Programme

Join us on this transformative intellectual journey!

Contemporary climate policy debates in the West, despite ideological differences, frequently converge on a shared premise: that ecological crisis can be resolved primarily through technological innovation. High-tech solutions are often presented as politically feasible and economically attractive, yet their deployment depends on large-scale extraction of transition minerals, generating profound ecological and social consequences.

The 2026 edition of the CLS Summer School engages with this tension by exploring the concept of the ancestral future — a perspective associated with Ailton Krenak’s critique of modernist notions of progress. This approach invites a re-examination of sustainability beyond purely technological frameworks and raises the possibility that addressing environmental breakdown may require shifts in underlying worldviews rather than additional layers of innovation.

Instead of treating climate change exclusively as a technical problem, the course situates it within broader ecological, legal, economic, and cultural contexts. Participants are encouraged to critically analyse dominant assumptions about development, progress, and sustainability, while engaging with both the promises and contradictions of contemporary climate strategies.

Course Focus

This ten-day interdisciplinary programme introduces participants to both the opportunities and limitations of modern green technologies — from smart grids and large-scale heat pumps to AI-based tools — while examining the material infrastructures required to build and sustain them.

Particular emphasis is placed on the ecological, legal, economic, and geopolitical implications of transition mineral extraction. Participants will analyse contemporary cases of extraction on Indigenous lands, explore environmental justice dimensions of resource governance, and examine governance dilemmas surrounding deep-sea mining and the fragmentation of global supply chains.

Participants will explore:

• the role and limitations of technological climate solutions
• ecological and geopolitical implications of transition mineral extraction
• environmental justice dimensions of resource governance
• legal frameworks governing international commons and Indigenous rights
• governance challenges associated with deep-sea mining
• alternative sustainability practices grounded in relational and community-based model.

The course places particular emphasis on the often overlooked relationship between climate mitigation technologies and the extractive systems that underpin them.

Conceptual Perspective

Alongside the analysis of mainstream policy and technology debates, the programme engages with Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK) and the concept of quiet sustainability — everyday practices such as community self-provisioning, gardening, foraging, repair cultures, and communal kitchens.

These practices, while rarely framed as environmental strategies, generate significant ecological benefits without being driven by environmental rhetoric. They offer valuable insights into alternative ways of organising economic and social life and provide important reference points for designing more grounded, relational, and context-sensitive public policies.

Through this perspective, participants will explore how principles underlying Indigenous and Global East sustainability traditions can inform more just and ecologically coherent climate governance.

Learning Outcomes

By the end of the programme, participants will be able to:

• compare competing conceptualisations of sustainability, including modernist, Indigenous, and Global East perspectives
• explain key climate justice debates, particularly those related to extractivism, Indigenous rights, and international commons
• analyse legal obligations concerning land rights, international commons, and cultural protection in the context of climate change
• evaluate governance dilemmas associated with critical mineral extraction and deep-sea mining
• critically reflect on normative assumptions about technology, progress, and development
• strengthen interdisciplinary reasoning, integrating insights from law, anthropology, political ecology, economics, and environmental humanities
• identify and assess “quiet sustainability” strategies and relate them to contemporary policy design
• develop alternative policy approaches informed by relational and ancestral sustainability traditions
  and more through ten days of intensive engagement with an international and interdisciplinary group of students and practitioners.

Programme Structure

The summer school combines thematic academic seminars, moderated discussions, and practical, skill-based workshops.

Core thematic areas include:

Climate Technologies and Transition Pathways
Examination of contemporary technological approaches to climate mitigation and adaptation, including their systemic and material constraints.

Mineral Extraction and Ecological Limits
Analysis of the environmental and socio-economic consequences of transition mineral extraction on land, including regional case studies and global supply chain dynamics.

Deep-Sea Mining and Global Commons
Exploration of emerging governance conflicts, ecological risks, and regulatory challenges associated with seabed resource extraction.

Climate Justice and Resource Governance
Consideration of distributional impacts, environmental justice claims, and geopolitical tensions arising from the green transition.

Legal Dimensions of Environmental Protection
Study of state obligations regarding the protection of international commons, cultural rights, and the self-determination of Indigenous communities.

Traditional Ecological Knowledge and Quiet Sustainability
Engagement with alternative knowledge systems and everyday sustainability practices, supported by interactive workshops.

As in previous years, the programme is built around two main types of activities:

• academic seminars
• skill-based workshops

The provisional programme of 2026 edition will soon appear here.  

Please note that the programme is not finalised and may be subject to change.

Do not forget that besides the lectures, there is also a non-academic dimension of this summer school: you are invited to participate in various trips and sports, to use the wellness equipment of the chalet (sauna, whirlpool), and to enjoy the free evenings, getting to know your fellow students and the lecturers.