From Climate Conflicts to Environmental Peacebuilding?

• Applicant: Privatdozent Dr. Tobias Ide
• Subject Area: Political Science
• Term: since 2021
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 462625920

Global environmental change and armed conflicts are two grand challenges of the 21st century. Researchers are increasingly studying the interactions between these two challenges with a particular focus on climate change and conflict. While there is increasing evidence that climate change influences conflict risks, the underlying pathways remain unclear. Environmental peacebuilding studies how natural resource management can support conflict prevention, resolution, and recovery. Little is known, however, on how environmental peacebuilding (including climate change adaptation) can address climate-conflict risks, and what (unintended) negative effects it has. The network tackles these knowledge gaps in three steps. First, it analyses through which pathways climate change is most likely to affect conflict risks. Second, the network members will investigate how (and in which contexts) environmental peacebuilding is likely to address these pathways. Third, the network will take a critical stance and study the potential negative impacts of environmental peacebuilding practices. Specific outcomes include a special issue, a public event, podcasts, blog posts and the promotion of young scholars.

• DFG Programme: Scientific Networks