Publications by Author: Clark, William C.

2014
Harley, Alicia, Sharmila Murthy, Laura Diaz Anadon, Gabriel Chan, Kira Matus, Suerie Moon, Vanessa Timmer, and William C Clark. 2014. “Innovation and Access to Technologies for Sustainable Development: A Global Systems Perspective.” Innovation and Access to Technologies for Sustainable Development: A Global Perspective. Cambridge, MA. Publisher's Version Abstract

This workshop report is a summary of themes discussed by five panels during a daylong workshop on “Innovation and Access to Technologies for Sustainable Development: A global Perspective” at Harvard University on April 24, 2014. The workshop brought together a diverse group of scholars to explore how the technological innovation needed for sustainable development can be promoted in ways that assure equitable access in current and future generations.

Three key themes that emerged from the workshop include: (1) The central role of power, politics and agency in analyzing technological innovation and sustainable development—an important aspect of this includes the articulation of the roles of actors and organizations within frameworks and models of innovation systems. (2) The importance of focusing both on supply-push and demand-pull mechanisms in innovation scholarship and innovation policy. (3) The need to focus more innovation scholarship around the goals of sustainable development.

2008
Clark, William C, Michael Devereux, and Henry Lee. 2008. “Biofuels and Sustainable Development”. Abstract

The goals and concerns surrounding the debate over government policies related to the greater use and production of biofuels were addressed in an executive session convened by the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University and the Venice International University on May 19-20, 2008. The session attracted more than 25 of the world's leading experts from the fields of policy, science, and business to San servolo Island for an intensive two day session (see Appendix A for a list of the participants). The discussions were off-the-record, with each participant present in his or her own capacity, rather than representing an organization. The session was one in a series on Grand Challenges of the Sustainability Transition organized by the Sustainability Science Program at Harvard University with the generous support of the Italian Ministry for Environment, Land, and Sea. This particular session was held as part of the Ministry's ongoing work with the Global Bioenergy Program established at the G8 Gleneagles Summit in 2005. This summary report of the session is our synthesis of the main points and arguments that emerged from the discussions. It does not represent a consensus document, since no effort was made at the Session to arrive at a a single consensus view. Rather, we report here on what we heard to be the major themes discussed at the session. Any errors or misrepresentations remain solely our responsibility.

Also CID Working Paper No. 174 and BCSIA Working Paper, July 2008.


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2006
Clark, William C, and Laura Holliday. 2006. Linking Knowledge with Action for Sustainable Development: Summary of a Workshop. The National Academies Press. Publisher's Version Abstract

This report summarizes a workshop organized by the National Academies Roundtable on Science and Technology for Sustainability. The workshop brought together a select group of program managers from the public and private sectors to discuss specific cases of linking knowledge to action in a diverse set of integrated observation, assessment, and decision support systems. Workshop discussions explored a wide variety of experiments in harnessing science and technology to goals of promoting development and conserving the environment. Participants reflected on the most significant challenges that they have faced when trying to implement their programs and the strategies that they have used to address them successfully. The report summarizes discussions at the workshop, including common themes about the process of linking knowledge with actions for sustainable development that emerged across a wide range of cases, sectors, and regions.

2001

This study seeks to better understand the long-term development of efforts to manage interactions between society and the global environment. It conceives "management" broadly to include problem and goal definition, as well as the formulation and implementation of action programs and policy. It explores the impact and interactions of ideas, interests, and institutions on the development of management practice. It investigates the extent to which, and means by which, efforts at global environmental management entrain multiple actors in multiple national and super-national arenas. Similarly, it is interested in the extent to which the management capacity for dealing with any specific global environmental concern is affected by the management capacity developed for dealing with other issues. Finally, it asks to what extent and in what ways, learning has played a significant role in the development of society's approach to the management of its interactions with the global environment.

To illuminate these questions, the study traces the evolution of efforts to address the issues of acid rain, stratospheric ozone depletion, and climate change over a period extending from the International Geophysical Year of 1957 through the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development of 1992. It offers a comparative exploration of the development of these issues across a range of national and international settings including Japan, the United States, Canada, Mexico, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Germany, the former Soviet Union, Hungary, the European Union and the family of international environmental organizations. It describes the development of management response along two dimensions: one focusing on problem framing, agenda setting, and issue attention; the other on management functions of risk assessment, monitoring, option assessment, goal and strategy formulation, implementation and evaluation.

Numerous studies of global environmental change have concentrated on particular countries, issues, institutions, periods and policies. This work seeks to complement such focused efforts by fashioning a long-term, large-scale overview of how the interplay between ideas and actions across multiple problem areas has laid the foundations on which contemporary efforts in global environmental management are now building. It has been written by, and should be of interest to, scientists, policy advisors and others involved in contemporary efforts to manage global environmental change, as well as scholars seeking to advance our broader understanding of global environmental issues and governance.

1999
Clark, William C. 1999. “A Transition Toward Sustainability”. Abstract

This paper discusses the challenges and opportunities facing efforts to shape a transition toward more sustainable relations between humans and their planet. It begins with a review of international goals for human development and environmental conservation, past trends in interactions between the earth’s social and natural systems that set the stage for contemporary efforts to meet those goals, and some of the foreseeable problems that will have to be addressed in the years ahead. Arguing that the successful strategies for navigating a sustainability transition will necessarily be knowledge intensive, the paper discusses strategies for social learning about sustainability. It closes with a review of the institutional reforms that will be necessary to implement such strategies.

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