Academic Journal Article

Funding Community Resilience in a Polycrisis: Exploring a Human Learning Systems (+)-Based Approach

The authors explore how the polycrisis requires a rethinking of funding mechanisms to build community resilience. They argue that traditional, risk-averse, outcome-based models are ill-suited to address interconnected crises, and propose the Human Learning Systems (+) model—an approach that enables funders and grantees to consider system-scale elements such as local economic drivers and political conditions, […]

Funding Community Resilience in a Polycrisis: Exploring a Human Learning Systems (+)-Based Approach Read More »

Ten New Insights in Climate Science 2025

This paper presents ten recent advances in climate change research with high policy relevance, spanning Earth system processes, climate impacts, and mitigation action. The record-warm years of 2023–2024 are explained by a combination of long-term greenhouse gas forcing, changes in aerosol loading, internal variability, and feedback processes leading to an elevated Earth energy imbalance —

Ten New Insights in Climate Science 2025 Read More »

Big AI is accelerating the metacrisis: What can we do?

The author argues that large-scale corporate artificial intelligence, or “Big AI,” is accelerating a converging set of ecological, cultural, and linguistic crises that together constitute a global metacrisis. Focusing on large language models, the article examines how these technologies intensify environmental pressures, undermine meaning-making and democratic processes, and contribute to the marginalization and loss of

Big AI is accelerating the metacrisis: What can we do? Read More »

More Than a Buzzword? Mapping Interpretations of the ‘Polycrisis’

This article critically examines the concept of polycrisis, tracing its evolution from rhetorical buzzword to an emerging analytical lens in sustainability and crisis research. Based on a Q-methodology study involving 50 experts, the authors identify four distinct framings of polycrisis: as analytically tractable, as networked shocks, as a global governance challenge, and as requiring conceptual

More Than a Buzzword? Mapping Interpretations of the ‘Polycrisis’ Read More »

All Crises are Unhappy in Their Own Way: The Role of Societal Instability in Shaping the Past

This article introduces the Crisis Database, a comprehensive resource that systematically documents 168 historical societal crises across different time periods, regions, and levels of complexity. Aiming to overcome small-sample bias in previous studies, the database captures a wide range of political, economic, cultural, and institutional factors associated with crises, as well as their consequences—such as

All Crises are Unhappy in Their Own Way: The Role of Societal Instability in Shaping the Past Read More »

Systemic Risk: Opportunities for Inter- and Transdisciplinary Science to Improve Societal Resilience

This article introduces a focus collection on systemic risk science, arguing that systemic risks, are increasingly amplified by global warming yet remain poorly understood. It summarizes six contributing papers that highlight methodological advances in flood risk monitoring, critical infrastructure modelling, agent-based modelling, and the use of artificial intelligence in climate adaptation, while noting that current

Systemic Risk: Opportunities for Inter- and Transdisciplinary Science to Improve Societal Resilience Read More »

Polycrisis and Global Inequality

This article interrogates the concept of ‘polycrisis’ through a decolonial, Global South-centered lens, arguing that current polycrisis discourse inadequately addresses entrenched global inequalities and power asymmetries. It contends that the convergence of crises is not a novel universal condition but a structural feature of neoliberal global capitalism, long experienced in the Global South. The author

Polycrisis and Global Inequality Read More »

Climate Change and Systemic Risk: Evidence from Financial Intermediaries

The authors investigate the impact of climate-induced temperature shocks on systemic risk within the banking sector. Using a sample of 35 financial intermediaries across 13 countries and employing the ΔCoVaR methodology, the authors find that deviations from historical temperature averages are associated with heightened systemic risk, concluding that climate volatility threatens financial stability by amplifying

Climate Change and Systemic Risk: Evidence from Financial Intermediaries Read More »

The Weaponization of Emerging Technologies and Their Impact on Global Risk: A Perspective from the PfPC Emerging Security Challenges Working Group

The authors examine how emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence, synthetic biology, quantum computing, and neurotechnology, are reshaping global security risks. The study argues that traditional threat-based security models are inadequate for addressing the complex, transnational, and increasingly weaponized nature of these technologies. The authors propose a shift toward risk-based frameworks that emphasize resilience, systemic

The Weaponization of Emerging Technologies and Their Impact on Global Risk: A Perspective from the PfPC Emerging Security Challenges Working Group Read More »

Scroll to Top