What does ‘the Nexus’ mean? asks a Nature editorial, drawing on the recent paper by the Nexus Network co-ordinator, Rose Cairns, and Anna Krzywoszynska, from the University of Sheffield.
The Nature editorial reflects on Rose and Anna’s arguments around the nexus as a buzzword, and concludes
But the risk is that containing this [nexus] territory, however loosely, constrains it instead — and that the nexus becomes the focus of the analysis, rather than a natural consequence of studying the supporting problems.
Perhaps, like the most distant stars, the nexus is best viewed only with peripheral vision: we can see it’s there, but we shouldn’t focus our gaze directly on it lest its true nature slips from view. And, at the very least, it shows that we should choose our buzzwords with care.
Read the full editorial on the Nature website
Nature Editorial. Scientific buzzwords obscure meaning. Nature 538,140 ().
Doi: 10.1038/538140b
To read the Nexus research paper, go to Environmental Science & Policy website
Rose Cairns and Anna Krzywoszynska. Anatomy of a buzzword: The emergence of ‘the water-energy-food nexus’ in UK natural resource debates. Environmental Science & Policy, Volume 64, October 2016, Pages 164–170. doi:10.1016/j.envsci.2016.07.007
Image credit: with thanks to Javier R. Linera on Flickr.
