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Environmental conflicts pose powerful challenges to civil societies. More often than not they are complex and hard fought affairs that present urgent and practical problems to be solved. Citizens and decision makers are hungry for ways to improve environmental discussions. Many communities need wiser outcomes that are sound, explicitly equitable, and have practical staying power. At the same time we need to reduce the transaction costs (both human and financial) that are associated with public interests conflicts over climate change – adaptation or mitigation issues, water, pollution, timber , land, hunting, fishing and energy development just to mention a few.
Environmental and natural resource conflicts are ubiquitous. Everywhere and every day, people compete for scarce resources, including access to clean air and water, oil and gas, minerals, timber, farmland, or to preserve habitat for plants and animals. In competition for these resources, people struggle to resolve issues such as how to balance resource exploitation with the need to preserve air and water quality, how to supply water to arid regions while protecting surface and groundwater supplies, or how to permit genetic modification of plants and animals while preserving the integrity of naturally evolved species and ecosystems. Each of these issues involves a distinct “how” question that collectively defines the core challenge of environmentalism: How can we promote the use of our natural resources and technology, while preserving the long-term quality and integrity of those resources on which current and future generations depend? Most decisions on whether and how resources should be used impact a wide diversity of people at the local, regional, and national level. These decisions also have inter-generational and global impacts that are beginning to be taken into account.
This environmental concentration will significantly advance the participants’ knowledge of how to utilize collaborative approaches to problem solving, while acknowledging the unique political, emotional and ideological influences that are often woven into environmental conflict. It prepares students to enter the field by introducing them to multi-party engagements that address the spectrum of conflict escalation indicators. In addition to those indicators, students will be become knowledgeable about (a) uniqueness, complexity and history of environmental conflict analysis and engagement; (b) managing scientific and technical information in environmental conflicts, and (c) consensus building and facilitation theory relevant to environmental problem solving.
Courses
CAE635 Introduction to Environmental Conflict & Collaborative Problem Solving
CAE636 Managing Scientific and Technical Information in Environmental Conflicts
CAE610 Consensus Building & Facilitation Theory
Practitioner Workshops
ICAE140: Introduction to Negotiation
ICAE160: Introduction to Mediation
ICAE285: Group Facilitation Skills
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