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Harvard Forest Research Project 2023
- Title: New England (USA) futures: a meta-study and assessment
- Principal investigator: James Peters (jspeters3100@gmail.com)
- Institution: Harvard University
- Primary contact: James Peters (jspeters3100@gmail.com)
- Team members:
- Abstract:
Driven by the dynamic interactions of nature and society, New England’s future of climate change, mitigation, adaptation and ecological restoration will be a product of the interactions of a set of relationships that, while forged at regional scale over long periods of time, are also discontinuous. Exhibiting periods of equilibrium, stability, and incremental change, these relationships will eventually give way to new periods of equilibrium, stability, and incremental change in which the relationships have changed. Accurate forecasting of discontinuous socio-ecological change brought about by the interactions of such diverse factors as climate, population dynamics, culture, material culture, natural resources, technology, economic organization, and human consciousness, which are themselves constantly changing, seems an impossibility. However, the application of scenario-based forecasting techniques can offer insights into possible futures. In an effort to peer into New England’s possible futures, this paper presents a meta-analysis of XXX published New England futures studies, using hierarchical cluster analysis to group like-type studies and scenarios, discusses the study and scenario types, assesses their findings from the perspective of climate-change mitigation and adaptation options, and presents four alternative meta-scenarios of New England’s socio-ecological future.
