Paul Wagner
Thesis title: Modelling Dynamic Policy Networks for Managing Climate Change in IrelandSupervisor: Dr Diane Payne
Funding: PRTLI 5
Biographical Note:
Even though there is almost unanimous agreement by climate scientists about the dangers resulting from global climate change, there has been no similar convergence on an agreement of what should be done in response. This is because people and groups interpret events and information differently, and therefore an investigation of how climate change is understood in Ireland will vary from how it is interpreted in other countries. The aim of my research is to generate and analyse a substantial amount of high quality quantitative and qualitative sociological data describing Ireland’s understanding and organizational response to the consequences of climate change.
I am undertaking my research as part of an international research project called COMPON (Comparing Climate Change Policy Networks). Each group involved in the COMPON project is trying to understand the dynamics of the socio-political responses to global climate change in their own society. COMPON researchers are concerned with the conditions under which the near universal scientific consensus about the nature of the problem becomes accepted by populations so as measures to mitigate the consequences of climate change can become politically viable. COMPON affiliated researchers undertake this task by analysing the composition of their society’s climate change policy network, and the advocacy coalitions therein.
See www.compon.org for more details on COMPON
See Dynamics Lab http://dl.ucd.ie/wordpress/
I graduated from UCD with a BSocSc in Sociology and Economics in May 2011. My main research interests include: Network Science, Computational Social Science, Quantitative Methods, Environmental Sociology and Political Sociology.
Awards Obtained:
UCD President’s Award, March 2010, for outstanding academic achievement in Sociology.
Email: paul.wagner.1@ucdconnect.ie