Recent calls to action by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and the World Wildlife Fund indicate we are at a crossroads in responding to accelerating global warming and biodiversity loss. Cities are often at the forefront of these transformations, both in feeling their effects but also initiating responses. How might we reimagine our cities in a way that promotes thriving and equitable ecosystems? What tools exist in the policy landscape to initiate needed changes? What innovative responses are emerging to confront the challenges of increased flooding, rising temperatures, habitat fragmentation, and food insecurity? How might we reimagine an urban commons? With a primary focus on Canadian cities, in this course we explore the ways divergent conceptualizations of urban-nature have informed policies and practices drawing largely from critical, political ecology, and Indigenous perspectives; the policy landscape that informs current urban planning; and new and innovative approaches that help us to reshape and reimagine our relationships to urban nature, including initiatives led by municipalities, non-government organizations and citizens groups.
Recent calls to action by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and the World Wildlife Fund indicate we are at a crossroads in responding to accelerating global warming and biodiversity loss. Cities are often at the forefront of these transformations, both in feeling their effects but also initiating responses. How might we reimagine our cities in a way that promotes thriving and equitable ecosystems? What tools exist in the policy landscape to initiate needed changes? What innovative responses are emerging to confront the challenges of increased flooding, rising temperatures, habitat fragmentation, and food insecurity? How might we reimagine an urban commons? With a primary focus on Canadian cities, in this course we explore the ways divergent conceptualizations of urban-nature have informed policies and practices drawing largely from critical, political ecology, and Indigenous perspectives; the policy landscape that informs current urban planning; and new and innovative approaches that help us to reshape and reimagine our relationships to urban nature, including initiatives led by municipalities, non-government organizations and citizens groups.
