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Christopher Columbus' situation and the challenge of understanding today's global environmental issues

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 July 2009

Uno Svedin
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Abstract

This paper highlights the process of selecting a long term research agenda in the environmental-development field. What are the criteria to be used for the understanding of what is important in our phase of history? In order to dwell on this process somewhat from the outside, the entry-point chosen is Columbus' world and challenges 500 years ago. In his time the problem was not environmental issues; however, at a more general level an analysis of the interplay between what is supposed to be known, the ideological connotations, the political ambitions, and the economical and technical capacities, provide interesting parallels to our time.

Type
FOCUS—Science and Technology Assessment
Information
European Review , Volume 3 , Issue 1 , January 1995 , pp. 93 - 101
Copyright
Copyright © Academia Europaea 1995

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References

REFERENCES

1.Flint, V. I. H. (1992) The Imaginative Landscape of Christopher Columbus. Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
2.Svedin, U. (1992) The challenge of the societal dimension to environmental issues: a Swedish research response. In Svedin, U. and Aniansson, B. (Eds) Society and the Environment: A Swedish Research Perspective. Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
3.Svedin, U. (1991) Responsiveness of science and technology institutions in Sweden to environmental change—a Swedish contribution to a cross-national study coordinated by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). (This is part of a broader several-country study.)Google Scholar
4.Gibbons, M. et al. (1994) The New Production of Knowledge: The Dynamics of Science and Research in Contemporary Societies. Sage Publications Ltd., London.Google Scholar