The "Fight or Flight" Dilemma: Social Adaptation to Systemic Change

What is the project about?

This year Project Fight or Flight will focus their attention on the region of Lower Saxony in Western Germany and specifically the city of Osnabrück.   

The regions location in the centre of Germany and the heart of Europe landmass leaves it exposed to increasing temperatures and the impacts of climate heating from our warming planet.  An increase in climate temperature is know to have an impact on humans and the nature we depend upon. The Internation Governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) have recognised this with high confidence, meaning that there is a strong consensus among scientists, 8 out of 10 or 80% chance of this occurring. With a high confidence of this occurring, then there is need for us to ACT! Students participating in Project Flight or Fight will study the geographic area, meet local people and look at the issues they face with this changing environment. The team will also work with the local municipality to help them develop a plan to deal with climate change and heat related issues. We will explore the fundamental societal response to accelerating systemic changes, primarily driven by climate change and interconnected global crises (e.g., resource scarcity, migration, public health). The core of the project focuses on the "Fight or Flight" dichotomy in the context of long-term environmental and social stress: 

• The "Flight" Response (Reactive Adaptation): Societies, communities, or individuals choose to react to consequences—e.g., managed retreat from coastal areas, migration, resource hoarding, technological fixes that don't address root causes.
• The "Fight" Response (Proactive Transformation): Societies commit to deep, systemic change—e.g., rapid decarbonization, radical policy shifts, redesigning economic models, building resilient and equitable communities. 

Your Mission: To analyse the drivers that push societies towards one response over the other, and to design interventions that intentionally foster the "Fight" (proactive transformation) response across different sectors in Europe. 

Are you interested in joining our team?  

Project Details: 

Our climate is changing. How we live and where we live will have to change. How will we change? How can we help this change and help our communities to cope with change? Project ‘Fight or Flight’ explores these issues around how we adapt and deal with to climate change. 

What is the project about? 

Europe has experienced extreme weather for centuries however things are changing. Storms are more extreme and more frequent. Rainfall patterns are changing with a greater intensity.  Summers are hotter, for longer.  All these extremes impact humans and the environment in which they live. 

Based around the specific meteorological issues of a warming atmosphere and intense solar heating, which can lead heat waves and record-breaking air temperature, the team will assess the impact on people and their environment.  They will develop a technical understanding of the problem, it’s possible solutions/scenarios and the social challenges we could face. Should society FIGHT or should they FLIGHT?   

These climate challenges, new to the current population of Europe, will have environmental, social and economic dimensions.  We need to debate these dimensions, and specifically our desire to maintain a way of life in these affected areas and the protection of our natural environment for the ecosystem services it provides.   

The challenge for our society is clear. We need to adapt.  The problem is how do we? 

Team Fight or Flight will look at these challenges, explore different possible scenarios and develop solution and decision-making tools. Amongst other things, the project outcomes may include;  
            How to communicate the problem  
            Propose solutions to how we adapt  
            Design decision making tools for change  

The project directly supports the following Sustainable Development Goals while also inherently connected to many others; 

SDG4  Quality Education                      SDG11 Sustainable Cities and Communities 

SDG13 Climate Action                          SDG17  Partnerships for the Goals 

Study areas: 

If you are interested in solutions for the future, want to help understand how society changes, why it changes and how we can influence change then this may be the project for you. While students may have a specific study area, we aim to build a team that has one or more of the following elements.  Environmental sciences who understand the mechanisms causing change on our   environment. Social sciences where participants recognise the impact slow or sudden changes have on society and our inherent response to these.  Business and finance where decisions were once based on economic models, now we must think about other factors such as people and the natural world and the future! Alternatively, you might bring other skills essential to the task; communications, marketing or politics. 

 
Our Project Team 

For our project to be successful our project team will need the following skills; 

•  Good communicators who want to meet local people, talk about local issues and help understand their challenges.
•  A range of environmental knowledge, some experts but also some new to the topic who are keen to learn
• Technical, creative thinkers who want to explore solutions and novel ideas that help transform society for a better future
• Media and marketing experts who want to develop communication tools that help us explain our challenges and understand how they can help solve them 

If this sounds like you, then please apply! 

If you have any questions about the project, please contact