The Future of Environmental Geography

Abstract

Around the world, the environmental crisis is deepening. Rising global temperatures are fuelling socioecological threats and damage with distinctly uneven geographical consequences. Although rapid and drastic reductions in carbon emissions are critical to preventing climate breakdown, our institutional, societal and individual responses have to date fallen short of what is needed. In the context of this urgency, how we respond now will profoundly reshape the geographies of our lives and will continue to do so far into the future. As geographers, we have a crucial role to play not only in analysing and anticipating these changes but also in advocating, as researchers, collaborators, teachers and citizens, for more sustainable futures. Here our speakers—all leading thinkers in environmental geography and currently shaping agenda-setting themes in Geo: Geography and Environment—address the place of geography in advancing and advocating for more sustainable, lower carbon and fairer socioecological places and futures. They will reflect on their own experiences and research interests and, in doing so, address questions and debates that speak directly to the vision of geography as a space for new, critical and underrepresented ideas in pursuit of fresh viewpoints and solutions to the world's most pressing environmental problems.