ISET's Work
ISET's Work Broadly Defined
ISET's work transcends disciplinary boundaries. We use a systems perspective in all of our work because social processes, climate change and environmental degradation do not exist independently of each other. Addressing and mitigating the impacts of climate change is the main undercurrent of all of ISET's work currently. Current projects can be loosely grouped under the following interconnected themes:
- Urban systems
- Desakota Systems
- Disaster Risk Reduction
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Urban Systems
Urban Systems
The study of urban systems looks at the complex interrelationships within urban environments, including the social, cultural, political, economic, geographic, organizational, and bioenvironmental factors that influence urban populations and how they interact. From a bioenvironmental frame, a city is comprised of high population densities within defined political and administrative units where the capacity of local ecosystems to provide the basic food and water requirements of the city are exceeded. Urban physical, socio-economic, institutional, and ecological systems can fail under changing climatic conditions, and when they do, the results can be catastrophic for large populations directly and indirectly affected.
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Desakota Systems
Desakota Systems
"Desakota" is a Bahasa Indonesia term meaning "village-town" and aptly describes the rural-urban continuum common throughout Asia. Desakota encompasses more than the term "peri-urban' - it refers to the closely interlinked, co-penetrating rural/urban livelihoods, communication, transport and economic systems. These systems occupy and radiate out from a spectrum of conditions that have purely urban and purely rural as the two extreme ends. Desakota regions are highly complex and experience the burdens of a changing climate from multiple directions and forces.
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Disaster Risk Reduction
Disaster Risk Reduction
ISET employs qualitative and quantitative cost-benefit analyses and shared learning dialogues to assess the best interventions available for disaster risk reduction interventions under projected climate change scenarios. These are climate change induced hazards such as floods, droughts, glacial lake outburst floods, sea-level changes, inland saltwater ingress, etc.
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What We Do
ISET’s work bridges the science-policy-implementation divide across regions and cultures. While we are engaged in both basic research and applied implementation activities, ISET’s particular skill lies in the translation of global natural and social scientific insights into local contexts in a manner that improves understanding and enables action. We are also particularly skilled in analyzing the implications of local physical, cultural, economic and other system dynamics for global and other high level policy and strategy. Click here to read more.
ISET Contact Information
948 North Street, Suite 9
Boulder, Colorado 80304, U.S.A.
Tel: 720 564 0650 / Fax: 720 564 0653
Email