Multi-party collaboration: the road to innovative solutions for global warming challenges.

The objective of this project is to undertake activities leading to the formulation of a project proposal that addresses the research question of how multi-party collaboration (MPC) can become an essential instrument in crafting appropriate responses to the issue of global warming. These activities involve the clarification of the five research objectives identified so far. These five objectives coincide with the five phases of an MPC: What are the antecedents of MPC for climate change? What are the optimal process and actor capabilities for climate-oriented MPC? What metrics can both support and measure the outcomes of MPC? What conditions should be met in order for translating successful outcomes of MPCs into fortification and replication of such outcomes. What conditions facilitate the multiplication of successful MPC in countering climate change into new fields of social relations and new domains of practices? The research consortium will develop a coherent set of selection criteria and will identify relevant cases for empirical observation. These cases will be used to empirically validate our conceptual assumptions. Additionally, the selection framework must be fully commensurate with the envisaged valorisation track. These cases should furthermore provide an opportunity to demonstrate that MPC may be a valuable instrument to overcome technological, motivational, cognitive and capability obstacles. We will evaluate and validate our research design. First, the selection of cases should target empirical settings that account for a significant proportion of GHG-emissions. Second, the selection should be done in communities of practice that in principle leave room for future improvement in GHG-reductions. Third, cases should be related to settings that are sufficiently homogeneous to allow for analytical rigor in the interpretation of research results. Fourth, at the same time, the selection framework must allow for sufficient variety and heterogeneity in terms of interdependence of social relations to enable empirical coverage of all research objectives and all conceptual dimensions of MPC-history and evolution. Finally, the selected cases should be comprised of actors that are committed to be engaged in a valorisation track.

Keywords:Global warming challenges

Disciplines:Agricultural animal production, Agricultural plant production, Agriculture, land and farm management, Other agriculture, forestry, fisheries and allied sciences, Biological and physiological psychology, General psychology, Other psychology and cognitive sciences, Forestry sciences, Applied sociology, Policy and administration, Social psychology, Social stratification, Social theory and sociological methods, Sociology of life course, family and health, Other sociology and anthropology