People, Poverty and Environmental Change

Course content

The world is experiencing rapid and unprecedented changes, including the depletion of environmental resources. This has profound adverse effects on people and communities who rely on these resources for their livelihoods. An open question is also whether poverty drives environmental degradation or whether the causality predominantly runs in the opposite direction. Balancing environmental and social concerns and achieving sustainability is an analytical and practical challenge.

In this course, we focus on poverty and environmental change. We explore key concepts and perspectives from social science disciplines focusing on livelihood strategies and how they change over time. The course is research-based and develops students’ quantitative and qualitative skills through working with original research data. We use cases to highlight the relationship between environmental resources, institutional arrangements, poverty and wellbeing. And we discuss how external factors such as climate change, market forces, and state legislation affect local resource control and access and how that affects rural livelihoods.

A vital component of the course is its focus on both quantitative and qualitative tools for understanding and analyzing rural livelihoods. This provides students with a solid foundation for critically assessing and reflecting on academic representations of livelihoods and linking local issues to broader developmental processes. Through this work, we aim to provide students essential skills for conducting thesis work involving fieldwork in the Global South.

Education

MSc Programme in Environment and Development
MSc Programme in Global Environment and Development
MSc Programme in Global Forestry
 

Learning outcome

The course aims to provide participants with a thorough understanding of the connection between poverty and environmental change as it materializes through people's livelihood activities and enable students to critically reflect on methodological and analytical strategies for exploring this nexus.

After completing the course, students should be able to:

Knowledge:

Discuss strengths and weaknesses of different livelihoods approaches

Discuss the spatio-temporal variations of livelihoods

Discuss the relationship between local institutions and livelihood outcomes

Discuss how economic, environmental, and political processes affect rural livelihoods

 

Skills:

Analyse quantitative and qualitative household-level data

Critically assess approaches to livelihood data collection and analysis

Develop methodologies for livelihood analysis

Cooperate with peers to integrate different disciplinary approaches to livelihoods analysis

 

Competences:

Towards the end of the course, students should be able to critically reflect on and discuss outcomes and processes of rural livelihoods and different methodological and analytical strategies for understanding these.

Blended learning combining e-learning and classroom activities. E-learning is centered on online asynchronous discussions in small groups. Students are asked to (i) read the mandatory literature; (ii) participate in online asynchronous discussions on a particular topic of relevance for the week’s theme (see themes above); and (iii) meet up in class to discuss the reading material and solve livelihoods problems (based on quantitative and qualitative case study data).

The course curriculum consists of state-of-the-art book chapters and journal articles that are made available during the course.

Academic qualifications equivalent to a BSc degree is recommended. A core principle of the course is a curiosity in different intersecting approaches in understanding sustainability challenges. This curiosity is also expected from the students.

The course is identical to the discontinued courses, NIFK20007U Livelihoods and Environmental Change, LNAK10083U Rural Livelihoods and Natural Resources Governance and NIFK18002U Interdisciplinary Approaches to Rural Livelihoods. Therefore you cannot register for this course, if you have already passed NIFK20007U Livelihoods and Environmental Change, LNAK10083U Rural Livelihoods and Natural Resources Governance or NIFK18002U Interdisciplinary Approaches to Rural Livelihoods.

If you are registered with examination attempts in NIFK20007U Livelihoods and Environmental Change, LNAK10083U Rural Livelihoods and Natural Resources Governance or NIFK18002U Interdisciplinary Approaches to Rural Livelihoods without having passed the course, you have to use your last examination attempts to pass the exam in this course. You have a total of three examination attempts.

Written
Oral
Individual
Collective
Continuous feedback during the course of the semester
Feedback by final exam (In addition to the grade)
Peer feedback (Students give each other feedback)

Lecturer’s written feedback on online discussions, peer feedback on online discussions, lecturer’s written feedback on written assignments, lecturer’s oral feedback during in-class empirical exercises.

ECTS
7,5 ECTS
Type of assessment
Written assignment, made during the block
Type of assessment details
An individual essay of 2000 words in which students analyse a case-based problem using a combination of qualitative and quantitative insights and discuss the results using scientific literature.
Aid
All aids allowed
Marking scale
7-point grading scale
Censorship form
No external censorship
one internal examiner
Re-exam

Re-examination will be a 2000-word essay. Students will get 24 hours to write the essay.

Criteria for exam assessment

See description of 'Learning outcome'

Single subject courses (day)

  • Category
  • Hours
  • Lectures
  • 12
  • Class Instruction
  • 24
  • Preparation
  • 100
  • Practical exercises
  • 16
  • E-Learning
  • 24
  • Exam
  • 30
  • English
  • 206

Kursusinformation

Language
English
Course number
NIFK23005U
ECTS
7,5 ECTS
Programme level
Full Degree Master
Duration

1 block

Placement
Block 2
Schedulegroup
A
Capacity
40
The number of places might be reduced if you register in the late-registration period (BSc and MSc) or as a credit or single subject student.
Studyboard
Study Board of Natural Resources, Environment and Animal Science
Contracting department
  • Department of Food and Resource Economics
Contracting faculty
  • Faculty of Science
Course Coordinator
  • Martin Reinhardt Nielsen   (4-7e837f7a517a7783803f7c863f757c)
Teacher

Martin Reinhardt Nielsen

Saved on the 19-02-2024

Are you BA- or KA-student?

Are you bachelor- or kandidat-student, then find the course in the course catalog for students:

Courseinformation of students