SOME NOTES REGARDING GLOBAL ENVIRONMENTAL CHANGE RESEARCH / CONCEPTS:
The field or research coming to be understood as GEC (Global Change
Research) utilizes certain basic concepts and terms to help
systematically define "what we mean" and at what "scale" of analysis
we're looking at. Here is a brief introduction to the key terms and
where you can "read more about it" on the web:
SOME KEY TERMS / ACRONYMS:
HDGC = Human Dimensions of Global Change
GEC = Global Environmental Change
GCLP = Global Change and Local Places (a special research project)
LUCC = Land use / (land) cover change
RAR = Regions at Risk
Driving forces of change
Criticality
Endangerment
Impoverishment
Sustainability
Environmental "sensitivity" vs "resilience"
Environmental "vulnerability" vs "fragility"
Proximate and distal causal forces
Systemic vs cumulative forces of change
Spatial and temporal scales
Intensity vs. intentionality
Terrestrial vs Climate change
Human "impacts" vs "responses"
Regional "trajectories" of change
Anthropogenic (human-induced) change vs "natural" change
READ MORE ABOUT IT:
Read more about these terms in the online lecture notes prepared by Dr.
James Proctor (Univ of California, Santa Barbara) as he used them in a
course entitled: "Human-Induced Environmental Change" (GEOG 186)
URL: http://docprocsun.geog.ucsb.edu/186/home.html
Go to "Resources" and read online definitions / summary of the concepts
at URL:
http://docprocsun.geog.ucsb.edu/186/186links.html
You may also want to see the following two major books and collections
of case studies (they should be available "on reservere" for use this
summer):
a) Kates, Robert W., B.L. Turner, II, and William C. Clark. 1990. The
great transformation. In The Earth as transformed by human action:
Global and Regional Changes in the Biosphere over the Past 300 years,
ed. B. L. Turner, II, William C. Clark, Robert W. Kates, John F.
Richards, Jessica T. Mathews, and William B. Meyer, 1-17. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
b) Turner, B.L. Roger E Kasperson, and Jedanne X. Kasperson. 1995.
Regions at Risk: Comparisons of Threatened Environments. Tokyo; New
York: United Nations University Press.
OTHER ONLINE RESOURCES:
1) Read a brief abstract on the GCLP Project (by NSF) at:
http://www.geog.utah.edu/~hdgcsg/research.html#Global Change in Local
Places
2) See some "case" material (including satellite images of first three
research sites in Kansas, Piedmont, Lower Great Lakes at the AAG
homepage URL:
AAG = http://www.aag.org/
GCLP Project = http://www.aag.org/gclp/gclpnew.html
3) GRID / UNEP has another beautiful online "case" showing "comparative"
GCLP (see satellite images from the Rift Valley of East Africa at URL:
http://grid2.cr.usgs.gov/landsat/kenyan.html
4) Read about the major global LUCC (Land use /cover change) research
project at URL:
http://pathfinder-www.sr.unh.edu/lucc/index.html
Hope you find these resources helpful.
OTHER KEY RESOURCES:
1) One of the most used "diagrams/flow charts" describing physical and
human driving forces of global change is called the "Bretherton Diagram"
- see it at URL (courtesy of ESSE/USRA).
esse = http://www.usra.edu/esse/ESSE.html
(B & White diagram) = URL: http://www.usra.edu/esse/Info_by_Topic.html
(diagram in color) = URL:http://www.usra.edu/esse/BrethColor.GIF
3) You may want to also explore resources found at GCRIO (The US Global
Change Resource Information Office) at URL:
Explore and enjoy!
Bob Ford
Westminster College of Salt Lake City
