Convergence

The Global ARC’s convergences “connect the dots” by bringing together diverse community-based organizations and engaged researchers.

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Convergences bring people together who share common cause (e.g., the desire to create healthy communities where our basic needs for water, food, energy, and transportation are met in sustainable ways).  Convergences build common ground and actionable vision in light of larger regional and global forces/flows within which we all work.

Convergence refers to a coming together of otherwise distinct entities, efforts or processes. The act of coming together (convergence) is transformative; it changes the makeup of participating elements as these elements join forces in mutually reinforcing ways. Convergence creates new powers of connectivity, learning and integration vital to problem solving and scaling up sustainability solutions.

*Photo: This photo was taken March 6, 2009, during a full day UCSD-TV Documentary Brainstorm Session. The meeting generated ideas for a script focused on bridging science and society in support of vulnerable communities along the U.S.-Mexico border. This convergence brought community leaders together with environmental health scientists, urban and regional planners, information and communications technology specialists, visual artists and climate change scientists. The UCSD-TV documenary that came out of this process is part of a larger ongoing project focused on human settlements and planning for ecological sustainability in a binational watershed. This project is written up in the Global ARC’s database