The Problem of Climate Change and The Analogy of Development
| When: | Tuesday, 30 July 2024 - Tuesday, 30 July 2024 |
| Where: | Hybrid Event Parktown Management Campus North Lodge, SCIS Seminar Room, Parktown Management Campus, 2 St David's Place, Parktown, Johannesburg, 2193 |
| Start time: | 12:30 |
| Enquiries: |
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| RSVP: | To attend online, REGISTER HERE |
| Cost: | Free but registration is required |
SCIS invites you to a seminar with Benjamin H. Bradlow titled The Problem of Climate Change and the Analogy of Development on 30 July 2024, 12:30 - 14:00 (SAST)
The Southern Centre for Inequality Studies (SCIS) invites you to a seminar with Benjamin H. Bradlow titled The Problem of Climate Change and the Analogy of Development on 30 July 2024, 12:30 - 14:00 (SAST).
Abstract:
A comparative sociological approach to the problem of mitigating climate change requires reaching for historical analogy of comparison cases that highlight the social basis for switching points in large scale development trajectories. I argue that late industrializing developmental “catch-up” is such an analogy that can help illustrate the sociological foundations of when and why these switching points yield dramatic shifts in developmental outcomes. I proceed to analyze what carbon-based economic growth in the authoritarian East Asian “tigers” (South Korea, Taiwan, Japan) and democratic cases in Brazil and India over the past half century tell us about the possibilities for a transition away from carbon-based economic growth. In doing so, I present tentative findings from ongoing field-based research in the automotive sector in Brazil and South Africa, and each country’s efforts to transition from gas-powered to electric battery-powered vehicles.
About the speaker:
Benjamin H. Bradlow is an Assistant Professor of Sociology and International Affairs at Princeton University, jointly appointed in the School of Public and International Affairs and Department of Sociology. He is a CIFAR Global Azrieli Scholar (2024-2026), in the research program on "Humanity's Urban Future." Bradlow's research makes connections between climate change, urbanization, industrial change, and the political challenges to democracy that confront societies across the globe.
His first book, Urban Power: Democracy and Inequality in São Paulo and Johannesburg, will be published in October 2024 with Princeton University Press (Princeton Studies in Global and Comparative Sociology). Bradlow compares the divergent politics of distributing urban public goods — housing, sanitation, and transportation — in two mega-cities after transitions to democracy: São Paulo, Brazil, and Johannesburg, South Africa. He is currently researching a new comparative book project that examines industrial transitions from carbon in the Global South. This work explores how middle-income countries with export-oriented, internal combustion engine automobile manufacturing sectors are navigating a rich world transition to electric vehicles.
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