2019 Graduate Workshop on China in the urban age

The first graduate workshop on the China Studies Centre’s multidisciplinary research program China in the Urban Age, aimed at any branch of the sciences, humanities and social sciences with an interest in sustainability, was devoted to China’s environmental challenges and eco-civilisation: a multidisciplinary approach to the Anthropocene.

The workshop endeavoured to build a collaborative approach to the study of China to stimulate a connection between the production of local knowledge and the global discussion on the environmental, social, engineering, health, cultural and governing challenges of urbanisation.

This is an initiative of the China Studies Centre in collaboration with the Planetary Health Platform at the University of Sydney.

Shades of Green: Notes on China's Eco-civilisation

Edited by Olivier Krischer and Luigi Tomba

Is China the new champion of environmentalism? Are democratic models becoming obsolete? Is efficiency all we need to tackle this environmental crisis? Believing such questions to be flattening the debate and obscuring as much as they reveal, Shades of Green offers short reflections from the perspectives of 14 young scholars addressing the problem in compelling and original ways. They are exploring issues of language and policy interpretation, the complex nexus of social and environmental justice, case studies in rural revitalisation, precarious urban housing and hygiene impacts of city development, as well as the potential to address spiritual or indigenous questions to ecological challenges in the context of China today. 

Download PDF book here

Presentations videos

Finding a New Language: the challenges of eco-civilization
Luigi Tomba, Professor of Chinese Politics and Director, China Studies Centre, The University of Sydney 

Planetary Health and Urbanisation
Tony Capon, Professor of Planetary Health, The University of Sydney

Chinese art in the 1990s and the spectre of urban citizenship
Olivier Krischer, Art historian and Deputy director, China Studies Centre, The University of Sydney 

Design for Healthy Cities
Peng Gong, Professor and chair, Department of Earth System Science, Tsinghua University

Program

View the 2019 Graduate Workshop program (PDF, 1.6MB). 

Enquiries

The 2020 Graduate Workshop is in planning stage. Subscribe to our newsletter to stay informed. All questions regarding the Graduate Workshop should be addressed to the China Studies Centre.

Image credit: Hung Chung Chih / Shutterstock.com