Daniela Ferreira da Silva presented a poster titled “Reimagining Political Agency: The Voice(s) of Youth in the Climate Change Debate” at the 1st CRIA* Doctoral Students Meeting (2025/26). The event took place at the School of Social Sciences and Humanities, NOVA University Lisbon, on November 6, 2025, from 2:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m.
This work was developed in co-authorship with her advisory team.
The poster can be viewed here.
*Centre for Research in Anthropology
Daniela Ferreira da Silva, in collaboration with Anabela Carvalho and Maria Fernandes-Jesus, presented her research at the 13th Portuguese Congress of Sociology, under the theme “Democracies Under Pressure: Risks and Uncertainties,” held at the University of the Azores from July 8 to 11, 2025.
The presentation, titled “Collaborative Workshops on Political Agency: How Can We Amplify Young People’s Voices in the Climate Change Debate?” was part of a parallel session on “Adaptation, Governance, and Development Models,” organized by the Environment and Society section.
The communication aimed to share the results of two collaborative workshops held in Porto and Lisbon between July and September 2024. These workshops were designed to encourage young people to think about ways to have a stronger voice in public and political discussions around climate change. The workshops highlighted the importance of creating safe, informal spaces where youth can share common experiences and diverse ideological perspectives. They also underscored the need to include young voices in climate discussions and demonstrated the transformative potential of collaborative action settings (read more here).
At the invitation of NUCLIO – the Interactive Astronomy and Education Innovation Center, Daniela Ferreira da Silva gave a presentation at the final conference of the EARN project – Exploratory Approaches and Real Needs in Service-Learning. The presentation was titled “Co-creating spaces of agency: climate activism and participatory research as learning spaces to political action”. It was developed in collaboration with her supervisory team – Anabela Carvalho and Maria Fernandes-Jesus. The final conference took place on May 15 at the Frei Gonçalo de Azevedo School in Cascais.
As a hegemonic “macro-narrative,” the idea of sustainability continues to dominate environmental discourses in contemporary societies. At the conference “Enhancing Sustainability: Bridging Corporate Practices with Academic and Popular Discourse,” held from December 18 to 20, 2024, at the University of Naples L’Orientale, analyses of multiple cases were presented in which the concept has been used vaguely, ambiguously, or purely for promotional purposes, along with some exceptions. Anabela Carvalho was one of the keynote speakers at the event and addressed the political imaginaries of different climate activism groups in Portugal and their reconstruction in the media. In a presentation co-authored with Tânia R. Santos and Daniela Ferreira da Silva, she demonstrated how the most transformative visions have been placed by the media outside the boundaries of what is considered acceptable or reasonable for addressing climate change. The conference program can be viewed here.
Daniela Ferreira da Silva, in collaboration with Anabela Carvalho and Maria Fernandes-Jesus, presented at the latest Research Days of the Institute of Sociology of UPorto, which took place between October 10 and 11 at the Faculty of Arts and Humanities (FLUP) of the University of Porto.
The presentation, entitled “JustFutures: Political Imaginaries in the Portuguese Youth Climate Movement”, was part of Table 12 of the conference, “Territories, Climate and Environment”. The researcher presented a brief overview of the main outputs of the JUSTFUTURES project and a presentation on the political imaginaries of youth climate movements in Portugal. The abstract can be read here: https://isociologia.up.pt/en/events/research-days
Having already had a communication accepted at the previous edition of the biennial ECREA conference, JUSTFUTURES was represented at ECREA2024—’10th European Communication Conference’, with an analysis of recent forms of climate activism in public spaces. The presentation, by Anabela Carvalho, was titled ‘Young people, political imaginaries, and climate change: On transgressing normality and re-scripting agentic roles.’ The conference took place in Ljubljana, Slovenia, from September 24 to 27, 2024.
More information at: https://ecrea2024ljubljana.eu/
The XV LUSOCOM – Congress of the Lusophone Federation of Communication Sciences (https://www.lusocom.net/acesse-a-programacao-da-lusocom-2024/), held at the University of Vale do Itajaí (UNIVALI), Brazil, between September 2 and 3, hosted another presentation by JUSTFUTURES (via Zoom). The presentation, at the invitation of the organization, was titled “Climate Change and Activism in the Media” and aimed to analyze how media discourse has contributed to the reproduction of destructive logics and whether it has provided space and legitimacy to youth climate activism.
Daniela Ferreira da Silva, in collaboration with Anabela Carvalho, presented their research at the 16th Conference of the European Sociological Association, themed “Tension, Trust, and Transformation,” held at the University of Porto from August 27-30.
Their presentation, titled “Climate Groups’ Discourses On Science: (Re)Constructing Scientific Knowledge in Light of Political Visions,” was featured in a parallel session on “Digital Media and Public Engagement in Environmental Campaigns,” organised by Research Network 12: Environment and Society. The work critiques the simplistic view that contemporary environmental groups are merely “ambassadors of the scientific message,” “amplifiers of scientific practices,” or “mobilisers of the IPCC’s work.” The research offers a more nuanced understanding of how these groups, in Portugal, incorporate science into their narratives. The authors focused on challenging this oversimplified perspective while also addressing the risks and challenges associated with integrating science into activist discourses.
Daniela Ferreira da Silva presented an e-poster titled “Political Imaginaries in the Climate Movement: Youth-Led Activist Groups Building Plural Visions of the Future” at the Encontro Ciência 2024. This work was co-authored with Anabela Carvalho and Maria Fernandes-Jesus. The Encontro Ciência 2024 event was organised by the Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (FCT) at Alfândega do Porto, under the theme “+Science for One Health and Global Well-being.” The e-poster was part of the Science and Technology showcase.
On June 27, Maria Fernandes-Jesus presented a webinar for the Climate, Environment, and Psychology Division of the Psychological Society of South Africa entitled “Shaping Our Collective Futures: Radical Political Imagination Towards Climate Justice.” In this presentation, the researcher discussed the work developed through focus group discussions with various engaged and non-engaged youths with climate action, exploring political imaginaries and their impact towards just social transformations.
