World Social Science Report 2013
Changing global environment
The issue of this report is global environmental change, a phenomenon that encompasses all the biophysical changes happening on the planet’s land and in its oceans, atmosphere and cryosphere. Many of these changes are driven by human activities such as fossil fuel consumption, deforestation, agricultural intensification, urbanization, over-exploitation of fisheries, and waste production.
The four main messages
- Frame the change: The social sciences must help to fundamentally reframe climate and global environmental change from a physical into a social problem.
- Enable change: A solutions-oriented social science would help society rethink the shape and course of social systems, to contest them, to connect disparate insights on levers for change, and inform and provoke action for deliberate transformation.
- Build capacity for change: To meet the diverse and complex challenges of global environmental change and societal transformation, social science capacity needs to grow radically across the world.
- Be the change: If the social sciences are serious about wanting their science to make a difference, they themselves must change.
Source: World Social Science