The police shooting a fifteen year old became the trigger of social unrest in Greece. The fatal accident of a building worker sparked simmering turmoil in Delhi. Has this become our new political framework for agency: fatal accidents as the new default? Yet according to Binyavanga Wainaina, "the burning houses and the bloody attacks here do not reflect primordial hatreds. They reflect the manipulation of identity for political gain." If a cartoon in one country can lead to the loss of lives in another, Atteqa Malik states, "then policies should also be created to address issues that cross borders. All stakeholders should be considered, inside and outside the country, before policies are created to influence practice."
Can we still argue from an institutionalist point of view for solutions if our major institutions have become part
of the problem? This is the main question that will be addressed in this session. Claudia Kemfert will explain how for her climate change could be the economic driver of our future and if it still can be the key engine of
society. Lorenz Petersen proposes a framework that takes an institutionalist perspective, focusing on the goods and services provided by natural resources rather than on the resource itself.
Crisis are moments of transition: they mark the passage from one dynamic to another, they are turning points in multidimensional transformation processes. ‘ESCALATION’ is part of a larger research project titled ‘North’ which was initiated by Territorial Agency in 2007. It fathoms the changes in the relations between geography, inhabitation and knowledge production in the 21st century.
The northern ice regions of our earth host cultures have followed traditional ways of life - related to ice, hunting and dwelling in extreme environments - for over 4000 years. In the ancient world the Hyperboreer was a mythic nation living at the most northerly edge of human imagination. The Inuits are the last limb in this Hyperboreic history, but now it seems their cultural tomorrow is doomed. Climate change is radically deforming this Inuit anthroposphere, changing indelibly their cultural selfconception and social texture. Geopolitical tugs of war on the north pole for raw materials for the combustion chambers of global industrialisation are impacting on traditional ways of life and endangering these forever. Can anything be done?
What are the cultural, economic and political conditions for regional cooperations in art, digital culture and the creative industries? Can the working conditions (production, presentation, distribution) of creative producers, artists and art initiatives be improved by means of professional networking?
The Climate change in its cause and physical impact is a matter of the natural siences. But the complexity and vast squareness of its consequences turn the debate into a matter of social and cultural studies. "In climate change lies not only the chance to overcome outmoded standards of living and actings but also to develop new institutional and individual modes of cooperation and cultural techniques for handling large scale threats." What are the chances and possibilities (technological and cultural) of opposing the destructive dynamics of climate change with constructive elements (policy, economy, technology, culture, art etc.)?
