Knowledge and capacity building in the field of planning and governance for metropolitan regions in a context of socioenvironmental challenges and climate change

Abstract

Nowadays, the challenges of metropolitan areas are widely discussed, in particular with regard to large agglomerations in the so-called Global South. Processes of state rescaling, the new roles played by state actors, private corporations and societal actors push towards a reconfiguration of planning and governance by new discourses, institutional arrangements, tools and practices. Global agendas and agreements as the New Urban Agenda, the SDGs and the Paris Agreement are enacting the emergence of new global platforms dealing with contemporary socio-environmental trends and challenges. Considering these current global driving forces, this project proposes to consolidate an already existing international partnership, generate knowledge and capacity building in the field of planning, governance and policy-making for sustainable metropolitan regions in a context of socio-environmental challenges, adopting a comparative Brazilian-German perspective. The relevance of the proposal is related to the fact that Brazil and Germany are federal states, sharing the challenges of improving intergovernmental coordination on a city regional scale, strengthening institutional governance arrangements and deepening cooperative practices with extra-governmental stakeholders, in order to enhance governability, effectivity and democratic legitimacy of public action. This comparative study on metropolitan environmental planning and governance, considering the particular conditions of multi-level-systems and power relations, should contribute to come to a better understanding of how these politico-institutional conditions support or hinder possibilities of effectively tackling with climate change related policies for the benefit of metropolitan sustainability. The three universities propose the integration and mutual adjustment of their curriculums favouring the exchange of professors and students at different academic levels. UFABC and TU Dortmund have already an agreement about the participation of UFABC in the International Joint Master in Regional Development Planning and Management (SPRING). We expect that this cooperation project paves the way for the creation of English taught master programs at UFABC, and the creation of joint PhD programs with the German Partners, allowing permanent interaction and exchange between the involved programs. Important to highlight the synergies with the CAPES/PrInt Program of Internationalisation and a recently submitted project to FINEP on Urban Drainage and Rainwater Management, involving the same German partners. The project is linked with the FAPESP-funded thematic project Environmental Governance of the Sao Paulo Macrometropolis (SPMM) in face of Climate Variability (Macroamb), under the coordination of Pedro Jacobi (May 2017-May 2022). Its main goal is to analyse institutional arrangements, processes of cooperation, environmental policies and territorial dynamics in the context of the SPMM, adopting an interdisciplinary perspective. The two main subprojects on environmental governance and territorial planning are coordinated by Klaus Frey and Sandra Momm, respectively. In the German context the initiative can build on two ongoing projects. At TU Dortmund the project ZUKUR is directed towards identifying, exploring and reducing barriers between long-term policies and goals of urban development for adapting to ecological, social and economic challenges. The project at the University Duisburg Essen, integrated in the multi-disciplinary research college FUTURE WATER, is examining how water governance on the state level is affected by information exchange networks between collective actors from different sectors and levels. Both projects share with Macroamb the concern of adopting an integrated research focusing on the potentials and conditionalities of public policies, planning practices as well as instruments and overarching governance-forms to contribute to actively build future-oriented sustainable regions. (AU)