Topic 1: As a sustainability scientist, how do you suggest we use scale and indicators to frame our approach and ultimately create politically feasible solutions? Examples?

As a sustainability scientist, how do you suggest we use scale and indicators to frame our approach and ultimately create politically feasible solutions? Examples?

Previously Christina Nolfo wrote:

As a sustainability scientist, how do you suggest we use scale and indicators to frame our approach and ultimately create politically feasible solutions? Examples?

The issue of scale continues to be in the forefront in our discussions about how to conceptualize CHES and how to approach the challenges of sustainability. I suggest we take a step back, even if just in online discussions, to acknowledge the fact that the concept of scale continues to be contested, and that the ways different disciplines approach scale could be either grounds for fruitful discussion, or great frustration. Either way this issue should be explicitly addressed in the text somewhere.
To that end I suggest a 2008 paper by Steve Manson, who argues for an epistemological scale continuum for "complex human-environment" systems: Manson, S. 2008. Does scale exist? An epistemological scale continuum for complex human–environment systems. Geoforum. 39: 776–788.
I was going to attach the paper here but it exceeds the 100 KB limit. Does anyone know how to get around that?
small disclaimer that I have not read this entire paper, but if others are interested in this topic and this paper, I definitely will!

This fits in with the other topics of a sustainability transition as well, but how do we prioritize sustainability goals?  For example, individuals can strive for sustainability with their consumption habits.  Within that, should they focus on food and buy locally, should they focus on transportation and bike/walk as much as possible, should they focus on energy conservation and minimalism?  Should our national priorities be for energy sustainability, or food distribution to alleviate extreme hunger/poverty, or carbon emissions?

Can we worry about national or international sustainability when our cities and homes are not sustainable?

 

Previously Elizabeth Barron wrote:

Previously Christina Nolfo wrote:

As a sustainability scientist, how do you suggest we use scale and indicators to frame our approach and ultimately create politically feasible solutions? Examples?

 

The issue of scale continues to be in the forefront in our discussions about how to conceptualize CHES and how to approach the challenges of sustainability. I suggest we take a step back, even if just in online discussions, to acknowledge the fact that the concept of scale continues to be contested, and that the ways different disciplines approach scale could be either grounds for fruitful discussion, or great frustration. Either way this issue should be explicitly addressed in the text somewhere.
To that end I suggest a 2008 paper by Steve Manson, who argues for an epistemological scale continuum for "complex human-environment" systems: Manson, S. 2008. Does scale exist? An epistemological scale continuum for complex human–environment systems. Geoforum. 39: 776–788.
I was going to attach the paper here but it exceeds the 100 KB limit. Does anyone know how to get around that?
small disclaimer that I have not read this entire paper, but if others are interested in this topic and this paper, I definitely will!