INVITATION FOR INTERNATIONAL INTERNS FROM THE PATEL INSTITUTE OF GLOBAL SUSTAINABILITY ON SUSTAINABILITY AND SUSTAINABILITY TRANSITIONS Cities can be cradles for innovation and sustainability transitions. They are places where slow and fast transitions are initiated and accelerated as well as test-‐beds and seedbeds for innovations. Cities have social, ecological and technological assets that are essential for economic and social development locally and globally; there is thus an imperative for balancing their efforts for continuity and prosperity while ensuring a livable space for their citizens. Increasing policy attention is put on the processes of change that take place in cities and for cities to drive the way to improved livability and resilience. This shows the diversity of opportunities and conditions in cities, where challenges such as urbanization and globalization contribute to the pressure for rerouting current development pathways towards sustainability and resilience. Urban studies scholarship offers insights about how pressures of globalization and urbanization may affect current livability standards in cities and also problematize on the implications of an abrupt transition of cities due to unpreparedness in face of climate change, demographic changes, ageing and a cascade of financial crashes. Finding the right approaches to tap into the potentials of cities and reroute their development pathways towards sustainability and resilience in the context of the particular challenges individual cities face is paramount. The governance of urban sustainability transitions requires new strategic planning processes that integrate diverse sources of knowledge and perspectives, make ‘glocal’ connections between local urban challenges and broader global, national and regional macro-‐developments and enable pragmatic decisions in a context of complexity and uncertainty. This challenges urban practitioners and scientists alike to take up a process-‐content thinking and to reflect on how to navigate societal complexity while mobilizing innovative and transformative societal potential towards action for sustainability. In view of our research and education focus on cities and sustainability transitions, we offer two thematic foci for internships on two of our pioneering urban research projects: -‐ ARTS project -‐ GUST project ARTS – Accelerating and Rescaling Transitions to Sustainability (www.acceleratingtransitions.eu) The focal unit of analysis of ARTS project will be innovative activities and related actor-‐networks that are fundamentally changing energy, food, shelter and mobility provisioning patterns at the scale of a city or region, situated within a wider European context. ARTS will explore how lessons from these initiatives can be drawn for broader transitions to sustainable low-‐carbon European societies. Specifically the ARTS consortium aims to investigate and deepen our knowledge on the following research gaps that relate to the key conditions that can be associated to acceleration of transitions (also) in the context of cities and regions, namely: synergy, diversity, speed of change, inclusivity, knowledge dissemination and social learning. We will explore these conditions based on a diverse set of transition initiatives in five transition regions across Europe in an inter-‐ and transdisciplinary way: Brighton, Budapest, Dresden, Flanders, and Stockholm. These transition initiatives act upon low-‐carbon challenges and have started to transform (to a limited extend) structures, cultures and practices in the domains that impact the low-‐carbon challenge at hand. In the transition regions mentioned above, different transition initiatives take action across multiple
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domains and impact on one or on each of the low-‐carbon domains: Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services, Resource Management, Energy Use and Supply, Living and Building, Transition and Mobility. We seek to identify the values, conditions and mechanisms for accelerating sustainability transitions, develop strategies to assist and stimulate their acceleration and assess them with dynamic modeling approaches. ARTS Transition Regions and associated Low-‐Carbon Domains
Stockholm Low-Carbon Domain:
Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services
Brighton
Dresden
Low-Carbon Domain:
Low-Carbon Domain:
Resource Management
Living and Building
Budapest Low-Carbon Domain:
Transport and Mobility
Flanders Low-Carbon Domain:
Energy Use and Supply
“Cities have little choice: to survive and flourish they must remain hospitable to pragmatism and problem solving, to cooperation and networking, to creativity and innovation” (Benjamin Barber, 2013, If mayors ruled the world, Yale University Press, p. 13)
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Internship Vacancy on ARTS project: Food Initiatives and Urban Sustainability Transitions Proposed period 6 weeks: 4 weeks of learning by doing and 2 weeks off Period: 6th June to 15th July 2016 Overview of activities and tasks Week Place and Activity th th 6 June to 10 of June 2016 Place: DRIFT, Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands (week 1) Activity: Introduction to the DRIFT research team and preparatory readings on urban sustainability and food initiatives in the ARTS cities Preparation of 1-‐page overview of ideas and sketches th th 13 to 17 June 2016 Place: 13-‐14 June at DRIFT, EUR, Rotterdam (week 2) 15-‐17 June at Dresden University, Dresden, Germany Participation in the Pan-‐European Conference of Cities – Informed Cities Forum #5 to be held in Dresden, Germany were an interactive debate of civil society organisations, policy makers and scientists will take place with participants across all Europe. The language of the conference is English. The intern will interact not only with young scientists and activists but also with the ARTS’ project’s group of citizen bloggers. 18-‐19 June 2016 (weekend) Hiking and river cinema in Dresden with the ARTS research team – We have planned for a nature-‐based weekend to recover from the conference, it is a social activity in the river forest. 20 June 2016 Place: Dresden, Germany (week 3) ARTS General Assembly meeting. Participation in the research meeting with the 10 research institutes to get a learning experience on real-‐life research and theory building for urban sustainability transitions. 21 June to 1rst of July 2016 2 weeks off to see Berlin and any other city in the Netherlands or (week 3 and week 4) Germany Note: Dresden is 2 hours by train from Berlin th th 4 to 8 of July 2016 Place: Rotterdam City (week 5) Field visit to urban agriculture initiatives in Rotterdam -‐ Uit ge eigen stad -‐ Dakkakkers -‐ Esenburgpark Informal interviews with founders and volunteers, description of impressions. Friday 8th July 2016: Short presentation of impressions and lessons so far to the DRIFT PhD group. 10 to 15th July 2016 Place: DRIFT, Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands (week 6) Work on blog and Brief paper together with Prof. Niki Frantzeskaki to publish on the DRIFT series of Practice Briefs. Practice Brief paper will be approximately 3,000 words with pictures, sketches and reflections.
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DRIFT Research Team for ARTS Internship Vacancy Associate Professor Dr. Ing. Niki Frantzeskaki, DRIFT, Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands Niki Frantzeskaki is an Associate Professor on Sustainability Transitions Governance at DRIFT, Faculty of Social Sciences at Erasmus University Rotterdam. She graduated her PhD on the topic “Dynamics of sustainability transitions: Driving Forces and Feedback Loops” with TU Delft, Policy Analysis Section. She is working at DRIFT since 2010, she researches urban transitions and the governance questions on how to facilitate and accelerate contemporary sustainability transitions combining theoretical and empirical work across Europe and in developing countries. Email: n.frantzeskaki@drift.eur.nl Professor Dr. Derk Loorbach, DRIFT, Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands Derk Loorbach is director of DRIFT and Professor of Socio-‐economic Transitions at the Faculty of Social Science, both at Erasmus University Rotterdam. Derk is one of the founders of the transition management approach as new form of governance for sustainable development. He has over one hundred publications in this area and has been involved as an action researcher in numerous transition processes with government, business, civil society and science. He is a frequently invited keynote speaker in and outside Europe. Email: loorbach@drift.eur.nl Giorgia Silvestri, DRIFT, Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands Giorgia completed with honors her Master degree in Environmental Science at Pisa University (Italy) and her bachelor studies at the Faculty of Mathematical, Physical and Natural Sciences at Florence University. In between, she studied for a semester at Rey Juan Carlos University in Madrid and she prepared her master thesis in Honduras on sustainability transitions of rural communities. She became familiar with transition theories and transition management during an internship of 9 months at DRIFT in 2013. Giorgia joined DRIFT in 2014 and she is currently working in three international projects: SUSTAIN, ARTS and IMPRESSIONS. Her research interests lie in the area of sustainability science and sustainability transitions ranging from environmental governance and policies, participatory methods, learning processes and stakeholder engagement strategies. She is a member of the COST Action TU1201 (Urban Allotment Gardens in European Cities – Future, Challenges and Lessons Learned) and a collaborator of rootAbility. Email: silvestri@drift.eur.nl
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Estimate global cost. Simulation (Just to help you on your personal estimate costs) We include below necessary concepts with an approximately global price. Please check them anyway on your personal case. Additional estimate costs Plane, round trip (Tampa-‐Amsterdam, Amsterdam-‐Tampa) Round Train Ticket Schiphol Airport to Rotterdam www.ns.nl Accommodation 35 days www.thestudenthotel.com Rotterdam-‐Dresden Round Trip Train ticket International & Cultural Optional Visits: Berlin, Leipzig, Amsterdam, Rotterdam Renting a bike to commute in Rotterdam Others daily subsistence costs Taxes to visit historical monuments and museums DRIFT Tuition Fee Total additional estimate costs
1500 $ 25 $ 600 $
250 $ 400 $ 50 $ 500 $ 50 $ 300 $ 3675 $
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GUST – Governing Urban Sustainability Transitions with Urban Living Labs European cities face a pressing challenge – how can they provide economic prosperity and social cohesion while achieving environmental sustainability? In response, new collaborations are emerging in the form of ‘living labs’– sites devised to design, test and learn from social and technical innovation in real time. Our aim is to examine, inform and advance the governance of sustainability transitions through urban living labs (ULL). ULL are proliferating rapidly across Europe as a means through which public and private actors are testing innovations in buildings, transport and energy systems. Yet despite the experimentation taking place on the ground, we lack systematic learning across urban and national contexts about their impacts and effectiveness. We have limited knowledge on how good practice can be scaled up to achieve the transformative change required. This project will bring together leading European partners to create a systematic framework for evaluating the design, practices and processes of ULL to enable the comparative analysis of their potential and limits. This knowledge will be co-‐produced with policy-‐makers and practitioners across Europe, with the explicit intention of providing new insights into the governance of urban sustainability and improving the design and implementation of ULL in order to realise their potential. Internship Vacancy on GUST project: Experimenting with urban partnerships for Sustainability Transitions Proposed period 6 weeks: 4 weeks of learning by doing and 2 weeks off Period: 2nd May to 10th of June 2016 Overview of activities and tasks Week Place and Activity 2nd May to 6th May 2016 Place: DRIFT, Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands (week 1) Activity: Introduction to the DRIFT research team and preparatory readings on urban sustainability, real-‐life experiments within urban living labs in the different Dutch cities and British cities. Participation in field research in Dutch Urban Living Labs. th th 9 to 13 of May 2016 Place: DRIFT, EUR, Rotterdam (week 2) Two activities take place this week: (a) DRIFT will prepare a real-‐life experiments exhibition to be part of the International Architectural Biennale Expo in Rotterdam’s Cultural Center. The intern will have the opportunity not only to see the Architectural Biennale but also to participate in the exhibition as part of the DRIFT research team. (b) DRIFT is organizing an intense scientific debate on experiments for urban sustainability in cities that will attract researchers from around Europe, and it will take place at DRIFT’s offices at the Erasmus University Campus. The intern will have the opportunity to be part of the scientific debate, interact and speak with researchers of urban sustainability around Europe. 16 to 20th May 2016 Participation in field research in Dutch Urban Living Labs in the cities of (week 3) Rotterdam, Groningen and Utrecht. Field observations, visiting the sites together with the DRIFT research team. 23rd May to 3rdf June 2016 2 weeks off to visit other cities around Europe (Brussels, Paris, Berlin) (week 4 and week 5) 6th to 10th of June 2016 Work on blog and Brief paper together with Prof. Niki Frantzeskaki to (week 6) publish on the DRIFT series of Practice Briefs. Practice Brief paper will be approximately 3,000 words with pictures, sketches and reflections. More specifically, it will include impressions, review of experience and lessons learnt from the urban living labs’ visits and understanding of urban sustainability transitions. Friday 10th July 2016: Short presentation of impressions and lessons so far to the DRIFT PhD group.
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DRIFT Research Team for GUST Internship Vacancy Associate Professor Dr. Ing. Niki Frantzeskaki, DRIFT, Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands Niki Frantzeskaki is an Associate Professor on Sustainability Transitions Governance at DRIFT, Faculty of Social Sciences at Erasmus University Rotterdam. She graduated her PhD on the topic “Dynamics of sustainability transitions: Driving Forces and Feedback Loops” with TU Delft, Policy Analysis Section. She is working at DRIFT since 2010, she researches urban transitions and the governance questions on how to facilitate and accelerate contemporary sustainability transitions combining theoretical and empirical work across Europe and in developing countries. Email: n.frantzeskaki@drift.eur.nl Professor Dr. Derk Loorbach, DRIFT, Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands Derk Loorbach is director of DRIFT and Professor of Socio-‐economic Transitions at the Faculty of Social Science, both at Erasmus University Rotterdam. Derk is one of the founders of the transition management approach as new form of governance for sustainable development. He has over one hundred publications in this area and has been involved as an action researcher in numerous transition processes with government, business, civil society and science. He is a frequently invited keynote speaker in and outside Europe. Email: loorbach@drift.eur.nl Frank van Steenbergen, DRIFT, Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands Frank has an academic background in Sociology (MSc) and Communication studies (BA) with a focus on intercultural relations and urban sociology. He joined DRIFT in 2010, where he mainly focusses on social and local dynamics within transition studies. Recurrent themes in his research are social in-‐ and exclusion, social innovation, urban marginality, local democratic participation and neighbourhood development. Most of his work at DRIFT relates to neighbourhoods or districts in deprived urban areas. He is also actively involved in exploring innovative forms of (urban) governance. Email: vansteenbergen@drift.eur.nl
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Estimate global cost. Simulation (Just to help you on your personal estimate costs) We include below necessary concepts with an approximately global price. Please check them anyway on your personal case. Additional estimate costs Plane, round trip (Tampa-‐Amsterdam, Amsterdam-‐Tampa) Round Train Ticket Schiphol Airport to Rotterdam www.ns.nl Accommodation 35 days www.thestudenthotel.com Train tickets to Groningen, Utrecht and other Dutch cities International & Cultural Optional Visits: Berlin, Amsterdam, Rotterdam , Paris Renting a bike to commute in Rotterdam Others daily subsistence costs Taxes to visit historical monuments and museums DRIFT Tuition Fee Total additional estimate costs
1500 $ 25 $ 600 $
150 $ 500 $ 50 $ 500 $ 50 $ 300 $ 3675 $
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Why DRIFT? The Dutch Research Institute For Transitions (DRIFT) at Erasmus University Rotterdam is the international leading institute in the field of Sustainability Transitions and especially Transition Management (TM). DRIFT relies on a multi-‐disciplinary team of researchers committed to sustainability research and sustainability transitions research in multiple levels from neighbourhoods to cities to regions to the planet level, working interdisciplinary, transdisciplinary and inter-‐paradigmatically. Over the past years, DRIFT has focused on guiding and accelerating sustainability transitions and its initial focus on environmental related areas (e.g. energy, water, food and mobility) has broadened towards socio-‐economic transitions and sustainable urban and regional development. Drift is connected with research institutions and networks for sustainable urban development around the world. Their outstanding research, project and advisory work the Drift team has delivered over the years, is acknowledged by the academic world, by governments at local, national level and global level, business and civil society and has developed into lasting relationships with these different actors in society. Currently Drift is actively working on the World Expo scientific agenda for the city of Rotterdam under the theme ‘Changing Currents’ with a focus on social, ecological and technological mega and micro trends and flows that have and will have a raical impact on the fabric of our society. Drift is also an internationally recognised research hub for sustainability transitions research given its involvement in three international fora for global environmental research: The Future Earth Urban platform (via Dr. Frantzeskaki), the Canadian Social Sciences and Humanities research project ‘Governing Urban Sustainability Transitions’ led by Assoc.Prof. Sarah Burch and involves Prof. Derk Loorbach and Assoc.Prof. Niki Frantzeskaki and the National Science Foundation of United States research fund ‘Urban Extremes for Urban Resilience’ co-‐led by Assist. Prof. Timon McPhearson that involves Assoc. Prof. Niki Frantzeskaki to a global meta-‐analysis of drivers for sustainability and resilience in cities that will be kicked off in 2016. Why Rotterdam? Rotterdam is a urban deltaic city, a cultural and economic hub. It is one of the most connected and accessible cities in Europe, with own airport and international train connections to Paris, Brussels, Germany and London. With the train, a visitor can be in 1 hour in Brussels in 3 hours in Paris and in 4hours in London. Rotterdam was pointed as the city to visit from New York Times in 2014 and it is a multicultural city hosting more than 147 nationalities living in harmony.
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