The Politics of Climate Change provides a critical analysis of the political, moral and legal response to climate change in the midst of significant socio-economic policy shifts. Evolving from original EC commissioned research, this book examines how climate change was put on the policy agenda, with the evolution of the United Nations Framework Convention and subsequent Conference of Parties.
The international team of contributors devote in-depth chapters to:
* climate change policies of different nations
* reductions of greenhouse gas emmissions
* legal aspects of...

The Politics of Climate Change provides a critical analysis of the political, moral and legal response to climate change in the midst of significant socio-economic policy shifts. Evolving from original EC commissioned research, this book examines how climate change was put on the policy agenda, with the evolution of the United Nations Framework Convention and subsequent Conference of Parties.
The international team of contributors devote in-depth chapters to:
* climate change policies of different nations
* reductions of greenhouse gas emmissions
* legal aspects of...

Leading experts analyze the fundamental concept and implications of the Precautionary Principle, on which environmental legislation and international conventions increasingly rely.

Global economic and social forces are affecting everyone, everywhere. However, their influence is shaped by local communities interpretation of these forces and responses to them. Social identities provide a guide; they are the product of history, culture, economy, patterns of governance and degree of community cohesion. How the global and the local connect and reconfigure at various scales and through different cultures is explained in this forward-looking volume.

Global economic and social forces are affecting everyone, everywhere. However, their influence is shaped by local communities interpretation of these forces and responses to them. Social identities provide a guide; they are the product of history, culture, economy, patterns of governance and degree of community cohesion. How the global and the local connect and reconfigure at various scales and through different cultures is explained in this forward-looking volume.

Sustainable development is forming part of tax and industrial policies, social security and health issues and, through Local Agenda 21, is creeping into local government. This volume aims to chart the course of sustainable development as an idea and to analyze how far it has emerged as an organizing focus in a number of European countries (Germany, Greece, Norway, Portugal and the UK) as well as in the European Union itself. There is also a chapter for comparative purposes from the USA.

1m Juni 1992 versammelten sich in Rio de Janeiro, Brasilien, 25000 Menschen zur grOBten Konferenz aller Zeiten, die auf Grund der gro6en Zahl der teil nehmenden Prasidenten und Regierungschefs auch als Welt-Gipfel bezeichnet wird. Sie stand unter der Schirmherrschaft der Vereinten Nationen und befaBte sich mit den Themen Umwelt und Entwicklung. Es wurden u. a. folgende Frage stellungen betrachtet: Wie kann zwischen der Notwendigkeit zur Entwicklung und Verbesserung der menschlichen Lebensqualitiit und der wichtigen Verpflichtung, die Umwelt zu bewah ren, die richtige Balance gefunden werden?...

Dieses erste speziell f r das interdisziplin re Fachgebiet 'Umweltwissenschaften' konzipierte Lehrbuch bietet allen, die im Rahmen Ihres Studiums oder Berufs mit Fragestellungen aus dem Umweltbereich konfrontiert sind, einen idealen Einstieg in die komplexe Materie. In einmaliger Weise verdeutlicht das Buch die Vernetzung von Natur-, Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaften. Dar ber hinaus beschreibt es politische und gesetzgeberische Bem hungen zur Durchsetzung von Umweltschutzma nahmen. Die Umweltproblematik wird dabei immer in einen globalen Zusammenhang gestellt. Besonders belastete und gef...

Tipping points are zones or thresholds of profound changes in natural or social conditions with very considerable and largely unforecastable consequences. Tipping points may be dangerous for societies and economies, especially if the prevailing governing arrangements are not designed either to anticipate them or adapt to their arrival. Tipping points can also be transformational of cultures and behaviours so that societies can learn to adapt and to alter their outlooks and mores in favour of accommodating to more sustainable ways of living.
This volume examines scientific, economic and...

Environmental Science for Environmental Management has quickly established itself as the leading introduction to environmental science, demonstrating how a more environmental science can create an effective approach to environmental management on different spatial scales. Since publication of the first edition, environmentalism has become an increasing concern on the global political agenda. Following the Rio Conference and meetings on population, social justice, women, urban settlement and oceans, civil society has increasingly promoted the cause of a more radical agenda, ranging from rights...