Deadline extended !!!!!
Guest editor: Juergen Zimmerer (University of Hamburg)
Anthropogenic climate change is the most fundamental challenge for humankind in the twenty-first century. Rising sea levels and the loss of agricultural land, severe weather changes and desertification are just some of the likely consequences that will drastically alter the living conditions of millions of people mainly in the Global South.
Climate change is therefore also of major concern to Genocide Studies. If we accept that collective violence is caused by crises, real or perceived, then environmental catastrophes will dramatically increase the likelihood of it occurring. This violence will be perpetrated by individuals, state-sponsored or systemic. It might lead to outright killing, forced migration or starvation. It will overlap with zones of violence that have been identifiable in certain regions for centuries or it might create new fault lines. It will certainly overburden our systems of prevention or containment, which are aimed at individual malfunctioning of the political and economic system, not however at systemic failures. It can be assumed that the occurrence of multiple crises will lead simultaneously to a cumulative radicalization of the response by the Global North. Even if it initially succeeds there will be a price to pay in form of compromising civil liberties or universal (human) rights. The defense of the “West” might render the “West” unrecognizable.
The Journal of Genocide Research is therefore inviting contributions from scholars of all disciplines for a special issue on ‘Climate Change and Genocide’, edited by Jürgen Zimmerer (University of Hamburg). Articles on the effects of environmental change on societies, on the link between change and violence and on local and trans-regional strategies to cope with environmental change and violence are particularly welcome. Articles may focus on specific regions, pursue a comparative approach or deal with international responses.
Please send proposals and a short cv to juergen.zimmerer@uni-hamburg.de. The deadline for proposals is 15 September 2011, and submissions are due on 31 April 2012. All submissions are subjected to the journal’s regular anonymous peer review process.
Prof. Dr. Jürgen Zimmerer
Historisches Seminar
Universität Hamburg
Von-Melle-Park 6
20146 Hamburg
Tel. +494042838-2591, Fax.: +494042838-2371
E-Mail: juergen.zimmerer@uni-hamburg.de
More information about the International Network of Genocide Scholars
http://www.inogs.com