Anabela Carvalho presented “Youth activism on climate change: analysing visions on politics and social transformation” during the 9th European Communication Conference that took place in Aarhus, Denmark on 19-22 October. Anabela Carvalho discussed the socio-environmental visions of young climate activist groups, and the visions of democracy that are being constructed, specifically by Climáximo, Greve Climática Estudantil and LIDERA a Década do Clima.
On October 13 Daniela Ferreira da Silva presented at the IX Doctoral Conferences of CECS at the University of Minho in Braga. The work presented is part of her PhD doctoral studies exploring the “Evocation of science by climate activists: a gap in knowledge”. The researcher discussed the process that has led to identifying a gap in scientific literature and how she will address it by critically looking at the ways in which young climate activists evoke the field of science in their communication.
On October 11 Daniela Ferreira da Silva presented at the Digital Activisms in Dialogue Seminar, which took place at CICSNOVA in Lisbon, the work explored the “Uses of digital platforms in communication on climate change – a look at the youth climate movement in Portugal”. At this meeting, the researcher had the opportunity to discuss the diversity of uses and communication strategies on digital platforms by Portuguese youth activists, in particular by the Student Climate Strike and Extinction Rebellion (which appeared between 2018/2019), as well as by two national initiatives, Climaximo (the oldest group, 2015) and Lidera a Década do Clima (2020).
On 23 September, Maria Fernandes-Jesus, with the collaboration of Carla Malafaia, gave a presentation on “Youth voices for climate justice: activists articulating and envisioning futures” during the International Conference of Community Psychology in Naples, which took place from 21 to 24 September 2022. This presentation was integrated in the symposium “Promoting social justice engagement between powers and privileges”.
Dora Rebelo also helped to facilitate a collaborative workshop during this conference entitled “Community Psychology and Migrant Justice” where scholars discussed the social complexity associated with migratory injustices.
The JUSTFUTURES research project team launches a report in which it presents an overview of the groups that have participated in climate activism in Portugal.
The report maps 68 groups that have climate change as their focus of action. There are also 105 groups that do not focus exclusively on climate change but have climate change as one of their areas of action. In addition, 102 groups supported some climate activism (e.g. by subscribing to a manifesto), even though climate change was not one of their areas of action. Overall, the data show a multifaceted picture of the movement.
This mapping was carried out between October 2021 and April 2022, and the dynamic character of the movement should be highlighted, so changes in the data presented here will have occurred – and will continue to occur.
On July 11, the JustFutures team had the opportunity to meet with several groups of the climate movement in Portugal where the mapping of the movement recently launched on our website was discussed.
It was a meeting where we were able to talk to various groups about the usefulness of this mapping, and where we could hear various suggestions and comments about the state of the climate movement in Portugal and their needs. Members of Associação Zero, ClimAção Centro, Geota, Lisboa Possível, Movimento Ar Puro de Rio Maior, Movimento Transformers, Plataforma TROCA, Plataforma Já Marchavas, SOS Quinta dos Ingleses and SOS Terras do Cávado were present.
During this meeting we proposed the creation of a monitoring group with elements of the groups present so that they accompany us throughout the different phases of this research project.
Maria Fernandes-Jesus contributed to the report The State of the Nation and Public Policies, an IPPS-Iscte initiative, published annually, which can be consulted here. Maria Fernandes-Jesus contributed with a chapter on democracy where she makes a diagnosis of democracy in Portugal and discusses the political participation of young people. In the same chapter, the author comments on the public consultation on the national lithium program. On July 21, a news article related to this work was published in the newspaper Público (A democracy deaf to the demands of citizens).
On July 7, Maria Fernandes-Jesus made a presentation on “Youth climate movement in Portugal: political imaginaries in youth-led groups” during the 27th Conference of the International Association of People-Environment Studies (IAPS), organised by Iscte-iul and that this year happened online.
Anabela Carvalho was also an invited keynote speaker of the conference discussing “Climate policies and practices: critical discourse studies perspectives”.
Several members of the JustFutures team recently presented their work at the 28th International Conference of Europeanists, which took place from June 29 to July 1 at Iscte-iul in Lisbon.
Anabela Carvalho made a presentation on “Political Positioning of Youth-Leaded Climate Change Activist Groups and Organizations in Portugal” with the collaboration of several team members.
Maria Fernandes-Jesus also participated in a roundtable to discuss “The urban environment of democracy”. Her intervention focused particularly on the urban challenges for climate justice and social movements in the city of Lisbon.
More information about the conference here.
A call is open for one PhD Fellowship within our research project “JUSTFUTURES – Climate Futures and Just Transformations: Narratives and Political Imaginaries of Young People” (PTDC/COM-OUT/7669/2020).
The work will be carried out at at the Centre for Research and Intervention in Education (CIIE) of FPCEUP, with local coordination of Carla Malafaia during 18 months.
Deadline was on 12th July 2022
For more information on how to apply here.