Soviet Climate Change Science

Soviet Climate Change Science explores the character and range of Soviet contributions to the emerging understanding of large-scale anthropogenic climate change during the post-1945 period. More specifically, it examines the role of Soviet scientists in helping to shape the debate, both domestically and on the international stage, and with a particular focus on the period 1960s to the 1980s.

The book details the institutional underpinnings of Soviet activity in this area, the main scientific debates evident within key centres of climate-related science and the activities of Soviet scientists with respect to a range of international collaborations such as the 1972 US-USSR Agreement on Cooperation in the Field of Environmental Protection, the early work of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the Greenhouse Glasnost initiative, which included the world’s first teleconference on climate change. It concludes with a reflection on the extent to which Soviet scientific legacies continued to shape Russian approaches to climate change post-1991.

This book will be of interest to those working on the historical and sociocultural aspects of climate change, providing the first detailed assessment of Soviet involvement in this critical area of scientific activity.