In Common

Insight #6: Academic working culture

This insight is taken from episode 020 of the podcast, where Michael and Stefan have a conversation with Courtney Hammond Wagner. Courtney is a postdoctoral research fellow at Stanford University, working on water governance in the Western United States. In the clip the three of us discuss challenges in academic working culture, including being a parent in academia, productivist mentality and self-evaluation.

 

Finding Sustainability Podcast

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Environmental Social Science Network

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023: Policy engaged research, collective action, and the ecology of games with Mark Lubell

This past fall we spoke with Mark Lubell, a professor in the Department of Environmental Science and Policy and the co-director of the Center for Environmental Policy and Behavior (CEPB) at the University of California, Davis. We spoke about Mark's interdisciplinary engagements at his institution, the value of doing used-based research, the ecology of games framework that he has pioneered, and how tools like this are needed to capture complex social interactions in real-world policy environments.

Mark's website: http://www.des.ucdavis.edu/faculty/lubell/

CEPB website: https://environmentalpolicy.ucdavis.edu/

Correction: In discussing the concept of polycentricity, Michael mentions Rebecca Gruby as being from the University of Colorado Boulder, but Dr. Gruby is a professor at Colorado State University (https://sites.warnercnr.colostate.edu/rebeccagruby/)

Insight #5: The challenge of frameworks

This insight is taken from episode 020 of the podcast, a conversation between Stefan, Michael and Courtney Hammond Wagner. Courtney is a postdoctoral research fellow at Stanford University, working on water governance in the Western United States. We discuss the challenge of using frameworks in science, with the example of Elinor Ostrom's social-ecological systems (SES) framework.

 

Finding Sustainability Podcast

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Environmental Social Science Network

https://essnetwork.net/

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022: Sustainable food systems with Liz Carlisle

Liz Carlisle is an Assistant Professor in the Environmental Studies Program at University of California, Santa Barbara, where her work focuses on fostering a more just and sustainable food system. She holds a Ph.D. in Geography from UC Berkeley and a B.A. in Folklore and Mythology from Harvard University, and she formerly served as Legislative Correspondent for Agriculture and Natural Resources in the Office of U.S. Senator Jon Tester. Recognized for her academic publishing with the Elsevier Atlas Award, which honors research with social impact, Liz has also written numerous pieces for general audience readers, in the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Business Insider, and Stanford Social Innovation Review. She is the author of two books about transition to sustainable farming: Lentil Underground (winner of the 2016 Montana Book Award) and Grain by Grain, coauthored with farmer Bob Quinn.

UCSB webpage

https://www.es.ucsb.edu/people/liz-carlisle

Personal website

 

 

Finding Sustainability Podcast

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Environmental Social Science Network

https://essnetwork.net/

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Insight #4: Harini Nagendra on structural biases

This insight clip is taken from episode 017 of the podcast with Harini Nagendra. Harini explains some of the challenges and bias of the science system between the global north and the global south.

Harini Nagendra is a Professor of Sustainability at Azim Premji University. Her recent book "Nature in the City: Bengaluru in the Past, Present, and Future" (Oxford University Press India, 2016) examines the transformation of human-nature interactions in Bangalore from the 6th century CE to the present, addressing the implications of such change for the urban sustainability of fast-growing cities in the global South. The book was listed by the science journal Nature as one of the five best science picks of the week in its issue of July 28 2016.

https://azimpremjiuniversity.edu.in/SitePages/harini-nagendra.aspx

Prof. Nagendra is an ecologist who uses methods from the natural and social sciences - satellite remote sensing, biodiversity studies, archival research, GIS, institutional analysis, and community interviews, to examine the sustainability of forests and cities in the global South. She completed her PhD from the Centre for Ecological Sciences in the Indian Institute of Science in 1998. Since then, she has conducted research and taught at multiple institutions, and was most recently a Hubert H Humphrey Distinguished Visiting Professor at Macalester College, Saint Paul, Minnesota in 2013. She is a recipient of numerous awards for her research, including a 2017 Web of Science 2017 India Research Excellence Award as the most cited Indian researcher in the category of Interdisciplinary Research; a 2013 Elinor Ostrom Senior Scholar award for her research and practice on issues of the urban commons, and a 2009 Cozzarelli Prize from the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA (with Elinor Ostrom).

Harini Nagendra has authored two books, and over 150 peer reviewed publications, including in Nature, Nature Sustainability and Science. 

Harini’s two books:

Nature in the City: Bengaluru in the Past, Present and Future

https://www.amazon.com/Nature-City-Bengaluru-Present-Future/dp/0199465924

 

Cities and Canopies: Trees in Indian Cities

https://www.amazon.com/Cities-Canopies-Trees-Indian/dp/0670091219/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=Cities+and+Canopies%3A+Trees+in+Indian+Cities&qid=1569093142&s=books&sr=1-1

She writes extensively on her research for the public via newspaper and magazine articles, science blogs, and has given a number of public talks for science communication. She also engages with international research on global environmental change, She is a Steering Committees member of the Future Earth Programme on Ecosystem Change and Society and a former Steering Committee Member of the Global Land Project, Diversitas and a Capacity Building Committee member of the Asia Pacific Network for Global Environmental Change. She has also been a Lead Author of the 5th IPCC Report - Working Group III.

Harini’s Google Scholar page

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

 

Link to her commentary piece in Nature 2018

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-05210-0

 

Link to her recent article in Nature Sustainability

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-018-0101-5?platform=hootsuite

 

Finding Sustainability Podcast

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Environmental Social Science Network

https://essnetwork.net/

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021: Linking Stoicism and sustainability with Kai Whiting

Kai Whiting is a researcher and lecturer in sustainability and Stoicism at the University of Lisbon, Portugal. His main research interests are how to better account for resource use and the practical application of Stoic philosophy to the challenges of the 21st century. He has a background in Environmental Engineering, but believes that without philosophy we will never understand the “why” we do what we do, which is why he combines both disciplines in his approach.

Kai’s website

https://stoickai.com/

Follow Kai on Twitter

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

Kai’s Google Scholar page

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

Text interview with Kai from the Daily Stoic 

https://dailystoic.com/kai-whiting-interview/

Finding Sustainability Podcast

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Environmental Social Science Network

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Insight #3: Elena Finkbeiner on reflexivity and games

This ‘Insight’ episode is taken from episode 010 of the podcast with Elena Finkbeiner. In this short segment, Elena discusses reflexivity in the scientific process and then explains the usefulness of games or behavioral economics experiments with fishers in Mexico. 

Elena Finkbeiner is the Fisheries Science Program Manager at Conservation International’s Center for Oceans. She is interested in understanding and improving adaptive capacity and equality within and across fishing communities and integrating a human rights-based approach to fisheries governance. She has over a decade of experience working in small-scale fisheries along the Baja Peninsula in Mexico. Elena holds a degree from UC Santa Cruz, a master’s degree from Duke University’s Nicholas School for the Environment and a PhD from Stanford University.

Conservation International is a non-governmental organization (NGO) with over 30 years of experience, with a mission statement to empower societies to responsibly and sustainably care for nature, our global biodiversity, for the well-being of humanity. 

Conservation International - Center for Oceans

https://www.conservation.org/about/center-for-oceans

Check out:

https://www.riseseafood.org/

 

Finding Sustainability Podcast

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Environmental Social Science Network

https://essnetwork.net/

https://twitter.com/ESS_Network

@ESS_Network

Insight #2: David Abson on ecosystem services

This ‘Insight’ episode is taken from episode 005 of the podcast with David Abson.

In this short segment, Dave discusses economic valuation of the ecosystem services concept, governance in ecosystem service frameworks and the challenge with operationalizing them. 

Dave holds a Professorship for Sustainability Economics and Assessment at Leuphana University in Germany. Dave explains the path that led him to academia, and then we discuss his understanding of sustainability premised on justice. The concept of land sparing vs land sharing is discussed as well as the ecosystem services concept, including its operationalization and dimensions of governance. Dave also explains the leverage points concept, and its usefulness for sustainability science research. We touch on numerous other topics including open access publishing and how he thinks about interdisciplinarity.

Dave's University page

https://www.leuphana.de/en/institutes/centre-for-sustainability-management-csm/persons/david-abson.html

Dave's Google Scholar page

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

 

Finding Sustainability Podcast

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Environmental Social Science Network

https://essnetwork.net/

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020: Academic culture and California's water governance with Courtney Hammond Wagner

In this podcast, Michael and Stefan have a conversation with Courtney Hammond Wagner. Courtney is a postdoctoral research fellow at Stanford University. We discuss some of the challenges of navigating a career in academia, particularly as a young parent and changing rules and norms of the science system itself. We then get into Courtney’s research on water governance in California, and challenges for using frameworks in science, with the example of Ostrom’s social-ecological systems framework.

As an environmental social scientist, Courtney’s research broadly aims to understand how we design incentives, rules and policies to collectively change behavior in water resource dilemmas to improve community well-being and ecological outcomes. At Water in the west, Courtney is working on two aspects of California’s 2014 Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) policy process: the mandated use of climate information in groundwater sustainability plans and the role of incentives in farmer groundwater use. This work builds on her previous SGMA research in Yolo County, California to identify the role of farmer social norms and fairness perceptions in the SGMA policy process.

Courtney received a Ph.D. in Natural Resources from the University of Vermont where she studied policy design for declining water quality from agricultural nutrient runoff, and has a BA in Psychology from Dartmouth College.

https://waterinthewest.stanford.edu/about/people/courtney-hammond-wagner

https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=FAgQyXgAAAAJ&hl=en

 

Finding Sustainability Podcast

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Environmental Social Science Network

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Insight #1: Larry Crowder on interdisciplinarity

This 'Insight' episode is a clip from episode 12 of the podcast with Larry Crowder. Insight episodes feature noteworthy and insightful clips from previous episodes.

 

Larry Crowder is a professor of Biology and Marine Conservation at the Hopkins Marine Station at Stanford University. He is also a senior fellow at the Stanford Woods Institute of the Environment, and affiliated faculty at the Stanford Center for Ocean Solutions. During our discussion Larry described how he began his career in ecology, his seminal work on sea turtle ecology and conservation, and his subsequent transition to a more interdisciplinary space where he has studied multiple marine conservation issues such as fisheries bycatch and governance.

Faculty website: https://crowderlab.stanford.edu/

On Larry's lab website we found this blog on marine conservation: https://crowderlab.stanford.edu/mcb

Google scholar page: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=Qjb5DnwAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao

 

Finding Sustainability Podcast

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Environmental Social Science Network

https://essnetwork.net/

https://twitter.com/ESS_Network

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