Research
The Planetary Futures Competition will be announced once a year in the years 2022-2025 to support the acquisition of third-party funding for transdisciplinary projects at Justus Liebig University.
Click here to download a PDF-Version of the call.
PLANETARY FUTURES COMPETITION Vol. III (2024/2025)
Competition for support for the acquisition of third-party funds
For the last time in this cycle, the Panel on Planetary Thinking invites applications to the Planetary Futures Competition (2022-2025). The aim is to provide financial support for emerging transdisciplinary research projects whose initiators are in the process of applying for external funding. This time, project ideas dedicated to researching planetary phenomena using innovative approaches and methods will be awarded funding of up to 10,000 euros . The main aim is to pave the way for explorative research projects that require a research practice beyond disciplinary boundaries and thus entail risks, challenges, and opportunities.
In line with the Hessian University Pact 2021-2025, Justus Liebig University has made it its goal to promote a planetary science culture and to create transdisciplinary points of contact. In this context, the Panel on Planetary Thinking forms a central node for a growing, international network for planetary research. Planetary thinking aims to understand what it means to be part of a planet. It involves moving away from a purely anthropocentric perspective to holistic views of an ever-changing planet. Human societies are thereby understood as actors in complex (inter-)planetary and intertemporal cause-effect structures, whose ability to shape planetary processes can influence them far beyond their own existence.
Possible topics for participation in the competition are accordingly broad - suggestions as well as exemplary pilot studies or art projects can be found on our website; in particular, we direct your attention to the previously funded projects within the Planetary Futures Competitions Vol. 1 & II .
JLU members of all disciplines can submit applications, if they are eligible to apply for the envisioned third-party funding line. The Planetary Futures funds can cover material costs that serve the execution of preparatory workshops, the realization of research trips, service contracts, or other purposes that specifically serve the soliciting of third-party funding. Due to the funding guidelines, hospitality expenses cannot be covered, and the funds must have been spent by the end of 2025 at the very latest.
The application should include the following:
- Abstract of the research project (~ 500 words)
- Outline of activities and financing plan (e.g. workshop outline & distribution of foreseen costs)
- Presentation of concrete funding line intended for the application (e.g. Volkswagen Stiftung: Open Up )
- Short CVs of all applicants
Please send your application in either German or English as a single PDF file and by July, 7 th , 2024 to panel@planet.uni-giessen.de .
Planet as Method
| Principle Investigators: |
Frederic Hanusch (Panel on Planetary Thinking, JLU Giessen) Sven Opitz (Institute for Sociology, PU Marburg) |
| Research Associate: | Clemens Finkelstein (Panel on Planetary Thinking, JLU Giessen) |
| Involved Researchers: |
Stéphanie Domptail (Panel on Planetary Thinking, JLU Giessen) Ute Tellmann (TU Darmstadt) Mi You (documenta Institut, University of Kassel) |
The project Planet as Method (PaM) develops the methodological foundation for producing planetary knowledge in the humanities and social sciences. Its guiding question is: How does our understanding of the planet translate into the way it is inhabited? Since the second half of the 20th century, the natural sciences have developed a transdisciplinary Earth System Science that has comprehensively revealed the human impact on the planet. However, the sense of the planetary condition rendered by natural scientific inquiry remains largely decoupled from the processes of social transformation. To identify the causes of this decoupling, it is necessary to examine scientific knowledge about the planet regarding the world-building it initiates, requires, or excludes. This analysis falls within the realm of competence of the social sciences and humanities, which, since their inception, have had methods at their disposal to consider the co-implication of researchers in their subject matter. “Planet as Method” leverages this expertise to demonstrate that the planetary dimension has always been an intrinsic part of social worlds. Bridging the insights of Earth System Science with those of the social sciences and humanities, the project offers an integrated approach to addressing the complex challenges of our time.
The project's seed funding is financed by the Experimentation Spaces funding instrument of the Research Campus of Central Hessen (FCMH) . It aims to develop a joint project with regional partner organizations.
The Planetary Portal aims to serve as a hub for planetary thinking, connecting disparate communities where theoretical and practical ideas on the Planetary are being developed.
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The Planetary is an emerging concept in the sciences, social sciences, humanities, arts, and politics that draws attention to the basic fact that human affairs take place on a planet — and the innumerous and complex implications that flow from this realization. To think with and through the Planetary is to acknowledge that human life is inextricably embedded within the biogeochemical ferment of an ever-changing planet — a planet that expands spatially from the Earth’s core to interplanetary space, temporally from nanoseconds to cosmic time scales, and materially from elementary particles to the dark matter of the universe. The Planetary Portal is a collaboration between the Panel on Planetary Thinking and the Planetary research program at the Berggruen Institute. It maps institutions around the world that are working on or within a planetary framework. They include university research centers, independent research institutes, NGOs, and other organizations that approach policy, politics, and philosophy through a planetary lens. It is our hope that representing the many diverse institutions that are working on the Planetary in one place will help visitors visualize the contours of this emerging field, draw connections between the various intellectual ventures, provide basic structure for the nascent category, and further the development of planetary thought, with the aim of developing a viable planetary politics. |
