Data on global temperature and biodiversity indicate that time is running and that we may already have passed the opportunity to keep the increase of global temperature below 2 degree Celsius. The knowledge of the potential costs of a continuing rise of global temperatures is out of sync with adequate political action. Rather, vested interests block or slow down significantly ambitious policies. Path dependence makes it extremely difficult to move towards new paths of economic and social development that are sustainable in socio-economic as well as in ecological terms. Strategies to unlock existing growth paths and to identify policies that help to mitigate adverse effects and to support the transition to a new model of managing natural resources such as air, water and energy are in scarce supply.

This PhD workshop explored questions related to the politics of unlocking and transitioning. The topics covered in the workshop included a diversity of questions including factors that drive disputes and social conflicts over adequate unlocking strategies; the political behaviours that actors undertake to influence political outcomes such as coalition building, narrative framing contests, lobbying; the negotiation or collaboration strategies that are used to address political debates, and determinants of policy choice.

Live introductory session: November 12, 2020 4-6pm CET
Facilitated group work phase on our interactive online platform: November 12-18, 2020
Live evaluation live session: November 19, 2020 4-6pm CET

Workshop Chair

Kurt Huebner Interim Director at the Institute for European Studies at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver. Kurt Hübner came in 2006 to UBC as the director of the Institute for European Studies. In 2012 he became a member of the Department of Political Science. He received his PhD from the Free University of Berlin where he also started his academic career in the field of Political Economy. His research focuses on the interplay of institutions and capital accumulation, on the national as well as on the international level. Over the years his work concentrated on money and currency regimes, politics and economics of European integration as well as on contradictions and complementarities of sustainability and international competitiveness. He has authored and edited 15 books and a substantial number of articles and book chapters. He is actively involved in a number of national and international research networks and currently holds grants from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the European Commission and the Hans Boeckler Foundation. In 2008 he received the best paper award in EU Governance from ECSA-Canada.