Welcome to Futuremakers from the University of Oxford, where our academics debate key issues for the future of society. Season Three: The History of Pandemics (Starting 01 Dec 2020) - Returning for its third series, the University of Oxford's Futuremakers podcast follows host, Professor Peter Millican, as he talks to researchers from around the world about some of the devastating pandemics humanity has experienced. Peter and his colleagues look at ten major outbreaks: from the Plague of Athens to the West African Ebola outbreak, via the Black Death, Cholera and Smallpox, and ask how these outbreaks have shaped society, what we may be able to learn from them today, and where we might be heading? Season Two: Climate Change - Conversations on how we respond to a changing climate, and how humanity will cope and thrive in an uncertain future, with some of the world’s leading thinkers. (28 Oct 2019 - 20 Dec 2019) Special episode: Could quantum computing change the world? (11 Apr 2019) Season One: Artificial Intelligence (16 Oct 2018 - 08 Jan 2019)

Is climate conflict inevitable?

December 13, 2019 0:49:30 47.58 MB Downloads: 0
In this Futuremakers episode we ask experts the question - is climate conflict inevitable? In 2010, Jeffrey Mazo outlined in his book 'How global warming threatens security and what to do about it' four ways in which climate and environmental change could produce security threats - a general systemic weakening, boundary disputes, resource wars, and by multiplying instability in already fragile or weak states.  Yet so far in our second series, with conversations around energy use, international treaties and individual choices, talk of conflict has received much less attention.  Is this a fair reflection of the relative threat, or should people be paying far more attention to these potential future developments? Is global conflict due to climate change inevitable? With Peter to discuss this are; Kate Guy, from the Centre for Climate and Security in Washington DC, a doctoral researcher at the University of Oxford specialising in International Relations, who focusses on the intersection of climate change and national security; and Dr Troy Sternberg, from Oxford's School of Geography and the Environment, whose research has explored how environmental and climate changes in the Gobi region of northern China and Mongolia, have impacted on security in the Middle East.