Joshua Kirshner is a senior lecturer (associate professor) in human geography. His research interests converge around the geographies of low-carbon transition and resulting urban and environmental change. He has studied these questions in various sectors, working at international levels and with colleagues in several countries across the world. Previously, he held posts at Durham University (UK), and Rhodes University and University of Johannesburg, in South Africa.

Josh was Co-investigator in the UKRI-funded project, Community Energy and the Sustainable Energy Transition in Ethiopia, Malawi and Mozambique - CESET. He was PI in Electricity grid access histories and futures in Mozambique, a project funded by UK Aid and co-led with Teesside University. His current research focuses on several themes:

• The geographies of just and inclusive energy transition, including the integration of community-based energy and gender equity, participatory co-design of off-grid systems, the role of renewables in reducing energy poverty, place-based adaptations to the built environment, and the engagement of (re)emerging development donors in green technology sectors
• The legacies, persistence and lived experiences surrounding carbon-intensive resource extraction, with a focus on interconnections between resource extraction frontiers and new urban configurations, planning practices, large infrastructure projects and environmental politics
• Contested relationships between the global agenda for sustainability transitions and local environment and wellbeing
• Historical geographies of infrastructure, migration and social integration, and urban climate adaptation, human-wildlife interactions in cities

Josh’s research and teaching have spanned several regions, including Southern and West Africa, Latin America and North America, and combine critical theory with participatory methods for social learning and change. His work has drawn attention to development policy and planning practices in rapidly growing, resource-rich, yet overlooked regions in places as diverse as Tete, in central Mozambique; Santa Cruz, in the Bolivian lowlands; and Alagoas, northeast Brazil. Most of his research has been supported through competitive grants, financed e.g. by UK Research & Innovation, Global Challenges Research Fund, British Academy and the Fulbright Commission.

Josh is author of more than 30 scientific papers published in leading international journals such as Environment and Planning A, Geoforum, Climate Policy and Nature Energy. He serves on the Editorial Boards of Energy Research & Social Science (Impact Factor = 8.5) and Revista de Estudios Urbanos y Territoriales. He has a PhD from Cornell University in City and Regional Planning, an MA from University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) in Urban Planning, and a BA (magna cum laude) from Harvard University in Social Anthropology.

Projects

Recently funded research has included:

I am a Co-investigator in ‘Community Energy Systems and the Sustainable Energy Transition in Ethiopia, Malawi and Mozambique (CESET),’ a UKRI-GCRF project (2021-2024), led by Vanesa Castán Broto (Sheffield), which explores the potential of community energy to support inclusive and clean energy transitions. The project focuses on diversity of community energy models and explores the notion of community through the lens of intersectionality.

I was PI for the project ‘A Political-Economic Analysis of Electricity Grid Access Histories and Futures in Mozambique’ (2019-2021), co-led with Teesside University and supported by DfID/FCDO. Working with local partners, the research demonstrated how energy access in Mozambique is shaped by the country’s pre-independence and post-colonial histories. 

I was a Co-I in ‘Integrating Ecological and Cultural Histories to Inform Sustainable and Equitable Futures for the Colombian Páramos,’ a NERC, AHRC and Colombia Bio programme project (2018-2021), with collaborators from Universidad de Los Andes, Humboldt Institute and the Nature Conservancy (all Colombia), Cambridge University (UK) and University of Florida (US).

Previously, I was Co-I in ‘Sustainable Energy Access in Mozambique: Socio-political factors in conflict-laden urban areas,’ in collaboration with Vanesa Castán Broto (PI, Sheffield) and Idalina Baptista (Co-I, Oxford) and funded by the British Academy/GCRF Sustainable Development Programme (2016-2018). I led the project’s work package 2, “Political Economy of the Energy Sector,” which examined how conflict around resource investments has created instability in Mozambique’s insertion in global trade circuits.

I was Co-I in STRIPES (‘Social Transformative Research Informing Processes of Environmental Science’), a British Academy-funded Knowledge Frontiers project that examined knowledge production, innovation and the socio-environmental implications of advanced bioethanol generation in Alagoas, in northeast Brazil, using enzymes. The project included an interdisciplinary team spanning the social and natural sciences, with collaborators at University of São Paulo.

I have also contributed to developing a partnership between academics at York and University of Ghana to study the management of small-scale and artisenal mining, exploring its socio-environmental impacts in the past, present and future.

Impact and Engagement

I have contributed to the CESET project’s Regional Energy Learning Alliance, which fosters knowledge exchange and capacity building to support community energy in the region. This has included hosting a conference on territorial strategies for delivering off-grid energy, preparing briefing papers, and hosting a webinar series. We are also setting up a Community Energy Lab in Maputo with community members, researchers, local authorities, and the social enterprise SCENE to co-design/produce a micro-grid for sustainable energy supply that meets the needs of those using it. It will serve as a demonstration site to explore and test what works for off-grid energy services in peri-urban communities. This includes needs assessment and evaluation.

Previously, I convened a two-day workshop, ‘Learning from Cyclone Idai: Response, Recovery and Future Risk’ held in York to explore post-disaster recovery in coastal southern and East Africa, with participants from the national electricity provider and municipal governments in Mozambique, along with researchers from University of York.

I contributed to staging a public exhibit, ‘Living with the Network: Experiences of energy access in Maputo,’ for British Academy’s Summer Showcase in London in 2019. We depicted everyday domestic practices with energy, using an installation with objects and soundscape.

I consulted on the filmmaker Sean Lovell’s short animation on charcoal and cooking, ‘Life of a Cookstove,’ and another short film on off-grid energy in Malawi, ‘Community Energy in Malawi: On the Ground Experiences.’