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Month: March 2014

One of the most important sustainability-related articles you have never read

March 30, 2014 / 1 Comment

This may be a big call, but I think one of the most important sustainability-related articles which few people have read is ‘Verification, Validation, and Confirmation of Numerical Models in the Earth Sciences’ by Naomi Oreskes et al (published in Science back in 1994).** Sure it sounds dry, but it usefully considers the increasing use … [Read more…]

Posted in: Complexity, PhD research, Sustainability issues Tagged: modelling, sustainability science

Anthony Giddens on the rise of futures thinking and risk management

March 21, 2014 / 1 Comment

It is commonly argued that modern Western cultures have a bias towards short-termism and the present (rather than adequately considering the future). I was recently prompted to re-engage with Anthony Giddens analysis of how engagement with the future has evolved, which challenges some of these prevailing these views. Giddens is an influential British sociologist who … [Read more…]

Posted in: Anticipatory action, Futures practices, PhD research Tagged: anticipatory action, Giddens, PhD

On the concept of ‘anticipatory interventions’ and its discontents

March 15, 2014 / 2 Comments

Dr Ken Henry’s recent interventions in the national Australian economic debate, in which he warned about future “day of reckoning” and made the case that an emerging budgetary crisis demands extensive tax reform, got me thinking again about the concept of anticipatory interventions. I first came across this term in Haico te Kulve’s thesis which … [Read more…]

Posted in: Anticipatory action, Futures practices, PhD research Tagged: anticipatory interventions, PhD

Dealing with complexity in evaluation, foresight and sustainability practice

March 3, 2014 / Leave a Comment

I’ve just finished reading The Science of Evaluation: A Realist Manifesto by Ray Pawson (SAGE, 2013), which re-states the case for realist forms of evaluation and further explicates ways of doing it (e.g. in systematic reviews). Pawson is Professor of Social Research Methodology at the University of Leeds and he describes social science inquiry as … [Read more…]

Posted in: Complexity, PhD research, Uncategorized Tagged: Evaluation, PhD, sustainability science

Recent Comments

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