BIARI at Brown 2012

Climate Change and Its Impacts: Regional Approaches

To understand and predict the interacting effects of increased greenhouse gas concentrations, climate and economic teleconnections, and regional scale changes in economic development and land use, interdisciplinary approaches are vital. This Institute brought together scholars from social, physical and life sciences to focus on the study of coupled human-natural systems at the regional level; and how such study generates templates for adaptation at local, national and regional levels, and key inputs for decision-makers. Themes included predicted changes in regional hydrologic cycles; resilience of existing social, economic, civil, ecological and agricultural systems to likely changes; the potential of local, national or multinational institutions to increase the resilience of these systems; and what can be learned from one region to inform science and governance in other regions. Participants developed interdisciplinary approaches through project-based collaboration and proposal writing.

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Conveners

LEAH VANWEY

Associate Professor of Sociology at Brown University.
Professor VanWey studies the dynamics of frontier settlement and consolidation in the Brazilian Amazon. She asks how we can simultaneously protect the Amazon's precious environmental resources while promoting equitable social and economic development.

AMANDA LYNCH

Professor of Geological Sciences at Brown University.
Lynch has published more than 100 articles, policy briefs, book chapters and books in climate science and meteorology, particularly in the polar regions.