Call for Abstracts

Prof. Aidan Hollis, Prof. Clara Brandi, Prof. Magdalene Silberberger,
Dr. Sebastian Kistler, Max Alexander Matthey, Benjamin Roth

An international working group that emerged from the Yale Global Justice Program will publish an anthology with “Springer Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften”. The book will be published as a bilingual volume in English and German in the “Economy + Society” series, for which Prof. Dr. Andrea Maurer (University of Trier) is responsible. Thematically, it will deal with the “Green Impact Fund for Transformation” presented at the COP27 in Egypt and the T7 meeting in Germany and its theoretical and methodological prerequisites.

This call is addressed to scientists of all disciplines who are concerned with the fight against anthropogenic climate change. This includes climate science, environmental economics and sociology, environmental law, environmental and business ethics, and political science. Both individual contributions and submissions by groups of authors are possible. Furthermore, young researchers are encouraged to submit contributions.

The anthology should contain about 15 contributions (approx. 300 pages) of 15-25 pages each (approx. 2,700 characters per printed page, including spaces). Bibliographies and graphics are not included. Minor deviations are possible. The abstract to be submitted should not exceed two pages.

The anthology will contain three thematic focal points to which contributions can be submitted:

a) Normative and theoretical foundations of climate policy and global innovation policy

So far, effective climate protection measures can chiefly be implemented by wealthy countries, as the countries of the Global South lack the needed financial resources. However, this poses an enormous problem for global efforts to mitigate climate change, as these countries are expected to experience the highest growth rates in greenhouse gas emissions in the coming decades. As a competitive mechanism, the Green Impact Fund for Transformation (GIFT) would promote CO₂e-reducing investments in the Global South through appropriate financial incentives. To this end, premiums are to be paid out, the amount of which will be determined by the actual amount of CO₂e saved. High-income nations would finance the mechanism based on their historical responsibility and the resulting obligations under international law.

Contributions to this thematic block can, for example, address the following questions:

• What responsibility does the Global North bear in combating the climate crisis? Which normative principles (climate justice, common good, effectiveness, innovativeness, solidarity, etc.) are of particular importance here?
• What is the importance of financial incentives, structural reforms, and economic rationality in global climate protection and innovation policy?
• What role do private actors (companies, NGOs, public-private partnerships) play in combating the climate crisis? How can they actively participate as ‘good corporate citizens in problem-solving strategies or fund solutions at GIFT?
• What competencies, perspectives and responsibilities do local actors bring to addressing the climate crisis? For example, how is the tension between economic growth and climate protection conceptualized in the Global South? What obstacles can be identified for a mechanism like the Green Impact Fund?

b) Climate Policy - Ideas, Measures, and their Criticism

The GIFT is not the first proposal for incentive-based reduction of CO₂ emissions. Other carbon pricing schemes are carbon taxes and emissions trading as practiced in Australia, Japan, or the EU. Submissions to this thematic block should deal with the different systems and mechanisms of climate policy. For example, the following questions could be addressed:

• What are the advantages and disadvantages of existing carbon pricing systems? What are the potential abuses, and how can they be counteracted?
• The GIFT is a system of performance-based subsidies. This requires an estimation of the alternative (subsidy-free) outcome, as would be the case for other voluntary offset mechanisms and the Clean Development Mechanism. What are the challenges here, and what is the best practice for estimating alternative outcomes?

c) Practical Perspectives: The Green Impact Fund for Transformation in critical reflection

The GIFT sees itself as a mechanism to protect the global environment by incentivizing economic development in the Global South to adopt more sustainable practices. In the Global North, growth in prosperity has been achieved in part through the use and burning of fossil fuels - a growth model that is reaching its natural limits. Supporting green growth is, therefore at the center of GIFT, which entails both opportunities and risks. Therefore, critical-constructive questions regarding GIFT should be at the center of submissions to this chapter.

• What potential does the GIFT hold, and what unseen risks does it face?
• Should the GIFT limit itself to patent-based innovation, promote only carbon-neutral products or open itself to all products that can reduce GHG emissions compared to a baseline?
• What are the risks of misaligned incentives in the proposed GIFT mechanism? How can these be countered?

On the Call for Abstracts Procedure

We seek proposals and submissions in the form of a maximum two-page abstract and a short CV. The deadline for submissions is 19 September 2023. A scientific question/hypothesis should be recognizable in the abstract. Likewise, the theories and methods used, the literature used, a classification in the current scientific discourse, and the connection with one of the above-mentioned focal points of the anthology should be made clear.

1. After a review phase of the abstracts by the editorial team, feedback will be given by the end of October 2023.
2. If a contribution is accepted based on the abstract, an author contract will be concluded between the author and VS Springer Verlag.
3. A conference will be held at the University of Regensburg on 23-24 November 2023, where all scholars whose contributions have been accepted are invited to present their contributions to the editors and the other authors in a short talk followed by a discussion. Participation in this conference is strongly recommended. For contributions from scholars based outside Europe, there will be a separate online format for presentation, the date of which will be announced.  
4. This will be followed by a writing phase with anticipated deadline for submission of 31 July 2024.
5. After the writing phase, the contributions will be reviewed again as part of a peer review process. The comments and suggestions for improvement will be made available to the respective authors for revision.

Please be sure to note: Please send submissions in .doc format (NOT as PDF!) with a short CV to ahollis@ucalgary.ca by 19 September 2023.