English
In spite of its manifest policy importance, environmental impact assessment (EIA) has been the focus of very few explicit attempts at theoretical understanding. Writing about EIA has been guided by assumptions and models that have been implicitly assumed rather than explicitly and systematically explored, formulated, or articulated. How EIA is understood to work, how much policy significance is attributed to it, and the meaning it has in the politics of the environment is determined largely by which of these implicit models constitutes a frame of reference. As a first step in developing a theory of EIA, we identify six categories of implicit models based on our survey of scholarly and practitioner literature. We locate and specify each of these models in terms of debates over EIA, analysing implications for a theory of EIA, both operational and normative.
SDGs and IPCC Cities offer an unprecedented opportunity for a transformative urban agenda. This also requires bold, integrated action to address constraints imposed by economic, cultural, and political dynamics. We move beyond a narrow, techno-centric view and identify five key knowledge pathways needed to catalyze urban transformation. While the topic of urban responses to climate change has been on the research agenda for the past two decades, 1 it has only slowly made its way onto the global stage, and is now at a critical juncture
Mapping out the eight main nodes of nanotechnology discourse that have emerged in the past decade, we explore how various scientific, social, and ethical islands of discussion have developed, been recognized, and are being continually renegotiated. We do so by (1) identifying the ways in which scientists, policy makers, entrepreneurs, educators, and environmental groups have drawn boundaries on issues relating to nanotechnology; (2) describing concisely the perspectives from which these boundaries are drawn; and (3) exploring how boundaries on nanotechnology are marked and negotiated by various nodes of nanotechnology discourse.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.