http://www.exchangemagazine.com/morningpost/2008/week41/Wednesday/1008015.html New tools for ‘climate emergency’<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /> Thomas Homer-Dixon - Arts Fleeing the disciplinary confines of his past, Thomas Homer-Dixon has arrived at <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />Waterloo, a free-range academic. “Coming to Waterloo is like breathing pure oxygen. I’m being allowed to do what I want for the first time since I was a post-doc.” The global visionary, award-winning author (The Upside of Down, The Ingenuity Gap), and former director of the Trudeau Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies at the University of Toronto has joined the new Balsillie School of International Affairs and holds cross-appointments to the faculties of arts and environment at Waterloo. “I’m at a watershed point in my career,” he explains. “I’ve built a foundation of knowledge and ideas. It’s a great time to arrive at Waterloo. One of the principal reasons I came here is the interdisciplinary nature of my work, which draws on political science, economics, environmental studies, geography, cognitive science, social psychology, and complex system theory. The problems we have now are located at the interfaces of professional domains.” Homer-Dixon’s current research focuses on “global responses to the climate emergency — the need to move as quickly as possible to zero carbon emissions.” To study the policy implications of different emergency scenarios, “we need new tools,” he says, adding he finds complexity theory “very provocative. It’s guiding everything I’m doing now. “According to complex adaptive system theory, the most adaptive systems tend to be distributed and decentralized in their problem solving,” he says, pointing to Wikipedia as an example. Over the next two years, Homer-Dixon plans to embark on two additional research projects. “Beyond the Growth Imperative: Challenges of a Global Steady-State Economy” will explore the need to move away from the commitment to global growth. “Open-architecture Democracy” will study the application of collaborative problem-solving on the Web to address what he terms “humankind’s extraordinarily complex social, political, and environmental problems.” Is there still time to save ourselves — and the planet? “I have two little kids,” he says. “I have to hope we have time.” -----------------------------------
Cheers, Brian Brian Czech, Ph.D., President Center for the Advancement of the Steady State Economy The CASSE position on economic growth may be e-signed at: http://www.steadystate.org/CASSEPositionOnEG.html .
