The political ecology of global environmental challenges

On successful completion of the course, the student should be able to:

• explain different theoretical approaches to nature-society relations and environmental policies, planning, and management
• provide an overview and discuss historical and current understandings and strategies of sustainability and how to handle environmental challenges
• discuss how different types of knowledge influence understandings of nature and management practices
• identify and discuss different local and global models for natural resource management
• recognise how global and local environmental challenges affect and are affected by societal development and local livelihoods
• make use of theoretical perspectives to analyse cases of environmental challenges in relation to political, economic, social and cultural societal aspects in the North and South

Sustainability and environmental challenges are pressing concerns in our society that influence the political agendas on both global and local scales. This course aims to explore some of the complexities embedded in what we understand as "global environmental challenges" and the diversity of policies and management models applied in local and global contexts.

The course will present and discuss different central discourses on sustainability and environmental challenges. It will introduce different theoretical approaches and positions to environmental policy, planning, and management. This involves considerations about how understanding and production of different types of knowledge (scientific, practical, cultural, etc.) influence nature policies and management practices. The theoretical concepts will be used to understand, analyze and discuss the political, socio-economic, cultural and ecological aspects of environmental challenges. Cases are presented from the South and North to exemplify the complexity and diversity of environmental challenges, and local and global policy and management efforts.