Earth System Governance Project

The Earth System Governance Project is a research alliance that builds on a network of research centers and researchers studying earth system governance. It is a long-term, interdisciplinary social science research alliance originally developed under the auspices of the International Human Dimensions Programme on Global Environmental Change.^[1] It started in January 2009.^[2]

The Earth System Governance Project currently consists of a network of about 300 active and about 2,300 indirectly involved scholars from all continents. The global research alliance has evolved into the largest social science research network in the area of governance and global environmental change.^[3] Since 2015 it is part of the overarching international research platform Future Earth.^[4]

The secretariat, called International Project Office, is hosted at Utrecht University, The Netherlands.^[5]

The Earth System Governance Project aims to contribute to science on the large, complex challenges of governance in an era of rapid and large-scale environmental change. The project seeks to create a better understanding of the role of institutions, organizations and governance mechanisms by which humans regulate their relationship with the natural environment.^[2] The Earth System Governance Project aims to integrate governance research at all levels.

The project also aims to examine problems of the global commons, but also local problems from air pollution to the preservation of waters, waste treatment or desertification and soil degradation. Due to natural interdependencies, local environmental pollution can be transformed into changes of the global system that affect other localities. Therefore, the Earth System Governance Project looks at institutions and governance processes both local and globally.^[6]

In 2001, the four then active global change research programmes (DIVERSITAS, International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme, World Climate Research Programme, and International Human Dimensions Programme on Global Environmental Change) agreed to intensify co-operation through setting up an overarching Earth System Science Partnership. The research communities represented in this partnership argued in the 2001 Amsterdam Declaration on Global Change^[7] that the earth system now operates "well outside the normal state exhibited over the past 500,000 years" and that "human activity is generating change that extends well beyond natural variability—in some cases, alarmingly so—and at rates that continue to accelerate." To cope with this challenge, the four global change research programmes have called "urgently" for strategies for Earth System management.^[2]

In March 2007, in response to the 2001 Amsterdam Declaration, the Scientific Committee of the International Human Dimensions Programme on Global Environmental Change (IHDP), the overarching social science programme in the field, mandated the drafting of the Science Plan of the Earth System Governance Project by a newly appointed Scientific Planning Committee. The Earth System Governance Project builds on the results of an earlier long-term research programme, the IHDP core project Institutional Dimensions of Global Environmental Change (IDGEC).^[8][9] In 2008, the Earth System Governance Project was officially launched.

The Earth System Governance Project operates under the direction of a Scientific Steering Committee. The role of the Scientific Steering Committee is to guide the implementation of the Earth System Governance Science Plan.^[10]

For its activities and implementation, the Earth System Governance Project relies on a global network of experts from different academic and cultural backgrounds. The research network consists of different groups of scientific experts.

The secretariat, called International Project Office is hosted at Copernicus Institute for Sustainable Development at the Department of Geosciences, Utrecht University, The Netherlands.^[5] It is the "focal point for management and administration, as well as for the communication and network development efforts of the Earth System Governance Project". It has three staff members as of July 2024.^[5]

In 2009, the Science and Implementation Plan of the Earth System Governance Project was published.^[2] In the science and implementation plan, the conceptual problems, cross-cutting themes, flagship projects, and its policy relevance are outlined in detail. The Science Plan was written by an international, interdisciplinary Scientific Planning Committee chaired by Prof. Frank Biermann, which drew on a consultative process that started in 2004. Several working drafts of this Science Plan have been presented and discussed at a series of international events and conferences, and numerous scholars in the field, as well as practitioners, have offered suggestions, advice, and critique.^[1]

Since then, the project has evolved into a broader research alliance that builds on an international network of research centers, lead faculty and research fellows. After the termination of the IHDP in 2014, the activities of the Earth System Governance research alliance are supported by an international steering group of representatives of the main Earth System Governance Research Centres and the global group of lead faculty and research fellows.^[11]

Since 2014 first discussions were held at the Conferences around new directions and a new Science and Implementation Plan. In 2016 lead authors were selected and invited. After reviewing by the Earth System Governance community, the final plan was launched at the 2018 Utrecht Conference.^[12]

The Earth System Governance Project organizes its research according to a conceptual framework guided by five sets of research lenses according to their 2018 Science and Implementation Plan:^[12]

• Architecture and agency
• Democracy and power
• Justice and allocation
• Anticipation and imagination
• Adaptiveness and reflexivity

These centre around four contextual conditions: Transformations, inequality, anthropocene, diversity.

The project does not charge membership fees. It gets financial support by several universities. There is also a foundation, the Earth System Governance Foundation. This is a "non-profit charitable organization under Dutch law, created to help channel support from a variety of sources to the earth system governance research community".^[13]

An important element in the project organisation is the global alliance of research centres that brings together the University of Ghana; the University of Brasília; Utrecht University; the German Development Institute; the CETIP Network; VU University Amsterdam; the University of Amsterdam; the Australian National University; Chiang Mai University; Colorado State University; Lund University; the University of East Anglia; the University of Oldenburg; the Stockholm Resilience Centre; the University of Toronto; the Tokyo Institute of Technology and Yale University. In addition, strong networks on earth system governance research exist in China, Latin America, Central and Eastern Europe, and Russia.

In 2015 the Earth system governance Project became part of the overarching international research platform Future Earth.^[4]

The Earth System Governance Project organizes task forces, which are international networks of senior and early career scholars with a series of working groups focused on particular ideas or idea clusters. There are currently seven Task Forces:^[14]

• Planetary Justice Research of ESG
• New Technologies of ESG
• Ocean Governance of ESG
• Conceptual Foundations of ESGe
• Earth System Law of ESG^[15]
• Methodology for ESG Research^[16]
• Accountability in Global Environmental Governance

The ESG Project interacts with many affiliated projects.^[17] Examples include Norms of Global Governance Initiative (NGGI),^[18] Innovations in Climate Governance (INOGOV),^[19] Improving Earth Systems Governance through 'Purpose Ecosystems',^[20] Governing the EU's Climate and Energy Transition in Turbulent Times (GOVTRAN),^[21] Global Goals,^[22] Environmental Governance in the Intermountain West: A study group of the Environmental Governance Working Group,^[23] CROWD_USG: Crowdsourcing Urban Sustainability Governance,^[24] and Behind the Scenes: Mapping the Role of Treaty Secretariats in International Environmental Policy-Making.^[25]

Projects are the ReSET Programme 'Governance of Global Environmental Change',^[26] Governance 'of' and 'for' the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG),^[27] Future Earth FTI 'Bright Spots: Seeds of a Good Anthropocene',^[28] Future Earth Cluster 'Extreme Events and Environments from Climate to Society' (E3S),^[29] Europe's approach to implementing the Sustainable Development Goals: good practices and the way forward,^[30] Climate-Smart Agriculture in Sub-Saharan Africa,^[31] and the BBNJ Initiative.^[32]

Since 2007, the Project has organized major scientific conferences addressing the topics of governance and global environmental change, including:

• 2007 Amsterdam Conference on the Human Dimensions of Global Environmental Change. 'Earth System Governance: Theories and Strategies for Sustainability'^[33]
• 2008 Berlin Conference on the Human Dimension of Global Environmental Change. 'Long-Term Policies: Governing Social-Ecological Change'^[34]
• 2009 Amsterdam Conference on the Human Dimensions of Global Environmental Change. 'Earth System Governance: People, Places, and the Planet'^[35]
• 2010 Berlin Conference on the Human Dimensions of Global Environmental Change. 'Social dimensions of environmental change and governance'^[36]
• 2011 Colorado Conference on Earth System Governance. 'Crossing Boundaries and Building Bridges'^[37]
• 2012 Lund Conference on Earth System Governance. 'Towards Just and Legitimate Earth System Governance'^[38]
• 2013 Tokyo Conference on Earth System Governance. 'Complex Architectures, Multiple Agents'^[39]
• 2014 Norwich Conference on Earth System Governance. 'Allocation and Access in the Anthropocene'^[40]
• 2015 Canberra Conference on Earth System Governance. 'Democracy and Resilience in the Anthropocene'^[41]
• 2016 Nairobi Conference on Earth System Governance. 'Confronting Complexity and Inequality'^[42]
• 2017 Lund Conference on Earth System Governance. 'Allocation & Access in a Warming and Increasingly Unequal World'^[43] This conference was co-hosted by Lund University during its 350-year celebration.^[44]
• 2018 Utrecht Conference on Earth System Governance. 'Governing Global Sustainability in a Complex World'^[45][46]
• 2019 Mexico Conference on Earth System Governance. 'Urgent Transformations and Earth System Governance: Towards Sustainability and Justice'^[47]
• In 2020, Brastislava was meant to be the host, but the conference was rescheduled for 2021 due to the Covid-19 pandemic.^[48]

There are four major publication series of the Earth System Governance Project:

• The Journal Earth System Governance was launched in 2019. There are 24 volumes as of August 2024.^[49]
• The book series on earth system governance by the MIT Press is about the research objections of earth system governance. Interdisciplinary in scope, broad in governance levels and the use of methods, the books are aimed at investigating earth governance systems and finding conceivable amendments. They are hence addressing the scientific community and professionals in politics.^[50][51] There are 19 books in this series so far (as of July 2024).
• The Earth System Governance Project is also collaborating with Cambridge University Press to summarize the research conclusions of 10 years Earth System Governance Project in 2019.^[52] Eleven books were published in this series.
• The Cambridge Elements series on Earth System Governance focuses on current governance research relevant for practitioners and scientists. The series is aimed at providing ideas for policy improvements and analyses of socio-ecological systems by interdisciplinary and influential scholars.^[53]

The Earth System Governance Project is a scientific effort, but also aims to assist policy responses to the pressing problems of earth system transformation.^[54][55]

In 2011, the Earth System Governance Project launched an initiative on International Environmental Governance. This initiative aims to provide a forum for discussion of current and ongoing research on international environmental governance and the institutional framework for sustainable development, in the period leading up to the 2012 United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development in Rio de Janeiro, also known as Rio + 20. In addition, the initiative aims to target decision-makers and to contribute not just to a better understanding but also to actual improvements in international environmental governance towards an institutional framework that enables sustainable development.^[56]

In 2011, more than twenty Nobel laureates, several leading policy-makers and some of the world's most renowned thinkers and experts on global sustainability met for the Third Nobel Laureate Symposium on Global Sustainability^[57] at the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in Stockholm. The Nobel Laureate Symposium concluded with the Stockholm Memorandum,^[58] calling for "strengthening of Earth System Governance" as a priority for coherent global action.^[59] This memorandum has been submitted to the High-level Panel on Global Sustainability appointed by the UN Secretary General and fed into the preparations for the 2012 UN Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20).

In 2012, 33 leading scholars from the Project wrote a blueprint for reform of strengthening earth system governance, which was published in Science.^[60]

In 2014, the Project's chair Frank Biermann was invited to speak in the United Nations General Assembly.^[61]

There is widespread support for the Earth System Governance Project in the scientific community, which is reflected in the size of the research network and in various publications by experts.^[62][63]

In an internal report of the International Human Dimensions Programme it is stated that the steering group of the Earth System Governance Project is too much dominated by experts from OECD countries. Since then, the Earth System Governance Project has actively sought ways to involve experts from different regions of the world.^[64]

• Earth System Science Partnership
• Global Carbon Project
• Global environmental governance
• Global Land Project
• International Human Dimensions Programme
• World Climate Research Programme
• Urbanization and Global Environmental Change Project

• Earth System Governance Project