Seminar: "Innovative quantitative analysis in sustainability science", by Mario Giampietro in Japan

ICTA-UAB researcher Mario Giampietro will be giving a seminar at the Waseda University, in Japan, to tackle the latest developments of the approach ‘Multi-Scale Integrated Accounting of Societal and Ecosystem Metabolism’ (MuSIASEM).


Seminar: "Innovative quantitative analysis in sustainability science"

Speaker: Mario Giampietro, ICTA-UAB researcher

Date: Monday, March 13th 2023
Time: 2pm (JST) - 22h (CET)
Venue: Online -  Zoom (register please here: https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_IPCjfIKoSGSe2ldl6BF86A)
 

Abstract
This seminar deals with three interrelated topics in the field of sustainability science: 1) the profound crisis in current policy making in sustainable development; 2) the underlying systemic flaws in quantitative analysis of sustainability concerns; and 3) a novel methodology to get out of this impasse.

1 – The crisis in sustainability science for governance. I will illustrate the presence of policy legends in the sustainable development policies of national and international governments. I will then debunk the two most popular of these policy legends, that is: (1) the idea that we will be able to decarbonize our modern economies in 20 years; and (2) the idea that a circular economy can solve all our sustainability problems.

2 – Systemic flaws in the quantitative analysis of sustainability issues. I will show and explain the presence of systemic problems in the current quantitative analysis of sustainability concerns by drawing on complex system theory and, in particular, on the concept of metabolic pattern of social-ecological systems. Complex adaptive systems, such as human societies, are organized over different hierarchical levels and are operating across different scales. Their analysis cannot be carried out by adopting one scale and one dimension at the time. I will present two examples to illustrate this point: (1) the absurdity of the common practice to compare the “efficiency” of the national economies of different countries; (2) the neglect in current analyses of the existence of internal biophysical constraints determining the profile of time allocation over different social practices.

3 – A novel methodological approach. Finally, I will present the latest developments of the approach ‘Multi-Scale Integrated Accounting of Societal and Ecosystem Metabolism’ (MuSIASEM). I will show how it allows to carry out a relational analysis between structural and functional components of a society across hierarchical levels. I will provide an overview of the MuSIASEM toolkit that has been designed for use in policy deliberation support. This toolkit provides a set of five different lenses to observe (and analyze) the metabolic pattern: 1. The FEELINGSCOPE, which is used to characterize social practices at the level of the household; 2. The MACROSCOPE, useful to characterize the “cost opportunity” associated with the profile of allocation of fund and flow elements across the different socio-economic compartments of the society; 3. The MESOSCOPE, useful to assess the level of openness of the system (to what extent is the local consumption dependent on imports?); 4. The MICROSCOPE, useful to assess the interaction of the local systems of production with the embedding ecosystems associated with the expression of environmental pressures; 5. The VIRTUALSCOPE, useful to assess the externalized end uses and the externalized environmental pressures associated with the production of the imports elsewhere. The simultaneous use of these different lenses generates quantitative assessments (based on matrices) expressed in different metrics. However, I will show that relational analysis allows us to integrate these quantitative results to enable a coherent deliberation of the trade-offs in policymaking.