Roundtable on the Future of Regulatory Scholarship in the Anthropocene

Abstract

Current generations live in the Anthropocene – a new geological age in which many conditions and processes on Earth are profoundly altered by human impact. Humanity’s outsized influence on the planet has already pushed the Earth system past several planetary boundaries, and triggered rapidly increasing turbulence, making the planet as a whole rapidly less hospitable for human life and civilisation. Already today, communities around the world are experiencing the destabilising effects of climate change, with increasing frequency and severity of natural disasters such as droughts, wildfires, floods, and heatwaves. Continuing along the current path of greenhouse gas emissions and natural resource exploitation amplifies the danger of reaching planetary tipping points after which self-perpetuating processes of climate and ecosystem change set in. This danger calls for wide-reaching changes in our economic and social organisation, with consequences for individual, political, and economic actors. This roundtable examines the question of what the future role of regulatory scholarship is – and should be – in light of this planetary emergency. What is our responsibility as researchers, teachers, policy advisors, and citizens of today’s world? Should we – as Karl Weick advocates – “drop our tools” and free ourselves from concepts, checklists, and assumptions that weigh us down, reduce our agility, and blind us to what is happening right here and now and how we can cope with it? What would this look like in practice? What concepts should be amplified, and which ones left behind? Which research questions need to be asked more, which ones less? How should we change our teaching and policy advising practices to fully respond to the planetary crisis? And is it permissible – or even our duty as scientists – to also engage in activism? The Roundtable will present various viewpoints, but all start from the same point, inspired by the words of Marshall McLuhan: There are no passengers on Spaceship Earth. We are all crew. Panellists: • Eva Thomann (moderator), University of Konstanz • Michael Huber, University of Bielefeld • Colin Scott, University College Dublin. • Julien Etienne, Independent policy consultant and researcher • Gary Lynch-Wood, University of Manchester • Janina Grabs, ESADE Business School