The research we do at the School is inherently transdisciplinary. Our approach is to build diverse networks of knowledge and expertise – both within and beyond the university – to identify urgent research questions and support the collaborative work of addressing them.
Research Clusters
How do we assess, interpret, and address the drivers and outcomes of ecological and climatic change, and why are these changes happening? Scholars in this cluster consider questions of climate change science, governance, policy, and communication, of ecological activity and adaptation, of biodiversity and conservation, and of social change leading to and emerging from environmental change and ecological protection—and consider how these trajectories might be altered.
How do environmental systems and change shape individual and collective health, physical and mental well-being, and opportunities for a multitude of species to thrive? This cluster encompasses work on biophysical, psycho-social, and community health, on eco-anxiety and psychological resilience, on designing spaces for well-being, and on the nature and effects of contaminants and pollutants—and asks what is needed for multiple lives to thrive on a changing planet.
How do systems of extraction, production, and consumption intersect with social, ecological, and biophysical systems? In this cluster, scholars consider the material foundations of culture and society, including the politics and consequences of energy generation and transitions across fossil fuel and renewable energy systems, along with questions of food security and sovereignty, land use change, the commodification of the environment, livelihoods, energy use patterns and efficiency, and social and economic arrangements of exchange—and envision what systems might enable more just and inclusive societies and economies.
How are human-developed spaces and objects—from buildings and household materials to neighbourhoods and infrastructure—affecting, and shaped by, the environment, and with what consequences for people and the planet? This cluster involves scholars who work on road dust and chemicals in tires and mattresses, on lighting in homes and workplaces, on the downstream and downwind consequences of industrial activity, and on the social connections and innovation in neighbourhoods that arise in response to inequalities in environmental conditions—and asks questions about how we design built environments that support and promote environmental and social sustainability and human well-being.
How do we understand “the environment” and human relationships with the rest of the world? From the relationships between Indigenous and Western science to faith-based value systems to questions of ontological agency in sustainability, and hope and despair in times of change, scholars in this cluster examine how different knowledge systems, beliefs, and understandings of the world shape our ecological and social relationships—and imagine how expanding or sharing across worldviews might illuminate pathways to more sustainable futures.
Collaborative Research Networks
Community of Practice (CoP) brings UT faculty and doctoral students together from different programs, faculties and campuses to discuss and critically analyze the what and the how of teaching sustainability. Comparing and critiquing the development of pedagogy, course curriculum, program design and co-curricular learning opportunities will help to identify promising practices towards transformative and intersectional approaches to sustainability teaching across the university.
By working collaboratively, this CoP offers faculty members opportunities to explore transformative pedagogies to engage their students in cognitive, affective, and embodied forms of learning. Key to this is centering Indigenous worldviews and ‘Land as first teacher’ in sustainability teaching; when combined with transdisciplinary, equity-focused, and place-based education, transformative pedagogy provides learning that is relational, community-engaged, justice-forward, and action-oriented.
The 2024 - 2025 Organizing Team includes Michael Classens, Hilary Inwood, Sarah Urquhart.
The Earth Commission is an international team of social and natural scientists engaging over 60 researchers around the globe, coordinated by its scientific secretariat hosted by Future Earth – the globe’s largest network of sustainability scientists. Miriam Diamond serves as an Earth Commissioner.
The Earth Commission is the scientific cornerstone of the Global Commons Alliance, a growing coalition of scientists, philanthropists, civil society groups, businesses, and innovators, enabling collective action to safeguard the global commons.
The Environmental Governance Lab (EGL), co-directed by Teresa Kramarz, Matthew Hoffmann, and Steven Bernstein, is a home for research, a node in global networks on environmental governance and transformative policy, and a platform for knowledge exchange with practitioners, policy makers, and the public. The EGL is housed at the Department of Political Science and the School of the Environment. It is also a Research Centre of Earth System Governance Project — a global research alliance that is the largest social science research network in the area of governance and global environmental change.
The Institute for Environment, Culture and Society (IECS), at the University of Toronto Scarborough (UTSC), supports research on the environment and climate change in the arts, humanities, and social sciences. The Institute focuses on the social, historical, political, and cultural dimensions of the environment and climate change, which are essential to understanding and confronting the systems and practices that produce climate change and to examining the uneven social and ecological consequences that this change generates.
Through its various initiatives, the IECS aims to equip University of Toronto researchers and students with methodologies and resources to more effectively understand and investigate the values, meanings, histories, and relationships that have produced climate breakdown, and to contribute to the development of practices that enable individuals and communities to flourish under the real pressures of climate disruption.
The Institute is interdisciplinary in scope, bringing together researchers from across the arts, humanities, and social sciences to address shared questions about the environment and climate change. While based at UTSC, it aspires to be a tri-campus initiative, involving researchers and students from across the University of Toronto’s three campuses in collaborative research.
The Oxford-Penn-Toronto International Doctoral Cluster (OPT-IDC) in the Environmental Humanities and Climate Justice is a research partnership comprised of graduate students, emerging scholars, and faculty from all three institutions with the shared goal of fostering scholarly community and knowledge exchange. Our interdisciplinary research in the Environmental Humanities seeks to understand and explain the cultural, social, and historical contexts of environmental change and crisis. It attends to the histories and practices that have traditionally divorced culture from nature, and queries how environmental issues are imbricated with multiple cultural settings. Working with our colleagues in U of T's Critical Zones initiative (JHI), at Oxford University (TORCH - The Oxford Research Centre in the Humanities), and at the University of Pennsylvania (PPEH - Penn Program in Environmental Humanities), we host engaging networking opportunities, lecture and seminar events, and provide travel bursaries in support of international research mobility for graduate students working on Environmental Humanities topics in UofT humanities divisions across the tri-campus. The University of Toronto Lead is Sherry Lee.
The Toronto Climate Observatory (TCO), led by Robert Soden is an emerging interdisciplinary initiative hosted at the University of Toronto. Our mission is to reimagine how communities around the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) understand and adapt to the impacts of climate change, and support place-based, plural, and just climate action. Through partnerships with scholars, the government and civil society, we are working to develop the next generation of climate informatics. We draw inspiration and methods from climate modeling, human centered design, Science and Technology Studies (STS), Indigenous scholarship, oral history, citizen science, and art/science collaboration. Though our focus in the Toronto area, our work spans many geographies and seeks to bring those lessons home wherever possible.
The Technoscience Research Unit (TRU), co-led by M Murphy (Red River Métis) and Kristen Bos (Red River Métis), supports critical and creative justice-oriented research related to science, technology, and environmental studies, with an emphasis on Indigenous, anti-colonial, and feminist approaches. The TRU includes both academic and community researchers and is a welcoming place for Indigenous, BIPOC, 2SLGBTQ+ researchers at all levels. It is home to the Indigenous Environmental Data Justice Lab, that focuses on community-based research about Canada’s Chemical Valley, building tools and creating policy relevant work to support community efforts, including the online Land and Refinery project co-led by Vanessa Gray. The TRU hosts the Indigenous Science, Technology, and Environment Studies Hub which supports researchers across the university’s faculties and campuses and seeks to grown this important field that centers Indigenous methods and values. The TRU is a key participant in the Acceleration Consortium CFREF project, leading the social science lab that focuses on Indigenous and ethical approaches to automated and sustainable substance discovery. Since 2008, the TRU organizes Technoscience Salon, a public forum dedicated to mixing disciplines and practices for bringing together intellectual and political questions about technoscience. The current focus of the Salon seeks to re-imagine what is a chemical. The TRU is part of the international Indigelabs Network.