Dear All,
I wanted to say hello to you all in the Climate Gains community. I met Tim through some colleagues at the UN Environment Copenhagen Climate Centre. Thank you for having me - its nice to connect!
I am a PhD researcher based in Sweden. Prior to research I worked as a consultant on various climate and energy access projects for UNHCR, GCF, UKAID amongst others.
My research (PhD project with funding 2020 – 25) explores how systems change in lower income countries is envisioned by actors based in both higher and lower income countries - and the political economy (and possible injustices) of these complex global networks. My research compares the different kinds of visions emanating from contrasting locations and actors, with a particular focus on what kinds of characteristics of change (e.g. actors, locations and directions associated with change) emerge when change is envisioned from an external vantage point. To date I have focused primarily on the energy sector and Rwanda, where I have explored visions of change associated with urgent demands for innovation and transitions towards sustainability. The broad aim is to encourage practitioners - particularly those like myself based in higher income countries - to be more reflexive about their role in processes of change related to lower income countries.
The specific research I am working on at the moment focuses on how change is envisioned from different scales/locations in flows of finance which connect to climate tech for lower income countries. I am particularly interested in the carbon financing world, and am looking for possible case studies in which the modalities of finance (and encoded visions of change) have shaped how a technology or project has unfolded. Or alternatively, studying efforts to change ways of doing things which folks feel are somehow problematic or ineffective.
I would love to follow discussions here amongst you all, and I am also very open to hearing possible ideas with regard to these case studies. I have some budget to dedicate time to this during 2024.
If you are interested to read more about my research, you can find my recent licentiate thesis here: https://research.chalmers.se/publication/534814/file/534814_Fulltext.pdf
Best,
Sam
