Dobbeltmøde:
Udfordringerne fra den nye verdensorden

Den geopolitiske krise er i fuld fart ved at ændre det internationale samarbejde, som har defineret den hidtidige verdensorden. Også klimaforandringerne bliver påvirket.

Globaliseringsgruppen har derfor inviteret to internationalt anerkendte forskere til at præsentere deres tanker og lægge op til debat.

Oplæggene bliver givet på engelsk.

Kl. 10:30 – 12:00
Geopolitiske og miljømæssige implikationer af Ukraine-konflikten
Oplæg: Keith Smith, økonom, University of London

Kl. 12:00 – 13:00: Fælles frokost

Kl. 13:00 – 14:30
The Climate crisis’ background in Western colonialism as described by Amitav Ghosh
Björn Johnson, emeritus senior associate professor, Aalborg Universitet

Mere om programmet

Keith Smith præsenterer sit papir: “Geopolitical and Environmental Implications of the Ukraine Conflict”

“This paper discusses the Ukraine conflict not in terms of the shooting war, the outcome of which is highly uncertain, but as a protracted and complex economic war.

It argues that this war has profound geopolitical implications – it has ended the unipolar hegemony of the West and is inaugurating a ‘heteropolar’ system based on strong superpower division and different sources of power across countries.

The critical problems facing the world at the present time are global warming, environmental degradation and pandemic disease. Warming in particular appears to be approaching biospheric limits.
We need a serious search for solutions, and this must entail multilateral collaboration.

However, a key geopolitical outcome of the war is the effective collapse of existing systems of multilateral collaboration, which have had some successes (the Montreal Protocol), and some failures (the COP process and emissions control).

The most important challenge facing global civil and political society is to construct some basis for enhanced multilateral collaboration in the face of deep geopolitical division.”

PS: Dette møde var planlagt som et webinar 25. januar, men måtte udsættes pga tekniske problemer. Det sker ikke denne gang, hvor Keith er han tilsted in person.
Link til Keith Smiths biografi

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Björn Johnson, emeritus senior associate professor, Aalborg Universitet present: “The Climate crisis’ background in Western colonialism as described by Amitav Ghosh”

“In my presentation I will try to discuss the main themes in two new books by Amitav Ghosh:
(1) The Nutmeg’s Curse. Parables for a Planet in Crisis, 2021
(2) The Great Derangement: Climate Change and the Unthinkable, 2016

Booth books are about the present climate crisis and its background in Western colonialism, which is described as a process of violence. More specifically Ghosh discusses how Western colonialism has affected our views on nature, society, culture and the total world system. The books present a harsh but serious critique of Western civilization, especially modernity. They are also a reminder of how deeply our history is affected by non-human entities and forces.

One basic theme is how the Anthropocene leads to new insight about the relations between nature and society.
Another theme is how the dynamics of climate change and other environmental crises connected to transgression of planetary borders are rooted in a centuries-old geopolitical order constructed by Western colonialism.
A third theme is about how human history has been entangled with earthly materials such as spices, tea, sugarcane, opium, and fossil fuels and how it has been shaped non-human forces. “The agency of the landscape”.
A fourth theme is the character of ‘modernity’ especially its claim that everything in the world exists to be exploited and utilized by humans – i.e., primarily white, male Europeans.
A fifth theme is ‘terraforming’ i.e., the muting and remaking of the landscape to fit European ways of life and the role this has played in the process of colonialization.
Other recurrent themes are the crucial importance of geo-politics and the paradigm of ever-growing material desire.

Amitav Ghosh is primarily a writer and his own main conclusion is:
“This is the great burden that now rests upon writers, artists, filmmakers, and everyone else that is involved in the telling of stories: to us falls the task of imaginatively restoring agency and voice to nonhumans”

Indtroduktion til Amitav Ghosh
On YouTube there several interesting videos in which Amitav Ghosh discusses ‘The Nutmeg’s Curse’, see for example: https://youtu.be/C3lZ7EmChWo

Link til Bjørn Johnsons biosketch