Current Research Projects

Ongoing Research Project: Climate in the Media

A group of Ceres 21 researchers based in China, Ghana, the UK and Norway are currently working to explore media portrayals of the climate issue in Ghana, China and Norway. Understanding the role of the media in shaping both public opinion, governmental policies and international debates is crucial to the creation of sustainale development, and comparing our diverse regions allows for a fruitful "global gaze" on the ruling understandings and debates about climate. The project was piloted in 2008, giving access to comparable data both across time and regions for the current analysis. 

The project will launch a comprehensive report in Accra this December and the results will be comprised and compared for publication in a peer-reviewed journal.   

Ongoing Research Project: Religion and Sustainability

Diverse worldviews give way to different interaction with nature, and hence also diverse attitudes and actions pertaining to climatic shifts. Commencing from this, Ceres 21 researchers are exploring how different worldviews both correspond with and challenge sustainable development. This humanist project is based on broad, comparative studies of responses to climate shift and innovation for sustainable future in the poor South, the fast expanding East and the rich West.

The project has so far resulted in a pamphlet of articles to be published here on the Ceres 21 official website and plans to publish in peer-reviewed journals are well underway.    

Ongoing Research Project: The Anatomy of Green Transition

The increased use of electricity and passenger transport sets out a demand for new low-carbon solutions.  The successful solutions to this demand require an alignment of political, social, technological and commercial actors, challenging both the status quo and current prospects internationally. The project focuses on our core areas, that is, the mature West (Europe), the growing East (China) and the developing South (West-Africa).

The project will result in the publication of a book dealing with both past and current developments in the above sectors. The book will also comment widely on todays' visions of future solutions and ongoing pilot projects and may outline the coming anatomy of green transition.

Ongoing Research Project: Ecological Wisdom

What is it to be wise today? Ceres 21 Project Director Nina Witoszek is currently writing a book on the topic of sustainable development and wisdom. Inspired by one of the Ceres 21 workshops that took place at the facilities of one our collaborating institutions, Stanford University, the book is planned for publication in 2013, adding to the list of valuable publications from the Ceres 21 project researchers.