2pm-4pm Wednesday 8 December 2021
Online via MS Teams
Please email CentreSECP@brighton.ac.uk for the joining link
SECP are hosting an informal workshop intended as a space to reflect on COP26.  We will loosely structure the session around a number of themes and invite those inattendance to offer brief reflections or provocations on each theme from their own perspective, whether that is informed by academia, activism, personal (everyday) and professional (research) engagements or the blurred lines between them.  A list of possible questions are listed below. We will narrow it down to a few key open questions to act as prompts for discussion on the day – everyone attending will have the opportunity to respond to them. Please get in touch with Matt (matthew.adams@brighton.ac.uk) if you have a question or theme in mind not covered here.
The workshop is a fantastic opportunity for colleagues in the Centre (PGRS, ECRs, all staff) and others across the university working on climate change issues (including but not limited to climate change, environmental politics, Anthropocene research, extractivism, climate justice, climate activism, minority land rights, conservation, feminist political ecology, water, heat, coastal erosion and climate migration, indigenous communities, urban violence, structural inequality, North-South divides etc.) to bring together our work in a fruitful collaborative way that can be publicised. We will try and capture key themes emerging and document as a blog essay and use the event as the platform for a more formal symposium with external presenters in the new year.
  • On (not) being there – the view from inside/outside COP26
  • One being somewhere – the importance of situated and specific perspectives on COP and climate change
  • What have we learnt from COP26? 
  • How have the outcomes of COP26 been mediated to date? Dominant narratives, framings? Alternatives?
  • What issues are missing or marginalised in coverage of COP26 and the proposed green transitions to take us into the future? 
  • Where is decolonisation and system change in addressing climate change related issues? (How) can it make it onto mainstream mitigation agenda? 
  • What role going forward for academic research (humanities, social science, climate, conservation science)?
  • What can be made of the UN’s call to include Indigenous knowledges (IK) in climate agendas – can they be accommodated without extracting, co-opting, de-politicising, and decontextualising? 
  • What is the role of technology in a just transition?
  • Should we problematise an emphasis on ‘urgency’ when it comes to climate change mitigation?
  • What role for activism, grassroots organizations and civil society? Priorities?
  • What are the material and psychic conditions of ruination and violence and how do we think and research them?
  • How do we address CC as an institution? 
We look forward to seeing you all there!
Please email CentreSECP@brighton.ac.uk for the joining link