Implicações da pecuária brasileira para a segurança alimentar: a ciência e o discurso do setor produtivo: scientific versus industry discourses

This article examines how actors involved in Brazil’s beef production sector define the sector’s role infood security in the context of re-primarization of the economy. Data drawn from 12 semi-structuredinterviews conducted between 2013 and 2014 with representatives of the sector show a contradictionbetween their framings of food security and those found in the scientific literature: while the latterincreasingly stresses the need to reduce production and consumption of meat in order to strengthenfood security in the long term, respondents present beef production as essential to ensure food securityat the national and global levels. Findings therefore indicate that the sector’s discourse paradoxicallyputs the country’s food security at risk.Este artigo avalia como os atores do setor produtivo da pecuária bovina brasileira compreendem o papel desta atividade econômica na segurança alimentar em um contexto de reprimarização da economia. Com base em 12 entrevistas semiestruturadas com representantes da cadeia produtiva brasileira, realizadas entre os anos de 2013 e 2014, demonstra uma contradição entre as suas definições e as da literatura científica contemporânea: enquanto a literatura científica aponta cada vez mais a necessidade de reduzir a produção e o consumo de carne para fortalecer a segurança alimentar em longo prazo, os entrevistados apresentam a produção pecuária como essencial para garantir a segurança alimentar em níveis nacional e mundial. O artigo argumenta que o discurso do setor paradoxalmente coloca em risco a segurança alimentar do país

When climate change is not blamed: the politics of disaster attribution in international perspective

Analyzing the politics and policy implications in Brazil of attributing extreme weather events to climate change, we argue for greater place-based sensitivity in recommendations for how to frame extreme weather events relative to climate change. Identifying geographical limits of current recommendations to emphasize the climate role in such events, we explore Brazilian framings of the two tragic national disasters, as apparent in newspaper coverage of climate change. We find that a variety of contextual factors compel environmental leaders and scientists in Brazil to avoid and discourage highlighting the role of climate change in national extreme events. Against analysts’ general deficit-finding assumptions, we argue that the Brazilian framing tendency reflects sound strategic, socio-environmental reasoning, and discuss circumstances in which attributing such events to climate change—and, by extension, attribution science—can be ineffective for policy action on climate change and other socio-environmental issues in need of public pressure and preventive action. The case study has implications beyond Brazil by begging greater attention to policies and politics in particular places before assuming that attribution science and discursive emphasis on the climate role in extreme events are the most strategic means of achieving climate mitigation and disaster preparedness. Factors at play in Brazil might also structure extreme events attribution politics in other countries, not least some other countries of the global South

Segurança Alimentar e Mudanças Ambientais Globais:: uma análise crítica no contexto da sociedade brasileira

Agriculture is closely related to global environment change, being part of both its causes and consequences. Global environmental change can increase the vulnerability of society’s food security. From a holistic point of view of the food system, this texts seeks to contextualize the link between food security and global environmental change by means of a literature review. The study points out the risks posed to Brazil’s food security and its vulnerability, along with the mitigation and adaptation measures needed to overcome the problem. The authors highlight challenges for policy making and scientific research on global environmental change and food security in Brazil.A agricultura está profundamente relacionada com as mudanças ambientais globais, participando tanto das causas como das suas consequências, podendo acentuar a vulnerabilidade da sociedade em relação à segurança alimentar. Fazendo uma revisão crítica da literatura, este trabalho tem por objetivo contextualizar as relações entre a segurança alimentar e as mudanças ambientais globais. Aponta os riscos aos quais está sujeita a segurança alimentar da sociedade brasileira contemporânea, os aspectos de sua vulnerabilidade e as ações mitigatórias e adaptativas necessárias para sua garantia, e destaca os desafios para a política e pesquisa científica sobre o tema. Prioriza-se o debate sobre a fração da segurança alimentar relativa ao universo dos produtos agrícolas, deixando-se de lado os produtos provindos da pesca e produção animal

International organizations, advocacy coalitions, and domestication of global norms : Debates on climate change in Canada, the US, Brazil, and India

National climate policies are shaped by international organizations (IOs) and global norms. Drawing from World Society Theory and the Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF), we develop two related arguments: (1) one way in which IOs can influence national climate policy is through their engagement in mass-mediated national policy debates and (2) national organizations involved in the policy process may form advocacy coalitions to support or oppose the norms promoted by IOs. To examine the role of IOs in national policy debates and the coalitions that support and oppose them, we use discourse network analysis (DNA) on over 3500 statements in 11 newspapers in Canada, the United States (US), Brazil, and India. We find that in the high-income countries that are high per capita emitters (Canada and the US), IOs are less central in the policy debates and the discourse network is strongly clustered into competing advocacy coalitions. In the lower-income countries that are low per capita emitters (Brazil and India), IOs are more central and the discourse network is less clustered. Relating these findings to earlier research, we suggest that the differences we find between high and low per capita emitters may be to some extent generalizable to the relevant country groups beyond our four cases.Peer reviewe

Impacts, adaptation and vulnerability to global environmental change: challenges and pathways for an action-oriented research agenda for middle-income and low-income countries

The socio-economic impacts of environmental stresses associated with global environmental change depend to a large extent on how societies organize themselves. Research on climate-related societal impacts, vulnerability and adaptation is currently underdeveloped, prompting international global environmental change research institutions to hold a series of meetings in 2009–2010. One of these aimed at identifying needs in middle-income and low-income countries (MLICs), and found that effective responses to the challenge of reducing vulnerability and enhancing adaptation will drive research and policy into challenging and innovative areas of research. Producing impacts, vulnerability and adaptation knowledge requires greater inclusion of MLIC researchers and a rethinking of the research structures, institutions and paradigms that have dominated global change research to date. Scientific literature discussed in this article suggests that governance issues need to become central objects of empirically based, detailed, multiscalar and action-oriented research, and that this needs to address the politically sensitive and seemingly intractable issue of reducing global inequities in power and resource distribution. The scientific literature suggests that without effective action in those directions, current trends toward greater inequality will continue to both reflect and intensify global environmental threats and their impacts

Shared Positions on Divisive Beliefs Explain Interorganizational Collaboration: Evidence from Climate Change Policy Subsystems in 11 Countries

Collaboration between public administration organizations and various stakeholders is often prescribed as a potential solution to the current complex problems of governance, such as climate change. According to the Advocacy Coalition Framework, shared beliefs are one of the most important drivers of collaboration. However, studies investigating the role of beliefs in collaboration show mixed results. Some argue that similarity of general normative and empirical policy beliefs elicits collaboration, while others focus on beliefs concerning policy instruments. Proposing a new divisive beliefs hypothesis, we suggest that agreeing on those beliefs over which there is substantial disagreement in the policy subsystem is what matters for collaboration. Testing our hypotheses using policy network analysis and data on climate policy subsystems in 11 countries (Australia, Brazil, the Czech Republic, Germany, Finland, Ireland, Japan, Korea, Portugal, Sweden, and Taiwan), we find belief similarity to be a stronger predictor of collaboration when the focus is divisive beliefs rather than normative and empirical policy beliefs or beliefs concerning policy instruments. This knowledge can be useful for managing collaborative governance networks because it helps to identify potential competing coalitions and to broker compromises between them

Conflicting Climate Change Frames in a Global Field of Media Discourse

Reducing global emissions will require a global cosmopolitan culture built from detailed attention to conflicting national climate change frames (interpretations) in media discourse. The authors analyze the global field of media climate change discourse using 17 diverse cases and 131 frames. They find four main conflicting dimensions of difference: validity of climate science, scale of ecological risk, scale of climate politics, and support for mitigation policy. These dimensions yield four clusters of cases producing a fractured global field. Positive values on the dimensions show modest association with emissions reductions. Data-mining media research is needed to determine trends in this global field.Peer reviewe