Eugene A. Rosa
Washington State UniversityWhat do we know: What does Sociology bring to the table for studying the human dimensions of global
climate change?
Part A1; Across the Social Sciences and in Larger Research Community: (1) Global Environmental Change:
The human dimensions of climate change—the purview of the social sciences—are often conceptualized within a
larger context, namely global environmental change (GEC). Recognized by an international intellectual and policy
community GEC typically comprises two fundamental processes: cumulative effects and systemic effects (Turner
et al., 1991). Cumulative effects are effects that are local in domain but so widely replicated that in sum they have
global consequences. Tropical deforestation is not only one example of this type of change, but a cumulative
effect that is coupled with climate change as both cause and effect. Systemic effects occur on large spatial scales
or alter the function of large systems and global climate change (GCC) is an exemplar of this type of GEC. In all
instances the concern is that human activities (anthropogenic drivers in the language of the international scientific
community) are changing the natural environment and the climate on a global scale. Hence, a delineation of the
human dimensions of GEC overlaps considerably (and is nearly equivalent) to a delineation of the dimensions of
climate change.
(2) Key knowledge bases across the social sciences: There is considerable and steadily increasing
understanding of land use and land changes due principally to the work of geographers and anthropologies. There
is a comparable body of solid research on the issue of common property and resources uses that spans the social
sciences (including sociology), but where anthropology and political science are especially influential. A third
area of research showing considerable progress, almost exclusively the purview of political science, is knowledge
of the international climate policy process and the formation and operation of international policy and regulatory
bodies. Finally, there is considerable input—primarily by geographers into one of the most interdisciplinary
topics (with input by biologists, ecologists, economists, engineers, and others) in climate change and GEC more
generally: vulnerability, resilience, adaptation and, recently added, mitigation.
Part A2: What Does Sociology Know? This question is protean, capturing a broad set of concepts ranging
from the very abstract to the very specific. At the broadest level sociology knows a great deal. It knows that
climate shapes the location of societies, what they do, and what they can do (Rosa and Dietz, 1998). We
also know that climate change is one of several grand risks facing all societies (risk is a context of outcome
uncertainty embedded with human stakes). We further know that one defining feature of risk, uncertainty, cannot
be eliminated. Most importantly we know that a variety of social factors and processes are the key drivers of
global climate change. At a more refined level we know from the STIRPAT research program (see <stirpat.
org>), from the industrial metabolism work at the Institute for Social Ecology (IFF), and from work in World
Systems research (Roberts and Grimes, 1997) that the key human drivers (termed anthropogenic drivers in the
GEC community) of climate change are the scale of population, levels of consumption, the pace of material
flows, position of nations in the world system, as well as some other persistent physical and social variables—but
with much less effect. We also know, despite claims in the economics literature (especially around the so-called
“Kuznets Curve”) and in some versions of European sociological theory, that global warming will not be solved
by following a “business as usual” path.
Unfortunately, despite the foregoing knowledge the inventory of sociological research on GCC is
remarkably meager. While the discipline knows a great deal about the emergence and operation of structures
and processes, about institutional design and practices, and about the connection between agency and micro