81952 - Geographies of Global Challenges (1) (LM)

Academic Year 2021/2022

  • Docente: Elisa Magnani
  • Credits: 6
  • SSD: M-GGR/01
  • Language: English

Learning outcomes

At the end of the course students will show understanding of some of the global challenges the population of the planet has been facing since the second half of the XX century. Among these, the critical relation with the natural resources and with the concept of development and, above all, climate change, with its connections to territorial development, ecological risk, food security and the consumption of natural resources At the end of the course, the students will have acquired the theoretical and empirical tools to critically analyse the global strategies of climate resilience and cooperation and the relation between climate change and tourism. They will also have acquired the ability to work in groups and develop class discussions. They will be able to communicate both in experts and non experts groups the global dynamics connected to climate change, globalization, poverty, development and tourism.

Course contents

The course focuses on one of the major challenges of our age “THE defining challenge of our age” as recognised by Ban Ki-moon, at the CMP 3, in Bali, in 2007.

Climate change offers the opportunity for a multidisciplinary analysis and, during the course, we will try to discuss together about the many topics connected to the phenomenon, using mainly a geographical approach which means with a focus on territorial impacts, policies and responses.

Along the lessons we will concentrate on three main aspects of the phenomenon:

  • PART 1 (WEEK 1 and 2) will introduce climate change as a global phenomenon, with its natural and anthropogenic root causes, positioning it inside the wider perspective of environmental degradation and pollution and analysing the global debate between climate change activists and deniers. In this respect we will carry out several activities, such as group work, presentation and class discussion.
  • PART 2 (Weeks 3) will analyse the Kyoto Protocol and the Post Kyoto adaptation and mitigation strategies, with a focus on the policy-making process but also trying to include it into a theoretical framework of adaptation
  • PART 3 (Weeks 4-5) Climate change and mobility: the connections between climate change and environmental crisis with migration and tourism. During this part the course will require a wide participation of the students, who will be invited to take part to group readings and discussions, using cooperative learning methodologies.

Readings/Bibliography

PROGRAMME FOR STUDENTS NOT ATTENDING THE CLASSES

The evaluation for students not attending the classes consists in the production of an essay of around 25,000 characters.

The essay will have to deal with a topic chosen from the bibliography mentioned below, possibly integrating other references. It will have to be submitted by email to the professor not later than 10 days before the official date of the exam, and discussed with the professor on the date of the exam.

The bibliographic references to prepare the essay are the following:

Swyngedouw Erik, «Apocalypse Forever? Post-political Populism and the Spectre of Climate Change» in Theory, Culture & Society 27, n.2-3, 2010, pp. 213-232.

1 book chosen among those in the following list (to analyse a specific aspect of the phenomenon):

Climate change and migration

  • Ionesco D., Mokhnacheva D., Gemenne E., The atlas of environmental migration, IOM, Earthsan from Routledge, London and New York, 2017
  • Piguet, Etienne, Laczko, Frank (Eds.), People on the move in a Changing Climate, Springer, 2014
  • Piguet E., Pecoud A., de Guchteneire P., Migration and climate change, Unesco Publishing, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2012.

Climate change and tourism

  • Becken S., Hay J.E., Tourism and Climate Change: Risks and Opportunities, Channel View Publications, Clevedon, 2007 (Chapters 1-2-3-4-5-10 + 2 more chapters chosen from 6-7-8-9).

Climate change debate

  • Hoffman A., How culture shapes the climate change debate, Stanford briefs, Stanford, 2015.
  • Klein N., This changes everything, Penguin Books, 2014.
  • Pelling M., Adaptation to Climate Change. From resilience to transformation, Routledge, London, 2010.
  • Stoknes P.E., What We Think About When We Try Not To Think About Global Warming: Toward a New Psychology of Climate Action, Chelsea Green Publishing, White River Junction (USA), 2015.
  • Tokar B., Eiglad E., Toward Climate Justice: Perspectives on the Climate Crisis and Social Change, New Compass Press, 2014.

1 article chosen among those in the following list (to critically contextualize the phenomenon):

Boas I. et al., "Climate Migration Myths", in Nature ClimateChange 9, 2019, pp.901-903

Leonardi E., "Carbon trading dogma: Theoretical assumptions and practical implications of global carbon markets", in Ephemera: theory & politics in organization, volume 17(1), 2017, pp. 61-87

Felli Romain, Castree N., "Neoliberalising adaptation to environmental change: Foresight or foreclosure?", in Environment and Planning A 44, n.1, 2012, pp. 1-4

Joseph J., "Resilience as embedded neoliberalism: a governamentality approach", in International Policies, Practicesand Discourses 1, n.1, 2013, pp. 38-52

Bettini G., "Climate Barbarians at the Gate? A critique of apocalyptic narratives on ‘climate refugees’", in Geoforum, 45, 2013, pp. 63-72

Zickgraf C., "Keeping People in Place: Political Factors of (Im)mobility and Climate Change", in Social Sciences 8, n.8, 2019, pp. 1-17

 

PROGRAMME FOR STUDENTS ATTENDING THE CLASSES

Students attending the classes will be required to participate to at least 75% of all lessons, actively taking part to the class activities.

As a consequence of their active involvement during the classes, their programme will be as follows:

  1. Participation to the class discussions and activities proposed by the professor (40% of final evaluation).
  2. Oral exam aimed at assessing the personal preparation on:
  • the topics discussed in class (30%) both in respect to the power point presentations shown by the professor during the classes and the class activities
  • the study of 1 book (30%) among those in the following list:

Climate change and migration

  • Ionesco D., Mokhnacheva D., Gemenne E., The atlas of environmental migration, IOM, Earthsan from Routledge, London and New York, 2017
  • Piguet, Etienne, Laczko, Frank (Eds.), People on the move in a Changing Climate, Springer, 2014
  • Piguet E., Pecoud A., de Guchteneire P., Migration and climate change, Unesco Publishing, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2012.

Climate change and tourism

  • Becken S., Hay J.E., Tourism and Climate Change: Risks and Opportunities, Channel View Publications, Clevedon, 2007 (Chapters 1-2-3-4-5-10 + 2 more chapters chosen from 6-7-8-9).

Climate change debate

  • Hoffman A., How culture shapes the climate change debate, Stanford briefs, Stanford, 2015.
  • Klein N., This changes everything, Penguin Books, 2014.
  • Pelling M., Adaptation to Climate Change. From resilience to transformation, Routledge, London, 2010.
  • Stoknes P.E., What We Think About When We Try Not To Think About Global Warming: Toward a New Psychology of Climate Action, Chelsea Green Publishing, White River Junction (USA), 2015.
  • Tokar B., Eiglad E., Toward Climate Justice: Perspectives on the Climate Crisis and Social Change, New Compass Press, 2014.

Other books may be selected in accordance with the professor.

Teaching methods

The course will be supported by the use of power point presentations, together with class activities based on participative methodologies.

Students will thus be strongly invited to share a participative attitude during the lessons, by participating to class/group discussions, seminars and other cooperative activities.

Assessment methods

The programme is differentiated between attending and non attending students, as follows:

STUDENTS ATTENDING THE CLASSES

In order to be considered attending, students need to attend at least 75% of all lessons. The programme for attending students consists in:

  1. Participation to the class discussions and activities (40% of the final evaluation) proposed by the professor.
  2. Oral exam aimed at assessing the personal preparation on:
  • the topics discussed in class (30% of the final evaluation) both in respect to the power point presentations shown by the professor during the classes and the presentations made by the other students
  • the study of 1 book (30% of the final evaluation) among those in the list.

The programme will be fully described during the first lesson and published in details on the power point "Presentation of the course".

Assessment methods:

For students attending the classes the assessment is an oral exam that aims at testing their comprehension of the geographical, economical, social and cultural phenomena presented during the lessons both by the professor and the other students' presentations and discussed together. Participation to the discussion is a key element to evaluate the students, together with the personal reflections on the issues studied. Moreover, students will be evaluated on their communication skills and on the use of a correct terminology.

STUDENTS NON ATTENDING THE CLASSES

Non attending students have to write an essay of around 25,000 characters. The essay will have to deal with a topic chosen from the books studies, possibly integrating other references. It will have to be submitted by email to the professor not later than 10 days before the official date of the exam, and discussed with the professor on the date of the exam.

Assessment methods:

For students not attending the classes, the production of the essay will aim at testing their comprehension of the geographical, economical, social and cultural phenomena studied. Students are invited to propose a personal reflection on the issues studied. Moreover, they will be evaluated on their communication skills and on the use of correct terminology.

 

FOR BOTH ATTENDING AND NON ATTENDING STUDENTS:

  • An excellent evaluation is associated to the full comprenhension of the phenomena studied and to the ability of connecting them to the appropriate theoretical framework and to case studies, together with a correct use of terminology and brilliant communication skills.
  • A sufficient evaluation is associated to a fair ability to discuss about the topics of the course, with a fairly accurate use of appropriate terminology and moderate communication skills.
  • A poor evaluation is associated to poor communication skills, lack of understanding of the theoretical and empirical aspects of the topics discussed in class, lack of connections between different aspects studied and imprecise use of appropriate terminology.

 

In order to sit the exam students will have to register for on the AlmaEsami website.

Teaching tools

All Power Point presentations and other materials for attending studens will be available among the "teaching materials" ("materiali didattici") downloadable from this website, whose access is restricted to students from the University of Bologna.

Office hours

See the website of Elisa Magnani

SDGs

Clean water and sanitation Affordable and clean energy Sustainable cities Climate Action

This teaching activity contributes to the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals of the UN 2030 Agenda.