Are you interested in understanding how factors such as gender, religion, ethnicity, race, age, culture, disability, norms, values, and behavior intersect and are involved in decision-making relevant to biodiversity? And do you want to translate lessons from decision-making theories, social theories of change, and behavioral sciences into behavior improvement and practice relevant to biodiversity? Then you have a role to play as a postdoc.
Your research will be part of the Horizon Europe Planet 4B Project, which aims to understand how factors such as gender, religion, ethnicity, race, age, culture, disability, values, norms, and behavior intersect and are involved in decision-making relevant to biodiversity in different sectors, scales, and environments. The project also aims to channel this understanding into stakeholder interventions and elucidate transformative pathways and policy recommendations. The ultimate goal is to prioritize biodiversity and halt and reverse biodiversity loss.
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Biodiversity is fundamental to humans and non-humans and the integrity of the Earth. Despite scientific evidence of the importance of diversity of life for ecosystems, food security, health and well-being, and calls to halt biodiversity loss, there is a large gap between the scale of the problem and the responses to it. The accelerated loss of biodiversity is unprecedented, not only because of its pace and scale but mainly and above all because of its anthropogenic drivers and possibly catastrophic consequences. Much is needed to maintain the diversity of life on Earth. However, what can be seen is the lack of prioritization of biodiversity in the political agenda, private companies, and the daily behavior of society.
We need to have a better understanding of how values, norms, and behavior are intertwined with decision-making by various actors, across sectors and scales. In addition, we are well aware of power imbalances and inequalities within and between countries, so transformation requires that the politics and plural values of human-nature relations: that is, the diversity of knowledge, beliefs, values, worldviews, and aspirations rooted in the relations between people and nature are brought to the forefront, along with the role of the intersectionality of social characteristics.
Understanding decision-making theories and intersectionality is one of the research objectives of the project, particularly to create a transdisciplinary framework of analysis. Their research will help build this transdisciplinary diagnostic framework of theories of behavior, decision-making, and change by identifying and listing all the ins and outs and facilitating dialogue between disciplines and consortium partners. For this, it will be necessary to identify, systematize and discuss the main theories, concepts, and debates in different disciplines, conducting systematic reviews in various sets of kinds of literature, preferably using bibliometrics and meta-analysis. In addition, it will carry out its extensive case study related to agricultural trade between Brazil and the EU/Netherlands and its impacts on biodiversity and indigenous peoples and traditional communities.
Profile
- You have a Ph.D. in a relevant field of social sciences (e.g., environmental social sciences, political science, and sociology).
- You can identify and understand broad disciplinary and theoretical debates related to transformative biodiversity governance, transformative change, decision-making theories, behavior change, justice, and intersectionality.
- It has a strong affinity with the policy issues of biodiversity, sustainability, governance, and justice, preferably evidenced by publications.
- You can analyze, discuss and synthesize theoretical and conceptual debates within and across different disciplines.
- You have an interest in interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research.
- He has knowledge and experience with mixed methods and qualitative research methods.
- You are familiar with systematic reviews of the literature.
- You have excellent written and spoken skills in English. Practical knowledge of Portuguese is recommended.
- You have good communication and facilitation skills and can work in a team.
- She has strong project management skills, flexibility, a proactive attitude, and excellent academic writing skills.
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