Anthropocene and Transdisciplinarity

Kelly, Jason M.

doi:10.1558/jca.v1i1.91

Cited by 7 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 20 publications

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“…Paul Crutzen suggested naming the new period not after some geologically relevant traits (then 'plastocene' might have been a good choice), but to raise the public awareness of the human impact on the Earth System, and the human responsibility to stabilise it. While often understood in policy debates in this way, some misread it as an opportunity (Domanska 2011;Kelly 2014) or even as a declaration of freedom to shape the earth at will, even expanding on their past hubris (Asafu-Adjaye et al 2022;Buck 2015). Since they are right in one point, that the wording is essentially not a standard geoscience one and the discussion is ongoing whether or not Anthropocene is a suitable chronostratigraphic term (Luciano 2022), we can leave it to the geoscience community to accept this wording or not as a disciplinary term.…”

Section: The Anthropocene-a New Geological Agementioning

confidence: 99%

Inside the Anthropo-Populo-Consumo-Capitalocene

Spangenberg

2022

Anthr. Sci.

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Twenty years ago, Paul Crutzen suggested declaring the present a new geological era and naming it the Anthropocene. While this suggestion is still disputed, we argue that the current state of the Earth system is deviating so dynamically from the status quo of the Holocene, that acknowledging a new era has begun is very plausible. However, that leaves open the question if 'Anthropocene' is an appropriate name, since the logic behind it differs from the standard chronostratigraphic terminology. As far as the term is intended to highlight the direct and/or indirect drivers causing the emergence of a new geological era, it could have been baptised as initially 'Populocene' and now 'Consumocene' as first population growth and now growing consumption per capita are the decisive drivers, with the technology providing efficiency gains insufficient to compensate for the impacts of consumption growth. However, behind the prevailing consumption and production patterns and their complex dynamics, capitalism has been identified as the higher-level driver. Some authors argue that the capitalist system depends on permanent economic growth and that the crisis of planetary health can not be overcome without first overcoming capitalism. We argue that this view is based on oversimplifications of economic theory, and that by capping resource consumption by political means, it is possible to steer the economy and society back into the environmental space provided by the planetary boundaries. On the consumption side, this requires a turn to sufficiency-based consumption, facilitated through sufficiency policies protecting and offering access to public goods. However, the impact on the economic system would be profound: not the end of capitalism, but the end of capitalism as we know it.

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Section: The Anthropocene-a New Geological Agementioning

confidence: 99%

Inside the Anthropo-Populo-Consumo-Capitalocene

Spangenberg

2022

Anthr. Sci.

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“…The Anthropocene nearly always serves as a metanarrative of modernity-a narrative in which energy-and resource-intensive industrialization and capitalism have been accompanied by population booms, increased flows of goods and peoples, the central role of nation-states, and demands for improvements in quality of life. It is a story in which humans have exploited the environment at unprecedented and ever-expanding rates, soon finding that their local actions have consequences on global scales (Kelly 2014). The Anthropocene becomes a category for critiquea way to define excess, limits, thresholds, and boundaries (Meadows et al 1972;Chakrabarty 2009;Rockström et al 2009;Dibley 2012).…”

Section: • • •mentioning

confidence: 99%

2. Ecosystem Service-Based Approaches for Status Assessment of Anthropocene Riverscapes

Large¹,

Gilvear²,

Starkey³

2020

Rivers of the Anthropocene

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Humanity is facing a crisis of its own making. The climate is changing. Oceans are warming. Dead zones of hundreds and thousands of square miles hover off our coasts. A mass extinction is in progress-the likes of which have not been seen for 65 million years. Salinization, pollution, and overconsumption threaten our supplies of freshwater. Our environments can no longer absorb human pressures. This is the condition of the Anthropocene-an age in which humans are altering the planet to such an extent that we are leaving a permanent and irreversible mark on its biological, hydrological, atmospheric, and geological systems. Humanity has initiated an environmental "phase shift, " and formerly resilient systems have been pushed into altered states. Even if humanity were to significantly modify its behaviors, the result would be a new equilibrium, fundamentally different from that of the preindustrial world.Identifying and working within environmental boundaries could mitigate the most extreme environmental consequences of human activity, and this is the approach favored by an increasing number of earth systems researchers. However, this will require dramatic shifts in consumption patterns, scientific assumptions, sociopolitical structures, and cultural systems. It will necessitate not only macro-level changes requiring unprecedented transnational cooperation but also micro-level adjustments in the practices of our everyday lives. To state it simply, putting the brakes on runaway environmental devastation will require a wholesale reworking of our societies, both from a technological-scientific standpoint and from a sociocultural standpoint. Research, planning, and implementation will require close collaboration between experts on the earth's biophysical systems and human sociocultural systems-between scientists, humanists, social scientists, artists, policy experts, and community-based organizations.xvi Preface Unfortunately, however, in this era in which humans and human systems have become prime agents of changes to the planet, we have yet to create a research and policy culture that bridges the divides between these groups. Because of this, we lose an important tool for tackling some of humanity's biggest issues, detracting from our overall understanding of global ecological change and limiting our ability to respond to escalating crises.One of the most potentially productive approaches to bridging these divides is transdisciplinarity, an approach that addresses a problem by building research frameworks and methods that transcend disciplinary barriers (Jahn, Bergmann,

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Section: Problems Of Agencymentioning

confidence: 99%