The global multi-hub conference: Inclusion, sustainability, and academic politics
Single-location international academic conferences are neither inclusive nor sustainable. The per-capita emissions are comparable with the global-average annual personal carbon footprint. Colleagues who cannot afford travel, accommodation, and registration are excluded. A multi-hub conference is ope...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Elsevier
2025-12-01
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| Series: | Sustainable Futures |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666188825004800 |
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| Summary: | Single-location international academic conferences are neither inclusive nor sustainable. The per-capita emissions are comparable with the global-average annual personal carbon footprint. Colleagues who cannot afford travel, accommodation, and registration are excluded. A multi-hub conference is open to colleagues from almost anywhere while at the same time enabling deep cuts in emissions and maintaining constant face-to-face contact within hubs. To achieve that, existing regional conferences on different continents can be held simultaneously and electronically linked. All hubs can be treated equally. Real-time interaction can be maximized by locating three hubs exactly eight hours apart (e.g., London, Tokyo, Los Angeles) with other hubs in nearby time-zones, and limiting the working day at each hub to three successive four-hour slots (morning, siesta, evening). With a hub on each inhabited continent, the conference becomes globally inclusive; for many academic subdisciplines, the optimal number of hubs may be seven (two in Asia). The necessary equipment is available in most university teaching rooms: laptop with inbuilt camera and microphone, videoconferencing software, data projector, loudspeaker. Multi-hub conferences are consistent with the no-harm principle: research should not harm people, animals, or the environment. This paper offers conference organizers useful background information on the logistics of multi-hub conference organization, the ethics of academic conferencing, and the politics of radical change in democratic committees. |
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| ISSN: | 2666-1888 |