Remate/ Closing

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A última sessão representou a oportunidade de aferir, com os alunos, a pertinência das apresentações anteriores, os métodos de avaliação e, sobretudo, as temáticas que, por falta de tempo e espaço, acabaram por ficar de fora, mas configuram temas importantes para uma reflexão clara e abrangente da sustentabilidade.

Da Sustentabilidade à Regeneração/ From sustainability to regeneration

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Conduzida por Nuno da Silva, a sessão decorreu em formato virtual (zoom) e iniciou-se com uma reflexão sobre o momento atual (relação humanidade/ mundo natural). Ao longo dos séculos, a humanidade idealizou a busca por um mundo de bem-estar, felicidades e prazeres, mas, ao invés, foi deixando marcas de destruição, conflitos e desconexões.

Governança Empresarial: O Global Compact como exemplo

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A iniciativa ‘the Global Compact’ foi impulsionada pelo então secretário geral das Nações Unidas Kofi Annan. Iniciada em 1999, começou com nove princípios em 3 áreas: direito do trabalho, proteção ambiental e sustentabilidade e direitos humanos. Anos depois foi incorporado um décimo princípio sobre combate à corrupção. Os documentos que orientaram a construção destes princípios foram a Declaração Universal de Direitos Humanos, a Declaração da Organização Internacionaldo Trabalho e os resultados da Rio/Eco 92.

Sociedade e sustentabilidade, ou um merlo branco que nunca ninguêm viu

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Sessão da responsabilidade do coordenador da disciplina, iniciou-se com a noção holística e sistémica de desenvolvimento sustentável: um conceito integrado e integrador que junta num mesmo imperativo o bem-estar social, a prosperidade económica e a salvaguarda do ambiente”. Apresentaram-se dados sobre a evolução do crescimento populacional no mundo ao longo do tempo e refletiu-se sobre o impacto que tal crescimento tem na qualidade ambiental e nos equilíbrios ecossistémicos.

Esses impactos, no entanto, não só não se distribuem equitativamente no mundo, como têm origens ainda mais desiguais. Importa, por isso, acautelar que a abrangência do DS se mantém para além dos princípios assumidos e aproveita a mobilização impar que implicou, por exemplo, a Agenda 2030 e o Acordo de Paris. Os fracos resultados até agora alcançados, no entanto, sobretudo entre os países do chamado Sul Global, faz crescer a desconfiança, no mínimo, a par da esperança que entretanto estes acordos e convenções internacionais procuraram renovar. Veremos se os próximos anos (em que se espera que, por exemplo, o acordo de Paris venha a ser ratificado pelos diversos países e organizações internacionais que o assinaram) não nos reservam surpresas desagradáveis e transformam uma vitória declarada, num saco de promessas vazias e inconsequentes.

Biodiversity, ecosystem services and sustainability

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Professor Cristina Branquinho began by stressing a major gap in the PhD program on Climate Change and Sustainable Development Policies. According to her, the issues between biodiversity and climate change are not properly addressed by most experts working in climate change. In particular, she stated that climate change experts should not neglect the identification of the trade-offs between biodiversity conservation, ecosystem services delivery and climate change policy.b) Agreements and Commitments vs Targets Achieved:The Earth Rio Summit in 1992 represented a milestone in environmental awareness regarding worldwide biodiversity loss. Since then, several countries have endorsed commitments towards halting the loss of biodiversity. The most relevant commitments were the 2010 Biodiversity Target,enacted in the Convention for Biological Diversity and the Aichi Biodiversity Targets.Concomitantly, in 2005, the United Nations (UN) launched the Millenium Ecosystem Assessment to improve the scientific information concerning the consequences of ecosystem change for human well-being. Later, in 2015, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) highlighted the links between biodiversity and human health. The SDGs, among other targets, call for the preservation an dconservation of biodiversity and guarantee the provision of ecosystem services. This number of agreements and commitments emphasizes the increasing pressures on biodiversity, further exacerbated by climate change and land desertification.Despite the multiple commitments and assessments, pressures on biodiversity are still increasing.The main Conventions concerning biodiversity, in particular, the Conventions on Biodiversity,Climate Change and Land Desertification have proposed ambitious targets to halt biodiversity loss.However, the inability to achieve the proposed targets to halt biodiversity loss can eventually reach a point of no return, leading to the extinction of many species. We should note that nowadays the issue of climate change sees the most funding opportunities. Still, the issues of biodiversity loss and land desertification are less subsidized. Concerning land desertification, the speaker stressed that this happens because the areas more vulnerable are in developing countries.

Localizar a Agenda 2030 – O caso do ODSlocal

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A sessão iniciou-se com uma breve apresentação do projeto ODSlocal e dos oradores convidados que o representaram. Os oradores convidados (Filipa Ferreira (MARE-NOVA) e Paulo Madeira e Madalena Santos (ICS-ULisboa) desafiaram os participantes com um exercício exploratório com recurso à Plataforma “MentiMeter” que seria novamente posto à discussão no final da sessão, partindo de três metas e da possibilidade da sua transformação para alvo de ação política e social à escala local.

Governance, institutions and sustainability

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Professor Filipe Duarte Santos started by presenting a historical treatise on the course that has led us to the current societal challenges. For a long period of time, humanity existed without the notions of “growth” or “progress” as part of their main goal or objectives. However, Modernism intellectual contests reprioritized the debate, putting humans’ development at the centre stage. This re-organised the priorities into society, henceforth, the living standards improved, societies got more prosperous and economic growth became intertwined with societal progress. The “great acceleration” boosted the prosperity process and economic growth, intensified by the adoption of Neo-liberal mainstream economics theories.The neoclassical theory of economic growth considers that stable and continued economic growth depends only on the combination of 3 factors - labour, capital and technology. Technology development became the mantra of any problem solving for contemporary society. One example of technological progress was the use and adoption of fossil fuel and the main energy matrix which led to further technological progress.

Transformation & Shaping Futures (II) Laverage poins

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The session of October 30th 2021 was a lecture by Olivia Bina, researcher at the University of Lisbon,working on environmental governance, sustainable futures and transition/transformation theories. The goal of the session was to present Donella Meadows work and the notions of leverage points as points of intervention incomplex systems. After a brief introduction on the speaker and topics, the session moderators introduced a thought provoking question on how the notion of leverage points can be applied to large complex issues such as the climate emergency and COP26 discussions, which were ongoing at that precise moment. Olivia Bina’s presentation followed and a final discussion and Q&A session finalised the seminar.

Transformation & Shaping Futures (I)

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On October 23, 2021, the session of the Seminar “Science of Sustainability and Climate Change” (SCSAC) was led by Dr. Olivia Bina and facilitated by Gideon Osabutey and Guillermo Porriños. During the first part of the session, attendants exposed their own ideas of what needs to change. During the second part, Dr. Bina exposed main theories of transformative change, structuring the lecture on three parts: why we need to change our global system; what we should change; and how to change it.

Methods for empathetic interviewing in social Sciences

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The scientific method must satisfy four key characteristics: 

• Logical:  Scientific inferences must be based on logical principles of reasoning: organized searching for realistic solutions to a problem 

• Confirmable:  Inferences derived must match with identifiable and provable  observed evidence. 

• Repeatable: Other scientists should be able independently to replicate or repeat a similar methodological approach and obtain similar, if not identical, results. 

• Scrutinizable:  The procedures used and the inferences derived must be acceptable to critical scrutiny (peer review) by other scientists and knowledgeable people. 

• Scope for novelty and unexpectedness.

Action research assumes that complex social phenomena are best understood by intervening or disturbing those engaged phenomena and observing the effects of those actions.  Here the researcher is usually an observer or an advisor or an organisational member embedded within a particular set of social relationships seeking a common or cooperative response to a real dilemma facing the social group being studied. The researcher’s choice of actions must be based on theory, which should explain why and how such actions may cause the sought after change.  The researcher observes the results of actions, modifying them as necessary, while simultaneously learning from the action and generating new theoretical insights about the target problem, the dynamics of the social group, or the effects of interventions.

Globalização, sustentabilidade e justiça socioambiental

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Sessão deliberativa facilitada por José Luis Monteiro da Oikos.

Apresentação da disciplina

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Apresentação da disciplina, plano de estudos e métodos de avaliação.

Assessing Net Zero Plans in the Context of Sustainability Principles

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Assessing Net Zero Plans (NZPs) in the Context of Sustainability Principles 

Introduction  COP 26, NDCs and NZPs :

Part 1. Dilemmas for Multi-Sector Governance

Part 2 .The Overarching Significance of Time

Part 3. Climate Justice

The 26th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change is planned to take place in Glasgow, UK between 1 & 12 Nov 2021, will be a critical event for reaching the global commitment to limit global temperatures rise to below 2 ⁰C,  a colossal test for governance, multi-sector coordination, and individual citizen engagement, COP 26 should provide for nations to lay out their national strategies to achieve net zero GHG emissions in two stages:

• In 2030 the UN will commit to its Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to lead to a permanent human and ecological right to productive harmony with the Earth. 

• Every country will (should) declare its updated nationally determined contribution (NDC) that leads to net-zero GHG emissions by 2050.

Climate Change and Sustainability Science - Tim O´Riordan

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• The role of climate change in creating tipping points which chaotically disturb the normally stabilizing natural processes of the Earth into wholly unexpected outcomes.

• The implications of combinations of tipping points for overwhelming human capacities and actions for reaching progressive means of achieving sustainability.

• The relationships between science and politics in creating the barriers to achieving sustainability science.

• The role of sustainability science in higher education and its purpose in this PhD course and in your research.

• Implications for your research when incorporating sustainability science into your work.

Apresentação

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A primeira aula foi tempo de dar a conhecer a disciplina, metodologia a aplicar, plano de estudos e métodos de avaliação .