Environmental Humanities: Transformation, Governance, Ethics, Law

This book analyses and develops overarching concepts for forest policy and forest governance and includes a detailed investigation into the historical discussion on forests. It examines opportunities and limits for negative emissions in a sector that – like peatlands – appears significantly less ambivalent compared to highly technical large-scale forms of climate geoengineering. The analysis shows that the binding climate and biodiversity targets under international law are much more ambitious than most people assume. Measured against that, the volume critically reviews the potentials of afforestation and reforestation for climate mitigation, which is often presented as the new saviour to fulfil the commitments of the Paris Agreement and to reach climate neutrality in the future. It becomes clear that ultimately only biodiverse and thus resilient forests can function as a carbon sink in the long term. The volume shows that the existing European and international forest governance approaches fail to comply with these targets and insights. Furthermore, the book develops a bundle of policy measures. Quantity governance systems for livestock farming, fossil fuels and similar drivers of deforestations represent the most important approach. They are most effective when not directly targeting forests due to their heterogeneity but central damaging factors. With regard to the dominant regulatory and subsidy-based governance for forests we show that it remains necessary to supplement these quantity governance systems with certain easily graspable and thus controllable regulatory and subsidy regulations such as a regulatory protection of old-growth forests with almost no exceptions; extension of the livestock-to-land-ratio established in organic farming to all farming; far-reaching restriction of bioenergy use to certain residues flanked by import bans; and a national and international complete conversion of all agricultural and forest subsidies to “public money for publicservices” to promote nature conservation and afforestation in addition to the quantity control systems.

This open access book marks the interfaces between life sciences, social, and spiritual sciences on the one hand and real-worlds problems and solutions on the other. How can hope made possible by action-oriented transdisciplinary collaboration? This question is highly relevant considering the aggravating climate crisis and biodiversity loss, as well as the justice and migration issues that become more and more serious. Undoubtetly, scientific answers should meet the expectations of decision-makers in politics and industries. But, at the same time, they cannot ignore cultural and thus spiritual preconditions for good decisions and the change of human behaviour. This volume presents the contributions to the 3th Biennial International Transdisciplinary Conference on Environmental Justice that took place in 2024 in Switzerland.