Essex's Global Challenges

Four major projects which address issues of worldwide significance have been selected to focus the University's research capacity on major global challenges.

The Global Challenges programme was introduced by Vice-Chancellor Professor Colin Riordan, as part of the University's Vision for 2008-2013. The aim is to develop substantial multi-disciplinary projects with the potential for international collaboration, which showcase Essex's research strengths and have a strong focus on leveraging external grant funding.

Each of the selected projects received initial funding of £50,000 from the University in 2009-10 to get them established, and match-funding was made available to support them as they begin to win external funding.

Twelve Global Challenges applications were received, and the following four were chosen. They got underway in August 2009.

Constructing a new global socio-economic and political order

Catastrophic flooding in Burma, oil at $150 a barrel, the destruction of the world's forests, a near doubling of the price of rice – just some of the crises that scientists and policy makers have failed to address in a coherent and integrated way.

That's according to the team behind this Global Challenges project, which aims to establish a research programme into the political and social conditions that could help achieve sustainable economic growth at a local, national and global level.

The project aims to take a more joined-up approach to major global issues such as climate change, the price of oil, food crises and the critical pressures on land use and water. The research team believes that a failure to address the links between these individual crises is potentially more serious than the impact of any of them individually.

Principal Investigator is Professor Mark Harvey from the Department of Sociology. He believes there has never been a more important time, in the context of the current global financial crisis, to explore new forms of economic coordination and strategic innovation. 'This project not only draws on the University's long-established and well-recognised research strengths in the area of social science and environmental studies, but also has longer term ambitions to establish national and international collaborations that could help address the most significant issues in the world today.'

As well as the team from Essex, colleagues from the University of Manchester and the Bio-Science for Business Knowledge Transfer Network are also involved in the project.

Essex research team

• Professor Mark Harvey (Sociology)
• Professor Jules Pretty (Biological Sciences)
• Professor Ian Colbeck (Biological Sciences)
• Dr Sarah Pilgrim Biological Sciences
• David Ong (Law)
• Dr Karen Hulme (Law)
• Dr Ben Anderson (Sociology)
• Dr Paul Stoneman (Sociology)
• Dr Becky Ellis (Sociology)

Insights from Ecocultures

This project will provide insights on how to build resilient communities in a world of rapid social and ecological change.

The Ecocultures of the world are traditional or emerging communities which, despite emerging global threats, are finding ways to increase resilience and promote sustainable living. This Global Challenge project will explore how Ecocultures do this, and how we may apply their lessons to other communities facing the ‘perfect storm’ of growing populations, changing consumption patterns, depleted resources and climate change.

The Ecocultures programme draws on the experience and expertise of researchers from across the University and beyond. The communities they explore include transition towns in Britain, traditional ice-fishing communities in Finland, rural communities in dryland Asia and forest ecovillages in Latin America. These studies are complemented by growing body of cross-cutting, multi-disciplinary theoretical work which synthesises the lessons offered by these communities and cultures. Together, the research team will develop a thorough understanding of the lessons these communities could offer the world in sustainable living. Research streams composed of Essex researchers examine various aspects of Ecoculture:

• A trans-disciplinary theoretical framework which can be used to widen empirical research into ‘exemplary’ communities;
• The lessons offered by agricultural Ecocultures to other land-based communities;
• The opportunities and challenges encountered by Ecocultures as a result of industrialisation and globalisation and
• The application of Ecoculture’s lessons to communities encountering sudden shocks or disasters.

Essex research team

• Professor Steffen Boehm (PI) (Essex Business School)
• Professor Ted Benton (Sociology)
• Zareen Bharucha (Biological Sciences)
• Dr Stuart Bunting (Biological Sciences)
• Professor Ian Colbeck (Biological Sciences)
• Rachel Hine (Biological Sciences)
• Dr Karen Hulme (Law)
• David Ong (Law)
• Professor Jules Pretty (Biological Sciences)
• Dr Kate Rockett (Economics)
• Dr Colin Samson (Sociology)
• Dr. Tom Vine (Essex Business School)
• Graham Walker (Government)
• Dr. Netta Weinstein (Psychology)

Transitions to peace and prosperity

The challenge of helping countries in their transition from violent conflict and repression to peace and prosperity is at the heart of the multi-disciplinary project on transitional justice.

Building on Essex's expertise in social sciences and the field of international human rights law in acute crisis, the project has been selected as one of the University's Global Challenges.

The project team recognises the need to go beyond recognised criminal justice processes, such as prosecution of perpetrators and reparations, to achieve stability. The transitional justice project is focusing initially on six research themes: data archiving and analysis, economic dimensions, peace-building, conceptual issues of transitional justice, and gender and children-focused approaches, and justice.

The team will build international collaborations in different continents with key global institutions as it seeks to establish Essex as a top research and teaching university on transitional justice. It is also hoped that, as the University's expertise grows, it will play a role in educating policy and decision-makers and practitioners, and advising governments and intergovernmental organisations.

Dr Clara Sandoval, from the School of Law and the Human Rights Centre, explained: 'Each state facing conflict or repression constitutes a potential threat to the international community. Transitional justice is a global challenge since it is a prerequisite for the successful achievement of lasting peace and prosperity.'

She added: 'An active investment in the complex processes of justice, peace-building, development, poverty eradication and the management of social change is needed to avoid states relapsing into instability.'

This is a potentially important strand in the development of the International Centre for Democracy, Peace and Human Rights at the University.

An Essex Transitional Justice Network of University academics with an interest in working on transitional justice issues has already been established. It includes representatives of the School of Computer Science and Electronic Engineering, the Departments of Government, History, Literature, Film and Theatre Studies, Language and Linguistics, and Sociology, the International Academy and the UK Data Archive.

Essex research team

• Dr Clara Sandoval (Law)
• Dr Andrew Harrison (Mathematical Sciences/Biological Sciences)
• Dr Fabian Freyenhagen (Philosophy)

Reinventing the internet

The University is to become a leading player in the global challenge to re-design the internet so it can cope with the demands of the 21st century.

Having secured funding from the EU, the University's Future Internet Research Task Force will offer a unique, holistic approach to solving this international problem. The internet has become a victim of its own success and usage today is stretching the original network to its limits.

It is mainly the emergence and ever-growing use of new applications such as video over the internet which is taking the biggest toll. The internet was not designed to be used for such globally popular applications as Facebook, YouTube, BBC iPlayer and Wikipedia.

'The internet has totally changed our social behaviour, and now our social behaviour is about to impose fundamental changes in the network technology,' explained Professor Dimitra Simeonidou, from the University's School of Computer Science and Electronic Engineering.

The Global Challenge is bringing together key researchers with computer science and electronic engineering expertise and internationally-renowned experts from Essex's sociology and business disciplines. Add to this the advantage of having access to the University's advanced laboratory and global network connectivity facilities, and the taskforce aims to become a leading player among similar initiatives worldwide to redefine the internet.

This combination of cross-disciplinary expertise with network research and connectivity facilities allows the University to offer a unique test-bed facility with unprecedented capabilities for collaborative research at a global scale and the potential to become a stepping stone between Europe and America on Future Internet Innovation.

Becoming one of the University's Global Challenge projects will provide an important platform, enabling the taskforce to achieve national and international recognition and to apply for much-needed further funding during 2009-10.

The project team plans to establish collaboration with members of Essex Business School, and the Departments of Economics, Government, and Sociology.

Essex research team

• Professor Dimitra Simeonidou (School of Computer Science and Electronic Engineering)
• Dr Ben Anderson (Sociology)
• Professor Vic Callaghan (CSEE)
• Dr Maria Fasli (CSEE)
• Dr Martin Fleury (CSEE)
• Professor Mohammed Ghanbari (CSEE)
• Dr Ken Guild (CSEE)
• Dr David Hunter (CSEE)
• Dr Reza Nejabati (CSEE)
• Dr Martin Reed (CSEE)
• Dr Svetlana Warhurst (Essex Business School)
• Dr Kun Yang (CSEE).

For correspondence from within the University, the Principal Investigators of the four projects can be contacted by e-mailing: global (adding @essex.ac.uk).