International Conference: Environmental justice, August 29th – September 2nd, 2021. Lasalle Institut, Switzerland

While warnings from the climate science community are growing, the Paris Agreement is not being met by any member country of the United Nations. What are the reasons for such a failure? How to cure it? In the meantime, new challenges have emerged, which still played a rather minor role in the 2015 negotiations but which, with the 15th Conference of Parties (COP) for the Convention on Biological Diversity in Kunming (Yunnan province, 2021), are coming on the front of the stage of political concerns: the sixth mass extinction is currently underway. The erosion of biodiversity complicates our understanding of the Anthropocene and requires a finer understanding of how the ecological reconstruction of the planet can be implemented.

2015 was also the year of publication of the encyclical Laudato Si’, which constitutes a major turning point in the way in which the Catholic Church is positioned with regard to the ecological question. In 2020, Fratelli tutti stresses that the ecological reconstruction cannot be done at the expense of the poorest. More than ever, the cry of the Earth resonates with the cry of the poor. In addition to the growing complexity of the challenges brought about by our ecological polycrisis, there is a demand for justice. How to meet these challenges in a fair way and how to build back better after the Covid-19 pandemic.

This international conference will offer an interdisciplinary platform for dialogue between the scientific community and that of ethicists and philosophers concerned by the imperative of justice. It is aimed at researchers, students, activists and decision-makers engaged in the social-ecological transition. Jointly organized by Georgetown University, Stellenbosch Sustainability Institute, Leuphana University and the Lassalle-Institut, it will lead to Proceedings published by Georgetown university Press. This conference will be the start of a series of annual international conferences in the following years.

Information and call for papers here.