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Over the last several years research has examined anew the potential for climate change to induce political conflict and potentiate social unrest. Several explanations for the relationship between weather and social unrest have been proposed, including the idea that temperature, acting through a physiological response mechanism, gives rise to collective aggression. This proposition first appeared in the aftermath of the 1960s US riots, which occurred primarily in the heat of summer, and has re-emerged within the contemporary literature on conflict and climate, in addition to explanations rooted in political economic processes. Building on both bodies of work, this article utilizes a case-crossover time-series design to explore the relationship between meteorological factors derived from high resolution spatial data of temperature and precipitation and social disturbances occurring in 50 major cities in Africa and Asia between 1960 and 2006. Poisson regression and generalized additive modeling are utilized to model linear and non-linear effects, respectively. A significant, but qualified, association between heat and urban social disturbances is found. The general relationship is non-linear, with peak levels of unrest occurring in the upper 20s (°C). The relationship between temperature and social unrest within individual cities is linear. In addition, there are differential effects of heat on lethal versus non-lethal episodes of unrest. The non-linear response to temperature is much more pronounced among lethal events than it is among non-lethal episodes. The conclusion taken from this research is that heat is associated with urban social conflict, but generally does not trigger episodes and instead acts to supplement aggression while other factors govern the primary timing of social unrest.

Sustainability certification systems play both an agenda-setting and practical role for a variety of architecture, planning, and engineering project types. The evolution of existing systems and the creation of new certification systems to address a broader set of social sustainability topics provide a unique opportunity to explore the different ways the industry is thinking about and applying social equity ideas to varied projects. We explore this diversity by conducting a content analysis of the guidance documents from eight sustainability certification systems to better understand how social equity is defined, the context in which the concept is applied, and how systems value the idea. The manner and degree to which systems engage with recognitional, procedural, and distributional aspects of social equity varies. Consequently, there is no guarantee that certification leads to real-world equitable outcomes. Moreover, sustainability professionals seeking to use certification systems to address unequal social impacts or benefits still need to bring a clear set of goals regarding equity of what and for whom, as well as ideas of how to measure and evaluate the distribution of social costs/benefits in order to put social equity into practice.

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