What are Nature-based Solutions for Flood Governance in France and the US?

Speaker: Joana Guerrin, Fulbright Visiting Scholar, UC Berkeley

Sponsor(s): Center of Excellence in French and Francophone Studies, The French Embassy in the United States

The concept of Nature-based Solutions (NbS) has increasingly developed in the conservation and climate policy arenas for the past 10 years at the international level. Promoted organizations such as the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) or The Nature Conservancy (TNC), this concept has also been institutionnalizing at national/federal levels in France and the US in flood policies. This research, realized in collaboration between researchers in France and UC Berkeley, attempts to analyze the genealogy of the concept at the international level, its role within global climate and environmental policy, and how it has been unfolding at national and local levels in France and the US. This talk proposes preliminary results and reflections from this on-going multi-sites research program.

Joana Guerrin is a Fulbright Visiting Scholar in UC Berkeley within the College of Environmental Design and. As a researcher in Political Science at the French National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food and the Environment (INRAE), Joana has been researching water-related risks policies on the environmental turn of flood policies in France and in Europe, drought governance in Sao Paulo (Brazil) or public participation in river restoration projects. At UC Berkeley, Joana is collaborating with Matt Kondolf (CED) and Anna Serra Llobet (CCRM) on the project ‘Nature-based Solutions from Theory to Practice: comparing France and the US’ (2021-2023), funded by the Program Post AgreenSkills Fund (PAF).