Join the annual IHS Urban Research Day on Thursday, 8 October 2026. Held within the framework of UN-Habitat’s Urban October initiative, this year's event focuses on impact-oriented urban research tackling the overlapping crises facing our world. We invite both early-career and senior researchers to submit abstracts that examine how global challenges manifest locally in urban environments and offer meaningful pathways for action.
Thematic focus & background
Our contemporary societies face multiple, interwoven global challenges. In the context of the Anthropocene, the concept of polycrisis has emerged to describe the concurrent and interconnected crises affecting societies worldwide, including climate change, increasing social inequality, uneven demographic structures across the Global North and South, deficiencies in democratic representation and participation, international migration, and the weakening of the welfare state amid increasing privatisation of key services such as education and healthcare (Ellis et al. 2016; Henig and Knight 2023; Byrne, 2024; Charbonneau and Giguère, 2025; Rakowski et al. 2025).
In an increasingly urbanised world, the effects of multiple and interconnected crises are becoming more visible in cities. The global polycrisis takes different forms locally, shaped by the social, economic, political and cultural conditions of urban environments. This raises the need to understand how these crises materialise in cities, and how urban research can provide meaningful insights and approaches to them. The event welcomes academic contributions exploring:
- Urban Resilience & Adaptation: Multi-dimensional approaches to how communities and areas adapt to systemic shock.
- Governance & Equity: Investigating democratic representation, migration, and the impact of welfare state privatisation in cities.
- Innovation & Alternative Recipes: Research identifying meaningful policy interventions and local practices that effectively address global disruptions.
Submission guidelines & selection
We welcome both ongoing and already published research. Abstracts must be 300–500 words and submitted via our online submission form.
Your submission must clearly include:
- Title, author names, affiliations, and keywords.
- A clear conceptual framework and described methodology.
- Main findings (or outlined expectations if the research is in an early stage).
Selection criteria: Submissions will be evaluated on content appropriateness, an impactful mix of academic and project-oriented research, a balance between early-career and senior perspectives, and the author's availability to attend on-site. While conventional presentations are welcome, we highly encourage alternative, interactive communication formats.
Practical information & deadlines
The Urban Research Day is an on-site event kicking off at 13:00 on Thursday, 8 October. It features parallel, topic-specific presentation sessions, a dynamic panel discussion on addressing the global polycrisis, and closes with a network borrel.
For any inquiries regarding the event or submission process, please contact the organising team at ihs@ihs.nl. Coffee, tea, and catering during the closing reception will be provided for all participants.
| Detail | Date & information |
|---|---|
| Abstract submission | 30 July 2026 |
| Notification of acceptance | 30 August 2026 |
| Final programme dissemination | 15 September 2026 |
| Event date & time | Thursday, 8 October 2026, 13:00 – 19:00 (including borrel) |
| Location | Institute for Housing and Urban Development Studies (IHS) Mandeville (T) Building, 14th Floor, Campus Woudestein Erasmus University Rotterdam (EUR) |
- More information
References
- Byrne, D. S. (2024). Scenarios—Using the complexity frame of reference to inform the construction of available futures in the possibility space. Frontiers in Complex Systems, 2. Read the paper
- Charbonneau, B. and Giguère, A. (2025). The polycrisis and the uncertainty possibility space. Global Sustainability, 8(4). Read the paper
- Ellis, E., Maslin, M., Boivin, N., and Bauer, A. (2016). Involve social scientists in defining the Anthropocene. Nature, 540(7632), 192–193. Read the paper
- Henig, D. and Knight, D.M. (2023). Polycrisis: Prompts for an emerging worldview. Anthropology Today, 39: 3-6. Read the paper
- Rakowski, J. J., Schaan, L. N., van Klink, R., Herzon, I., Arth, A., Hagedorn, G., Rode, J., Creutzig, F., Pe'er, G. (2025). Characterizing the Global Polycrisis: A Systematic Review of Recent Literature. Annual Review Environment and Resources. 50:159-183. Read the paper
