The workshop brought together approximately 70 participants to discuss aspects of human security and climate change. It served as a forum for formulating a research agenda related to human security and climate change.
In a first effort to study the relationship between climate change and human security in a broad sense, the CSCW co-sponsored with CICERO (the Center for International Climate and Environmental Research at the University of Oslo) an international workshop in Oslo in June 2005.
The workshop attracted a wide audience, with 70 participants from Australia, India, the USA, the UK, Mexico, Argentina, Sweden, Canada, Thailand, Spain, Nigeria, South Africa, Bangladesh, Burkina Faso, Belgium, Chile, Sri Lanka, Brazil, China, Germany, Uganda and Ghana.
In addition to participants from universities and research institutes, there were representatives from the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation (Norad), the Norwegian Ministry of Environment, the Research Council of
Norway, Health Canada – Climate Change and Health Office, the World Conservation Union, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the UK Met Office (meteorological service).
The workshop was organized for the Global Environmental Change and Human Security (GECHS) programme, which is a scientific project of the UN’s International Human Dimensions Program on Global Environmental Change (IHDP). Two scholars associated with the CSCW have served on the GECHS Scientific Steering Committee: Nils Petter Gleditsch (1999–2005) and Indra de Soysa (2005– ).
Over 40 papers were presented at the workshop. All the submitted papers are available in full text on the website (http://www.cicero.uio.no/humsec/). Several papers have been revised and submitted for special issues of journals such as Political Geography, Die Erde and
International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics. Papers were also sent to
New Zealand Journal for Environmental Law. We are very hopeful that these collections of
papers will stimulate further research and debate on the issues raised at the conference and gain wide exposure.
