Synopsis of GUARFS Research Grant Applications for 2023-24

Thomas Brewer

McDonough School of Business
Climate Change Tipping Points

The research is about the likelihood of climate change tipping points – Arctic and Antarctic ice melts, Amazon and other rain forest die-backs, coral reef die-offs, and Atlantic Ocean current circulation collapse – occurring sooner than forecasted. The grant would support the collection of original interview data from climate change experts from international agencies in Europe. Professor Brewer has an extensive publication record in the field. The grant will help pay for travel costs to collect data.

Michael Collins

English
The Christian Literary Imagination

The project is to pay an expert to create an index for a book whose title is that of the grant application, that Professor Collins is co-editing with another Georgetown person, Michael Scott, who is a senior advisor to President DeGioia. The book is a set of essays from Zoom talks in 2021 and 2022 given by Georgetown and Oxford faculty, in conjunction with Blackfriars Hall and Campion Hall, Oxford. This book is a sequel to the previously published edited book, Christian Shakespeare: Question Mark.

Katharine Olesko

SFS Science, Technology, and International Affairs
The Science and Geopolitics of Data Sharing: Prussian Territorial Data and the Russian Empire in the 19th Century

The research is about the geopolitical and scientific consequences of Prussia’s willingness to share cartographic data with Russia after Napoleon’s defeat in 1815, which elevated Prussia’s status as a scientific power in the region. The grant funds will support research at archives in Berlin that are already identified. The project is intended to be a stand-along publication and to contribute to a book that is 50% completed.

David Painter

History
The Oil Crises and the 1970s and the Making of the Contemporary World

The research is about the significant changes that the oil crises of the 1970s caused in the global economy, such as the collapse of communism, Western dominance in the Global South, and the transformation of the international order. The research is to be presented at a conference on the topic at the University of Calgary that Professor Painter is co-organizing. The grant is to be used to support Professor Painter’s travel to the conference.

Charles Weiss

School of Foreign Service
Proposed Norms for Science and Technology in Global Issues

The research will propose new basic norms of respecting science and guiding technology to be used to define expected behaviors of stakeholders in global issues such as nuclear war, climate change, and pandemics – all areas that require international cooperation. The intended outcome is to apply pressure to government and non-government actors to take account of accepted science and to advance science needed to address critical global problems. The grant will pay for research assistance.