The Asia and Pacific Working Group (formerly Asia-Pacific Working Group)seeks to initiate collective and collaborative dialogue and discussion among scholars (from early career to senior scholars) who are interested in adding regional perspectives and insights of and from the Asia and Pacific region into Earth System Governance (ESG) research. The aim of this working group is to reflect on research and experience in different fields and disciplines and apply ESG analytical frameworks to socio-ecological challenges within the Asia and Pacific region. An important focus of this working group is also to explore how ESG research in the Asia and Pacific could contribute to the global ESG research agenda, as well as to improve the current ESG governance in Asia and Pacific region and make sustainable impacts on the ground.
We believe that this initiative is timely and urgent, not only because of the rapid socio-economic development and dynamics, widening inequality and injustice, and accelerating rate of environmental changes in the Asia and Pacific region, but also due to the increasing scholarly engagement with new ideas and research innovations produced by scholars in the region to analyze and evaluate the governance of current and future socio-environmental problems.
We invite scholars within and beyond the ESG network who are interested in Earth System Governance in the Asia and Pacific to join us and share their ideas and interest in terms of important research and future collaboration relevant to the region and to design short- and long-term activities together. We welcome scholars from the region who may be focusing on issues of wider relevance. We have planned several activities such as regular meetings and research discussion sessions, which we expect to trigger scientific output (e.g., edited books, special journal issues and journal articles) and opportunities to engage with policymakers and other actors. Together, we expect to formulate policy-relevant research questions and findings that will actually help to address real-world socio-environmental problems.
For more information about the working group and how to join, please contact the coveners: Annisa Triyanti and Paul G. Harris.
Co-conveners
Participants
This list includes information on a subgroup of participants in the working group who desire to share their names and research interests publicly in the interest of furthering research collaboration. If you would like to be included on this page, please contact the conveners directly.
Click on the + sign to read more about each person’s bio and contact information.
Ronju AHAMMAD is a trans-/inter-disciplinary researcher who mainly focuses on using the social-ecological system approaches. Over the past years, he experienced integrating social and ecological methods to explore and explain the complex patterns and trends of forest-agrarian systems in the rural and regional context of the developing tropics and advanced economy in the Asia Pacific. He previously worked with Charles Darwin University, Australia, the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), Indonesia and United Nations Development Programme back in Bangladesh. He is currently engaged in the Asia Pacific working group and a research fellow in the Earth System Governance programme. Contact: ronj.ahammad@gmail.com. Website: https://internt.slu.se/en/cv-originals/ronju-ahammad/
Wendy’s research explores how those most affected by climate impacts, especially in developing countries and authoritarian regimes, could be included more democratically in adaptation governance at national and global levels. Her thesis examines the multiple discourses of climate change adaptation invoked by domestic and international stakeholders in Vietnam. Wendy has over fifteen years of professional experience in climate change and development with a focus on the Asia-Pacific region, having worked in government, NGOs, think tanks and academia. She has lectured on domestic and international climate policy at the Crawford School, Australian National University, and is also conducting research on the Global Citizens’ Assembly on the climate and ecological crisis. Contact: wendy.conwaylamb@canberra.edu.au Website: https://www.delibdem.org/our-researchers/wendy-conway-lamb
Huey-Shian Elly CHUNG obtained her PhD on the topic of social justice and equity in marine protected area governance from the Australian National Centre for Ocean Resources and Security in the University of Wollongong. Her research interest focuses on developing legal frameworks and policies to safeguard the future of marine biodiversity and human society. Her research highlights the need to shift legal and institutional frameworks from profit-driven models to a system of marine laws and regulations that that can adapt to a changing future. Contact: hschung@mail.ntou.edu.tw. Website: https://dolp.ntou.edu.tw/p/404-1069-43447.php?Lang=zh-tw
Joseph studies the political economy of Climate policies in the Northeast Asian region and primarily examines the linkage of carbon pricing policies. He adopts multidisciplinary lenses to analyze political barriers and drivers to international cooperation of climate change policies around the globe. His field of expertise encompasses empirical analysis and field research. He obtained a Ph.D. and an MSc. in Economics and Environmental Policy from Kyoto University in 2021 and has an MSc. in History and International relations from the University of Liege (Belgium). He has been a Youth delegate for Belgium to the UN and the UNFCCC and has participated in elaborating the Sustainable Development Goals. Contact: jdellatte@icloud.com. Website: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jdellatte/
Since 2015, I have led a competitive multidisciplinary research team developing research and applied projects by linking engineering, economics, and regulatory issues. All of them in a climate change framework to develop adaptation plans and risk assessment of extreme events by engaging companies, government, and NGOs to work together. My role has been encouraging to individual and collaborative academic research areas. In 2015, we being awarded to create an associative project, the Water Research Center for Agriculture and Mining funded by the Fifth National Competition for Research Centers in Priority Areas of National Commission for Scientific & Technological Research (CONICYT in Spanish, today Ministry of Science and Technology). Right now, I am working on Engineering, Climate Change and Governance. Contact: alexgodoy@udd.cl. Website: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexgodoyf/
Vara has studied Global Environmental Studies as a BA and Environmental Science and Policy as an MS at Clark University in Massachusetts. Her research interests are in climate and energy policies related to justice. She previously worked at consulting firms and a civil society think tank. Contact: vara_ha@fcinst.org.
Muhammad Badrul HASAN completed his PhD at the Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development in Utrecht University, the Netherlands. His PhD research topic was entitled “How to successfully govern community drinking water systems? Exploring the potential of the community management plus model in Southwestern Bangladesh.” With this, he explored the type of institutional arrangement leading to efficient governance of community drinking water systems in developing countries focusing on coastal Bangladesh. His research interests include water governance, environmental governance, common pool resource (CPR) management, sustainable development and institutional analysis. He published around twenty research publications on different issues from national and international journals including World Development Journal and International Journal of the Commons. In addition, Mr. Badrul Hasan has also been actively involved in different national and international research networks and platforms. He has been actively involved as a research fellow in Earth System Governance (ESG), Diamonds in Delta (DiD) network and Micro-governance Research Initiative (MGR), International Water Resource Association, International Water Association. Contact: badrulhasan@du.ac.bd. Website: https://www.du.ac.bd/body/faculty_details/PSC/736
Prior to joining PKNU, HAN Heejin worked at the Department of Political Science at National University of Singapore and Northern Illinois University. As a political scientist, she teaches and studies environmental politics and policymaking, particularly with a regional focus on Asia. Her most recent research interests include climate change and green recovery policy of various Asian countries at the national and subnational levels. She has published in multiple journals such as Environmental Policy & Governance, Environment & Planning C, Environmental Politics, and the Journal of Environment & Development. Contact: polhan@pknu.ac.kr. Website: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Heejin-Han
Mochamad INDRAWAN is a trained ecologist and conservation biologist with more than three decades of field experiences. Indrawan’s voluntary rainforest conservation work since 2007 included continuous facilitation of indigenous peoples and local communities whose joint endeavor is focused on the establishment of community conservation areas. Indrawan served as a member of two IUCN specialist groups (World Commission on Protected Areas and Red List Authority), and also as a research associate at Kansas University, USA, as well as visiting scholar at Kyushu University and Kyoto University, Japan. Indrawan’s research on Japanese the socio-ecological system (satoyama) during his past tenure as Asian Public Intellectual (API) Senior Fellow resulted in cross-countries’ comparisons with Indonesian agroforestry systems. Website: https://rccc.ui.ac.id/mochammad-indrawan/
Atsushi ISHII is an international relations and science and technology studies scholar. He currently is interested in: developing a transdisciplinary methodology for participatory scenario building in the field of climate engineering; comprehensively explaining Japanese environmental diplomacy; and doing an interdisciplinary scientific assessment of eel management in East Asia. His recent publications include Isao Sakaguchi, Atsushi Ishii, Yasuhiro Sanada, Yasuko Kameyama, Ayako Okubo, and Katsuhiko Mori. 2020. “Japan’s Environmental Diplomacy and the Future of Asia-Pacific Environmental Cooperation.” International Relations of the Asia-Pacific 21 (1): 121–56, https://doi.org/10.1093/irap/lcaa020. Recently he has published in International Relations in Asia-Pacific, Earth System Governance, Anthropocene Review, and Climatic Change. He is one of the winners of the 2017 Sustainability Science Best Paper Awards (Masahiro Sugiyama, Shinichiro Asayama, Takanobu Kosugi, Atsushi Ishii, et al. (2017) Transdisciplinary co-design of scientific research agendas: 40 research questions for socially relevant climate engineering research. Sustainability Science, Vol. 12, No. 1, pp. 31-44. 10.1007/s11625-016-0376-2). Contact: ishii910@gmail.com. Website: https://atsushiishii.academia.edu/
Yi hyun KANG’s research interests centre around environmental politics, particularly climate, biodiversity, and sustainable development governance. She focuses on the role of civil society and technology in the decision-making processes within environmental politics. She has developed her research interests through professional work experiences in diverse sectors including journalism, international development and public policy. She obtained her PhD from the Technical University of Munich, Germany, Contact: yi_hyun.kang@svet.lu.
Tarek KATRAMIZ was previously a Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) postdoctoral fellow at the United Nations University Institute for the Advanced Study of Sustainability (UNU-IAS). His main interest is in the politics of sustainability and development, local community, energy, and environmental policies. His current research projects are looking at how the SDGs potentially influence and stimulate new directions of national development planning and assessing the steering effects of the SDGs on local governments and non-state actors; the contestations and synergies in national implementation of energy and climate goals and other SDGs, with particular focus on SDG10 (inequality) and SDG11 (sustainable cities and communities). He holds a BA in Japanese Studies from Damascus University, MA and Ph.D. in Media and Governance from Keio University. Selected publications: Katramiz, Tarek. “Localizing the Nuclear: Risk Normalization and Sense of Place After Fukushima.” In Rethinking Locality in Japan, edited by Sonja Ganseforth and Hanno Jentzsch, 87-101. London: Routledge, 2021. Katramiz, Tarek, Mahesti Okitasari. “Accelerating 2030 Agenda Integration: Aligning National Development Plans with the Sustainable Development Goals. Policy Brief.” United Nations University Institute for the Advanced Study of Sustainability. no.25 (2021): 1-4. Masuda, Hiromi, Mahesti Okitasari, Kanako Morita, Tarek Katramiz, Hitomi Shimizu, Shun Kawakubo, and Yatsuka Kataoka. “SDGs Mainstreaming at the Local Level: Case Studies from Japan.” Sustainability Science (2021): 1-24. Contact: katramiz@sfc.keio.ac.jp. Website: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tarek-katramiz-ph-d-19866228/
Her research includes governance of planetary commons, US-China climate engagement and the empowerment of Global South on green growth. She studied liberal arts and philosophy in Waseda School in Japan and the National University of Singapore (dual degree, B.A.), and political science and political economics from the London School of Economics and Political Sciences (LSE, M.A MSc). Website: https://en.taejaefci.org/about/organization/158. Contact: minjung.kim@fcinst.org
Anthony Ho-fai LI’s research interests include comparative political economy, institutionalism, and sustainable development. For his doctoral dissertation, he studies the multi-level governance of energy transitions with solar energy development and citizen participation in Taiwan, sponsored by the HKU Postgraduate Scholarship and the Research and Publication Grant from the European Association of Taiwan Studies (EATS). Prior to joining the PhD program, he conducted research about China’s role in climate change mitigation and rural sustainability with the rise of e-commerce at the French Centre for the Study of Contemporary China (CEFC), engaged in the social and environmental impact assessments for environmental NGOs in Hong Kong, and studied the state-society collaboration in cultural conservation in Malaysia. He received his MPhil and Bachelor in politics and public administration from the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Contact: anthonylihf@gmail.com. Website: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Anthony-Li-3
Prior to this position, Danny MARKS was an Assistant Professor of Environmental Studies at the Department of Asian and International Studies of City University of Hong Kong. He also was previously a Postdoctoral Research Fellow with the Urban Climate Resilience in Southeast Asia project at the Munk School of Global Affairs of the University of Toronto. Dr. Marks has spent a number of years conducting research and working in Southeast Asia, particularly in the field of environmental governance. He has worked for a number of organizations in the region, including the World Bank’s East Asia and Pacific Governance Hub, the Rockefeller Foundation, ActionAid and the NGO Forum on Cambodia. Dr. Marks completed his PhD at the University of Sydney and received his MA in International Affairs from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. His research interests are political ecology, environmental justice, climate governance, disaster risk reduction, with a focus on Southeast Asia. Contact: danny.marks@dcu.ie. Website: https://www.dcu.ie/lawandgovernment/people/danny-marks
Pamela McELWEE’s work focuses on management of and policies for climate mitigation, ecosystem services valuation, and biodiversity conservation. She is currently PI on a study of the use of ecosystem services concepts in environmental policy formation in Southeast Asia, and is also undertaking studies of net zero emissions pledges, negative emissions strategies, and the governance of nature-based solutions. Her first book, Forests are Gold: Trees, People and Environmental Rule in Vietnam won the EUROSEAS prize for best social science book on Southeast Asia. McElwee has served as lead author for both the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), and the first joint IPCC/IPBES report on Biodiversity and Climate Change. She is trained as an interdisciplinary environmental scientist, with a joint Ph.D. in anthropology and forestry. Contact: pdmcelwee@gmail.com. Website: www.pamelamcelwee.com
Varun MOHAN specializes in the evolution of climate security discourse within the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), with a focus on its implications for the Global South. His research interests include the securitization of climate change, the politics of knowledge production, and their intersection with global governance, particularly in the Indo-Pacific region. He is also associated with The University of Trans-Disciplinary Health Sciences and Technology (TDU), India. Varun’s academic journey includes a Visiting Research Fellowship at the University of Queensland, Australia, under the mentorship of Professor Matt McDonald, where he furthered his research on climate security. He has authored several articles and his publications on platforms like the Planetary Security Initiative and South Asian Voices reflect his deep engagement with global environmental politics. He is also the recipient of the Senior Research Fellowship from the Union Grants Commission, India. Contact email: varunmohan@nias.res.in. LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/varun-mohan-08917125
Temuulen MURUN conducts research activities related to enhancing climate governance as an enabling condition to accelerate climate actions toward Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) implementation and Net-zero transition in developing countries. She is currently involved in ASEAN net-zero roadmap development and Transparency capacity building activities. Temuulen is also a PhD candidate at the University of Tokyo. Website: https://www.iges.or.jp/en/about/staff/murun-temuulen
Particularly, Hang Ryeol NA is interested in the issues of international environmental or forest policy and politics related to Asia. Dr. Na is the founding professor of All Seeds Academy in Canada, a reader of AP Environmental Science offered by the American College Board as part of the Advanced Placement Program and an examiner of Environmental Systems and Societies (ES&S), one of the interdisciplinary courses offered in the International Baccalaureate (IB) Diploma Programme. His work experience with APEC, ASEAN and ASEM for cyberinfrastructure such as Trans-Eurasia Information Network made Science Technology and Society (STS) one of his areas too. He teaches Science Technology and Public Policy at the Johns Hopkins Center for Talented Youth.
Hong Quan NGUYEN is leading a newly established Institute for Circular Economy Development (ICED) and also affiliated with socio-hydrology group at center of Water management and Climate Change (WACC), Institute for Environment and Resources (IER), VNU-HCM. He has a special interest in solving environmental related issues based on inter/trans-disciplinary study and by a strong partnership among academia-industry-government. Contact: nh.quan@iced.org.vn. Website: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Hong-Quan-Nguyen-3
Avid ROMAN-GONZALEZ is IEEE Senior Member, Electronic Engineer from the Universidad Nacional San Antonio Abad del Cusco, and Systems Engineer from the Universidad Andina del Cusco. He received his Master’s Degree in Industrial and Human Automatics from the Université Paul Verlaine de Metz – France, and he received his PhD Degree in Image and Signal Processing from TELECOM ParisTech. He was a postdoctoral fellow at UPCH. Contact: avid.roman-gonzalez@ieee.org. Website: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Avid-Roman-Gonzalez
Activities
2024 Forum on Re-imagining Earth System Governance in an Era of Polycrisis
The Asia-Pacific Working Group organized two sessions at the 2024 ESG Forum.
Our first session, The Asia-Pacific in Earth System Governance Campfire Session: Integrating South-South Perspectives, was on the 14th of October 2024. This session featured the co-convenors of the working group, Annisa Triyanti and Paul G. Harris, as well as, among others, Dr. Dhanasree Jayaram , Dr. Rini Astuti , Dr. Mahesti Okitasari and Dr. Joeli Varo. In this campfire-style event, speakers shared their research and science-policy work on Earth System Governance in the Asia-Pacific context. Our aim was to curate a diverse panel, with each speaker offering unique insights into the intersection of policy and science within the ESG domain. The session began with presentations from the speakers, providing attendees with a glimpse into their work and perspectives on ESG, including climate and disaster risk reduction, climate security and finance, broader sustainability and environmental politics, environmental justice, and the potential of South-South cooperation in the Asia-Pacific.
Our second session, The Asia-Pacific and Earth System Governance, was on the 18th of October 2024. This session featured specific input from Dr. Ronju Ahammad , Dr. Mochamad Indrawan , Dr. Annisa Triyanti , and Prof. Paul Harris, and included about two dozen other participants. It session served as an online working group meeting aimed at updating members and non-members on the ESG Asia-Pacific WG’s activities and potential collaborations.
Book Launch: Environmental Governance in Indonesia
Environmental Governance in Indonesia is an edited, open-access book recently published by Springer in February 2023. It offers an overview of the state-of-the-art of environmental governance in Indonesia, engages with bottom-up (national and local) perspectives, theory, and operationalization of theories/frameworks, and aims to engage multiple environmental governance actors (national to local) in different sectors. There are 25 chapters in this book, authored by more than 90 contributors representing the perspectives from science and practice. Six key topics were discussed in this book: emerging concepts such as the pluriverse, Anthropocene, and earth system governance, but also thematic and empirical cases ranging from wetlands, land, and forest, urban, climate, social, and technological interventions. Each area presents its challenges (e.g., socio-political dynamics, fragmentation, exclusion) and opportunities (e.g., new hybrid governance strategies, governance, socio-technological interventions, capacity-building efforts, and law and regulations). This is the first edited book that attempts to compile diverse research and perspectives on environmental governance issues in Indonesia.
2022 Toronto Conference on Earth System Governance, October 21-23, 2022
Symposium Panel on ‘Asia Pacific Regional Perspectives on the Earth System Governance Research’
Chair: Hang Ryeol Na (ALL SEEDS ACADEMY, Canada); Discussant: Annisa Triyanti (Utrecht University)
This panel aims to examine the recent research agenda of environmental and natural resources from Asia Pacific regional perspective. As a group of scholars specialized in environmental governance issues in the region, a collection of individual papers present a variety of topics from forests to water and greenhouse gas emissions reduction. The focus of the research is not limited to any specific aspect of earth system governance (ESG) research. From concepts or theories to fieldworks, its coverage is broad. The various research methods employed by the papers are also noteworthy, for example, literature review, correlation calculation, among others. But the theme of the proposed panel, the Asia Pacific regional perspective, is consistent across the diversity of individual papers. This panel will contribute to the ESG research agenda by providing input regarding the up-to-date ESG research questions and findings from the Asia Pacific as a region as well as the individual countries in the region.
Presentations:
1. Asian Regional Institutions of Forest Governance: From External Authorities to Self-Governance (Hang Ryeol Na, ALL SEEDS ACADEMY)
The purpose of this paper is to explore how governance institutions have evolved for forests in Asia. Focused on a regional (continental/inter-state) scale of forest governance in Asia, it will attempt to highlight some emerging trends through a comparative and historical study. From 1950, when the Asia-Pacific Forestry Commission was launched by the FAO, to the present day, when the ASEAN and APEC among others are actively operating forest governance programs through various forms of collaboration, the institutional evolution shows us a process of ‘Asianization’ of forest governance (Na et al. 2014)[1]. While Asian regional forest governance had traditionally been implemented by external authorities such as the World Bank, Asia-based institutions have taken the lead since the turn of this century. It can be prescribed as self-governance (Ostrom 1999)[2] in that ‘forest users in many locations have organized themselves to vigorously protect and, in some cases, enhance local forests.’ What can explain this Asianization of forest governance? The paper will discuss a variety of explanations and insights for the Asian self-governance such as the institutional maturity of Asia-based organizations, the increased value of forests in the context of global climate change regime, diplomatic ambitions of Asian countries, and so on.
[2] Ostrom, E. (1999). Self-Governance and Forest Resources. CIFOR Occasional Paper No 20. Bogor, Indonesia: CIFOR.
2. A Regional Model For Collaborative Emissions Abatement Through Shared NDCs (Alex Godoy-Faúndez, Facultad de Ingeniería, Universidad del Desarrollo)
The purpose of this paper is looking for proposing a new model of collaborating approach to speed up the emissions reduction at a regional scale by barter goods. To give an idea of how this would work at the regional level, countries like Chile could postpone the deadline for the achievement of their own emission reduction goals (carbon neutrality at 2050) by supporting other countries to achieve even more than what was pledged faster than Chile. This could be accomplished, for example, by exporting renewable energy or green hydrogen to neighbors or high emitting countries in exchange for being granted more time to reduce Chile’s emissions and the possibility of receiving support from others. The model is based on trading time by emissions by others. In this context, e.g. Chile’s natural advantage could be leveraged by the contribution of developed economies through technology development and transfer of technologies that we need to export renewable energy or green hydrogen at the lowest cost. Consequently, the trading of goods/services is based on economic value for countries seeking emission reductions, thereby avoiding incentives to trade at over-market prices. In this case, Chile could be a renewable energy exporter at the lowest prices or exchange a good (green hydrogen) for valuable goods/services such as hydrogen engines, batteries, or backup systems that are needed to accelerate progress to achieve our own goals. This collaborative approach could be deployed in Asian-Pacific Region by setting regional reductions of emissions accelerating the Paris goals upon new climate governance systems. The paper will discuss what kind of governance systems the region could require to deploy a collaborative regional model.
3. A Community Management Plus Model for the Governance of Community Drinking Water Systems: A Comparative Case Study of Pond Sand Filter Systems in Bangladesh (Muhammad Badrul Hasan, University of Dhaka)
Community drinking water systems (CDWS) in Bangladesh and elsewhere of the global south often fail to perform optimally. It is now widely acknowledged that a pure community management approach will not reverse this trend. The CDWS end-users need support from the external entities regarding the organization of collective action that some have labeled as community management plus (CM+) approach. In order to understand what this support could look like; we particularly zoom in on the role of public agencies. I ask firstly, what conditions explain variation in collective action among the beneficiaries of CDWS? And secondly, what conditions explain variation in collaboration between CDWS end-users and a public agency? I lean on the concepts and insights drawn from the commons’ literature. After all, the community drinking water system can be framed as a common pool resource (CPR). Its users frequently face appropriation and provision dilemmas, that have to be solved to avoid its failure. Based on this literature, I develop a list of enabling conditions for (i) collective action among CDWS end-users, and (ii) collaboration between the CDWS users and public agency. I applied this list to study the governance of thirty pond sand filter systems (PSF)-community drinking water systems- in the Southwestern coastal area of Bangladesh. Computing correlation, I find that large group size, interdependency among the group members, heterogeneity of endowments, a high level of dependence on PSF system, locally devised access and management rules, and well-working collaboration between PSF users and public agency officials are significantly associated with the occurrence of collective action among the PSF users. I also find that collaboration between PSF users and the public agency is positively influenced by transparency and inclusive decision-making procedures, but mostly by a relation that is characterized by trust. The study findings are expected to help the policymakers and practitioners to optimize the implementation strategy of CDWS and thereby help to avoid the failure of the CDWS in Bangladesh and elsewhere of similar contexts.
ESG Speaker Series. Climate change adaptation and mitigation policy: from Glasgow to the Asia-Pacific
In the last ESG Speaker Series of the year, we turned our attention to the discussions, outcomes, and implications of the COP26 climate change conference in Glasgow from the perspective of the Asia-Pacific Region. Our two speakers presented some examples of cause and effects relationship between the national contexts, commitments and the results of the COP 26. By the end of this session, we obtained a better understanding of the contextual challenges and implications of COP 26 not only at the national level but also at the level of the Asia-Pacific Region to keep up with the international climate agenda set in Glasgow.
Our first speaker, Hong Quan NGUYEN from the Vietnamese National University, Vietnam presented his reactions to the commitment of the Vietnamese government toward carbon neutrality by 2050 and the need to combine efforts to mainstream renewable energy with other solutions, such as carbon sequestration. He explored this issue from the viewpoint of “Agricultural Circular Economy.”
Our second speaker, Erwin Nugraha from the University of Twente, The Netherlands and Resilience Development Initiative (RDI) Indonesia, discussed how multilateral climate governance affected domestic climate agendas and could be informed by what he referred to as “climate imagination.” He also discussed the role and contestation of imagination in climate change governance in Indonesia.
We invited two discussants to further explore the speakers’ topics. The first discussant was Mahesti OKITASARI from UNU-IAS Tokyo, who reacted to the presentations from the viewpoint of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The second discussant was Haomiao DU from Utrecht University, The Netherlands, who linked the discussion to her expertise on the international environmental law of climate mitigation and adaptation.
Speakers:
- Hong Quan NGUYEN is currently an associate professor at the Vietnam National University – Ho Chi Minh city (VNU-HCM). He is leading a newly established Institute for Circular Economy Development (ICED) at the Institute for Environment and Resources (IER), VNU-HCM. He has a special interest in solving environment-related issues based on inter-/trans-disciplinary study and by a strong partnership among academia-industry-government. He has been working in environmental hydrology (e.g. saline intrusion, flood/drought, water pollution) in Southern Vietnam over the past 15 years and expanded his expertise in other disciplines, e.g. climate change adaptation/mitigation, circular economy, socio-ecological system, sustainability science.
- Erwin NUGRAHA is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Twente, the Netherlands, and a senior research fellow at the Resilience Development Initiative, Indonesia. His research focuses on climate change adaptation, urban environmental justice and planetary decolonisation. He was one of the recipients of the Allianz Climate Risk Research Award in 2017.
Discussants:
- Mahesti OKITASARI is a Research Associate at the United Nations University Institute for the Advanced Study of Sustainability (UNU-IAS) based in Tokyo, Japan. She is interested in understanding institutional architecture for transformative change and pervasive linkages between development policies and global sustainable development frameworks. Her current works include assessing multilevel governance arrangement and policy processes to implement the 2030 Agenda, researching gaps and opportunities in the urban development and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) nexus, and building knowledge on the partnerships and financing for the SDGs.
- Haomiao DU is a post-doctoral researcher at the Law Department of Utrecht University (UU). She also serves as the legal expert in an interdisciplinary research group on climate change and sustainability at UU. Haomiao holds a PhD degree in International Environmental Law from the University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands. She was an intern at the department of Legal Affairs of the secretariat of the UNFCCC in Bonn, Germany. Her research interests are legal and policy issues associated with climate mitigation (e.g. the legal framework for climate neutrality) and adaptation (e.g. the role of law in promoting climate resilience).
Asia-Pacific Working Group Meeting at the 2021 Bratislava Conference on Earth System Governance
The Earth System Governance Asia-Pacific Working Group (APWG) met virtually during the 2021 Bratislava Conference on Earth System Governance on Friday, 10 September 2021, at 08:30-10:00 CEST. The meeting was co-chaired by Annisa Triyanti of Utrecht University and Paul G. Harris of the Education University of Hong Kong, who are co-convenors of the APWG. The meeting was attended by about 15 scholars from universities in Australia, Canada, Chile, Hong Kong, Japan, the Netherlands, the United States and Vietnam.
The meeting started with an introduction to APWG initiatives and a mapping of research themes and topics. Jonathan Pickering, from the ESG Scientific Steering Committee, delivered introductory remarks, briefly introducing the ESG network, taskforces and working-group structure within the ESG network. He argued that the APWG has the potential to bring a regional perspective into the ESG research agenda and further strengthen and expand Asia-Pacific collaboration with scholars in countries such as Australia, Singapore and Thailand. Prof. Atsushi Ishii delivered additional remarks, also on behalf of the Scientific Steering Committee. Prof. Ishii is the focal point of Asia-Pacific on the committee, and he welcomed the initiative to develop the APWG. He stressed the importance of mapping the interests of Asia-Pacific countries onto the ESG research agenda and network.
Opening remarks were followed by a round of introductions from the attendees. Each person introduced their research topic and relevance to ESG and their vision and expectation from this working group. Several important points emerged from this discussion, including the following:
1. There was a diversity of interests among attendees, including climate governance and politics, disaster risk governance, biodiversity governance, forest governance, water governance, resource governance, energy transitions, urban transitions, infrastructure planning, planetary decolonization, multilateral environmental agreements, international governance of migratory species, hazardous waste governance, systems modelling, circular economy, marine governance and sustainability. Specific geographic foci include, among others, China, India, Indonesia, Korea and the Asia-Pacific region in general.
2. Relevancy of these topics to the ESG research agenda (including research lenses and contextualizations) were also diverse and across the spectrum. They include, among others, adaptiveness, reflexivity, transformation and justice.
3. There were diverse expectations for the APWG, such as having it serve as a learning and exchange platform, producing feedback to research projects and initiatives, and acting as a platform to connect science to policy and implementation.