Topics for Bachelor and Master Thesis:

1. Proposed Title of the Thesis: Who influences the IPCC reports? An analysis of the comments on the IPCC AR 6 Report

2. Brief Description of the Research Question:

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is one of the most prominent science policy interfaces, synthesising the state of scientific knowledge on climate change for policy makers at all governmental levels since 1990. In April 2022, with the adoption of the working group three report, the publication of the sixth assessment report (AR 6) will be completed. Around 1000 scientists have prepared the more than 10 000 pages of report describing the physical science basis, the impacts and adaptation possibilities and mitigation options of climate change.

Being an intergovernmental panel, the IPCC does not only provide knowledge for policy makers but provides a platform for the exchange of views. For its latest report, it received more than 100 000 comments by civil society organisations, individual scientists as well as governments which need to be individually addressed by the IPCC scientists. Despite the comments being publicly available, research is missing on the content of the comments as well as who exactly provides these comments. This is surprising as it is highly relevant to understand who comments with what kind of purpose the likely most authoritative information base on climate change world wide. With support from a doctoral student analysing the IPCC, it is the plan for this masters thesis to fill this research gap and analyse the comments provided to the IPCC.

Supervision by Junior-Professor Biber-Freudenberger and/or Professor Thomas Dietz. Interested candidates should contact Niklas Wagner (wagner(at)uni-bonn.de)