how actors across a variety of contexts interact to address sustainability challenges. Her work is highly collaborative. Among the groups she engages with is the Programme on Ecosystem Change and Society (PECS): https://pecs-science.org/.

Topics of the interview include:

The use of "critical realist" philosophy as a basis for engaged research.

The challenge of "pracademics": practical and ethical demands of conducting transdisciplinary research with local partners.

Empirical analysis of "patchy" watershed-scale governance among heterogeneous actor groups.

Jessica's personal website: https://sites.google.com/view/jesscockburn/home

Twitter: https://twitter.com/jess_cockburn

Jessica's paper that Michael mentioned:

Cockburn, Jessica, Georgina Cundill, Sheona Shackleton, Mathieu Rouget, Marijn Zwinkels, Susanna (ancia) Cornelius, Liz Metcalfe, and Dieter van den Broeck. 2019. “Collaborative Stewardship in Multifunctional Landscapes: Toward Relational, Pluralistic Approaches.” Ecology and Society 24 (4). https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-11085-240432.

Tiny book title: A story of hope from a patchy place.

Michael and Stefan interview Liana Chua.

Liana is a social anthropologist at Brunel University London with long-term ethnographic interests in Borneo, ethnic politics, development, more-than-human landscapes, visuality, and materiality. Her current research revolves around the social, political, aesthetic, and affective dimensions of the global nexus of orangutan conservation.

Liana received her PhD in Social Anthropology from the University of Cambridge, her MPhil in Social Anthropological Analysis from the University of Cambridge, and her BA in Modern History from the University of Oxford.

Topics include:

• How social anthropology contributes to conservation research and practice
• The out-group homogeneity effect
• Boundary objects and being open to new ideas
• Tips for effective collaborative research
• The risk of interdisciplinarity

We frequently reference a recent paper led by Liana, published in the journal People and Nature, titled “Conservation and the social sciences: Beyond critique and co-optation. A case study from orangutan conservation”. 

Link to paper Liana’s recent paper in the journal People and Nature:

https://besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/pan3.10072

 

Liana’s university page:

https://www.brunel.ac.uk/people/liana-chua

Liana’s Twitter:

https://twitter.com/liana_chua?lang=en

 

Finding Sustainability Podcast

@find_sust_pod

https://twitter.com/find_sust_pod

Environmental Social Science Network

https://essnetwork.net/

https://twitter.com/ESS_Network

@ESS_Network

 

In this episode, Michael interviews a colleague of his from Dartmouth College, Carey Nadell. Carey is a professor of biological sciences at Dartmouth, and he studies the the evolution of cooperation and conflict among bacteria in the context of their complex communities. His research program shares the same fundamental framing as many commons scholars studying how communities of resource users can avoid the tragedy of the commons. Carey and Michael discuss the relationship between their own research programs based on this shared framing.

Both Michael and Carey are members of Dartmouth's interdisciplinary PhD program in Ecology, Evolution, Environment and Society (EEES), which they also discuss. 

Carey's website: http://nadell-lab.org/