Dispelling the myth that people in the Global North share similar experiences of climate change, this book reveals how intersecting social dimensions of climate change-people, processes, and institutions-give rise to different experiences of loss, adaptation, and resilience among those living in rural and resource contexts of the Global North. Bringing together leading feminist researchers and practitioners from three countries-Australia, Canada, and Spain-this collection documents gender relations in fossil fuel, mining, and extractive industries, in land-based livelihoods, in approaches for inclusive environmental policy, and in the lived experience of climate hazards. Uniquely, the book brings together the voices, expertise, and experiences of both academic researchers and women whose views have not been prioritized in formal policies-for example, women in agriculture, Indigenous women, immigrant women, and women in male-dominated professions. Their contributions are insightful and compelling, highlighting the significance of gaining diverse perspectives for a fuller understanding of climate change impacts, more equitable processes and strategies for climate change adaptation, and a more welcoming climate future. This book will be vital reading for students and scholars of gender studies, environmental studies, environmental sociology, geography, and sustainability science. It will provide important insights for planners, decision makers, and community advocates to strengthen their understanding of social dimensions of climate change and to develop more inclusive and equitable adaptation policies, plans, and practices.

UNESCO Biosphere Reserves (BRs) are designated areas in geographical regions of global socio-ecological significance. This definitive book shows their global relevance and contribution to environmental protection, biocultural diversity and education. Initiated in the 1970s as part of UNESCO's Man and Biosphere (MAB) Programme, BRs share a set of common objectives, to support and demonstrate a balance between biodiversity conservation, sustainable development and research. The world's 701 BRs form an international, intergovernmental network to support the aims of sustainability science, but this purpose has not always been widely understood. In three distinct sections, the book starts by outlining the origins of BRs and the MAB Programme, showing how they contribute to advancing sustainable development. The second section documents the evolution of BRs around the world, including case studies from each of the five UNESCO world regions. Each case study demonstrates how conservation, sustainable development and the role of scientific research have been interpreted locally. The book concludes by discussing thematic lessons to help understand the challenges and opportunities associated with sustainability science, providing a unique platform from which lessons can be learned. This includes how concepts become actions on the ground and how ideas can be taken up across sites at differing scales. This book will be of great interest to professionals engaged in conservation and sustainable development, NGOs, policy-makers and advanced students in environmental management, ecology, sustainability science, environmental anthropology and geography.

UNESCO Biosphere Reserves (BRs) are designated areas in geographical regions of global socio-ecological significance. This definitive book shows their global relevance and contribution to environmental protection, biocultural diversity and education. Initiated in the 1970s as part of UNESCO's Man and Biosphere (MAB) Programme, BRs share a set of common objectives, to support and demonstrate a balance between biodiversity conservation, sustainable development and research. The world's 701 BRs form an international, intergovernmental network to support the aims of sustainability science, but this purpose has not always been widely understood. In three distinct sections, the book starts by outlining the origins of BRs and the MAB Programme, showing how they contribute to advancing sustainable development. The second section documents the evolution of BRs around the world, including case studies from each of the five UNESCO world regions. Each case study demonstrates how conservation, sustainable development and the role of scientific research have been interpreted locally. The book concludes by discussing thematic lessons to help understand the challenges and opportunities associated with sustainability science, providing a unique platform from which lessons can be learned. This includes how concepts become actions on the ground and how ideas can be taken up across sites at differing scales. This book will be of great interest to professionals engaged in conservation and sustainable development, NGOs, policy-makers and advanced students in environmental management, ecology, sustainability science, environmental anthropology and geography.

The rapidly changing nature of life in Canadian rural communities is
more than a simple response to economic conditions. People living in
rural places are part of a new social agenda characterized by
transformation of livelihoods, landscapes, and social relations -
these profound changes invite us to reconsider the meanings of
community, culture, and citizenship.
"Social Transformation in Rural Canada" presents the work of
researchers from a variety of fields who explore the dynamics of social
transformation in rural settlements, looking at them not simply as
places affected by external forces, but as incubators of change and
social units with agency and purpose.
In a break with a common approach to this issue, the authors pay
attention to such factors as local forms of action, adaptation,
identity, and imagination in examining the ways in which rural life in
Canada - including within Aboriginal communities - is
changing. Mobility, leadership, and the arts are among the issues that
figure in these stories of transformation, and many open a window onto
parts of rural Canada that are providing exemplary models for other
communities. The book's case studies, drawn from various regions
of Canada including the far North, present a rich and diverse portrait
of a country undergoing tremendous change that affects people from all
walks of life.John R. Parkins is an associate professor in the
Department of Resource Economics and Environmental Sociology at the
University of Alberta. Maureen G. Reed is a professor
in the School of Environment and Sustainability and the Department of
Geography and Planning at the University of Saskatchewan.
Contributors: Marilyn Baptiste, Darin Barney,
Jonaki Bhattacharyya, Ryan Bullock, Christopher Bryant, Ken J. Caine,
Emily Jane Davis, Nancy Duxbury, Greg Halseth, Lorelei L. Hanson,
Carol-Anne Hudson, Belinda Leach, Don Manson, Martha MacDonald,
Catherine Murray, Ross Nelson, Howard Ramos, Bill Reimer, Laura Ryser,
Ruth Wells Sandwell, David Setah, Peter Sinclair, Chris Southcott, Mark
C.J. Stoddart, Deatra Walsh, Roger William, Yoko Yoshida, and Nathan
Young

The rapidly changing nature of life in Canadian rural communities is more than a simple response to economic conditions. People living in rural places are part of a new social agenda characterized by the transformation of livelihoods, landscapes, and social relations, changes that invite us to reconsider the meanings of community, culture, and citizenship. This volume presents the work of researchers from a variety of fields who explore social transformation in rural settlements across the country. The essays collectively generate a nuanced portrait of how local forms of action, adaptation, identity, and imagination are reshaping Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal communities in rural Canada.

This book goes beyond the dichotomies of “pro” and “anti” environmentalism to tell the stories of the women who seek to maintain resource use in rural places. The author links the experiences of women who seek to protect forestry as an industry, a livelihood, a community, and a culture to policy making by considering the effects of environmental policy changes on the social dynamics of workplaces, households, and communities in forestry towns of British Columbia’s temperate rainforest. Taking Stands provides a crucial understanding of community change in resource-dependent regions and helps us to better tackle the complexities of gender and activism as they relate to rural sustainability.