Doing conferences differently: A decentralised multi-hub approach for ecological and social sustainability

Conferences are invaluable for career progression, offering unique opportunities for networking, collaboration, and learning. However, there are challenges associated with the traditional in-person conference format. For example, there is a significant ecological impact from attendees’ travel behaviour, and there are social inequities in conference attendance, with historically marginalised groups commonly facing barriers to participation. Innovative practices that enable academic conferences to be ‘done differently’ are crucial for addressing these ecological and social sustainability challenges. However, while some such practices have emerged in recent years, largely due to the COVID-19 pandemic, little research has been done on their effectiveness. Our study addresses this gap using a mixed methods approach to analyse a real-world decentralised multi-hub conference held in 2023, comparing it to traditional in-person conference and fully online conference scenarios. The decentralised multi-hub format consists of local in-person hubs in different locations around the world, each with a unique local programme developed around a shared core global programme; there is no single centralised point of control. We calculated the CO2 emissions from transport for each scenario and found the decentralised multi-hub conference had significantly lower emissions than a traditional in-person conference, but higher emissions than a fully online conference. We also interviewed 14 local hub organisers and attendees to gain their perspectives about the ecological and social sustainability benefits of the decentralised multi-hub format. We found that the more accessible and inclusive format attracted a more diverse range of attendees, meaning that the benefits attributed to conference attendance were able to be shared more equitably. These findings demonstrate the ecological and social sustainability benefits of doing conferences differently, and can be used as further evidence in the argument to help transition conferences to a more desirable state in terms of ecological and social sustainability.Author summary: Conferences are very important for career progression but at the same time they create negative ecological and social impact. For example, flying to a traditional in-person conference causes high carbon emissions which negatively impact the environment. Socially, there are many people who are unable to attend conferences because they do not have funding, are disabled, or have children/parents to care for (among other reasons) and this affects their career. We need to do things differently to both minimise the ecological impacts and be more inclusive to allow more people to gain the benefits of attending. In this study we looked at a decentralised multi-hub conference format which allowed people to gather in groups in different places around the world to share the same core programme, instead of all travelling to a single place. We found the carbon emissions were approximately 2 percent of a traditional in-person conference, and it was more inclusive because 50–85 percent of people would not have been able to attend an in-person conference in a central location.