ESEH conference in Uppsala

EASE session:
Archaeologies of Sustainable Environments

Keywords: archaeology, human-environment interaction, climate change, sustainable development goals (SDG)

Chair: Marco Hostettler (University of Bern); marco.hostettler@unibe.ch

Presenter(s): Erika Weiberg (Uppsala University, Sweden), Canan Çakirlar (University of Groningen, Netherlands), Albert Hafner (University of Bern, Switzerland), Daan Raemaekers (University of Groningen, Netherlands)

The session takes its cue from the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals with the vision of fostering collaborative archaeologies of sustainability in the climate-society nexus. As such it introduces a recently initiated interdisciplinary research network within the ENLIGHT university alliance (https://enlight-eu.org/), combining the sciences of climate change and agricultural development with a focus on human innovation. We especially emphasise the role of diversity, and how the diverse appearance of climate change in different times and places meets the full diversity of human resourcefulness, as well as the role of cultural, social, economic, biological and environmental diversity for sustainable alternatives in times of crises. Through the EASE network we explore the SDGs in relation to evidence from the past, with special emphasis on climate histories, food security and agriculture, and innovation and infrastructure.

On the theme of climate histories, we ask how we might rethink the written and material records of social adaptabilities and transformations to better understand what it means to live through an era of climate change. What was the influence of the rate and scale of climate change on human perception, and the role of individual action and social structure for shaping responses? In relation to food security and agriculture, we ask what the key features are that decide the vulnerability of agricultural strategies to climate change and other stressors. Agriculture, from its very beginnings, penetrates into all sections of society and the positive or negative relationship between natural conditions and agriculture is thus dependent not only on climate and natural resources but also on the organisation of societies that designed and manage these systems. To highlight these interlinkages, we explore the role of both hard and soft infrastructure as produced and reproduced through human resourcefulness. Evidence from the past supports the notion that innovation is especially visible in times of stress, in periods of strong expansion and population pressure, or in the face of climate and environmental change.

The panel session is made up of four papers that each tie evidence from the past to at least one UN SDG, asking to what extent the lessons provided are transferable across time and space:

1. Erika WEIBERG: The UN Sustainable Development Goals for historians – tools to think with or means to provide lessons for a future?
2. Canan ÇAKIRLAR, University of Groningen: Archaeologies of economic growth and its environmental impact
3. Albert HAFNER, University of Bern: Exploring Rapid Cultural Change of Alpine early farming societies: the role of past climate and environment
4. Daan RAEMAEKERS, University of Groningen: What sustainability and climate change have to say about the transition to farming in the Dutch wetlands

More about the conference: https://eseh2025.com/