- Environmental Sustainability, Anthropology, Geography, Urban Planning, Critical Development Studies, Critical Theory, and 24 moreGreen Energy, Anarchist Studies, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Development Studies, Latin American Studies, Critical Agrarian Studies, Neoliberalism, Development, Neoliberal Conservation, Environmental Anthropology, Social Theory, Political Ecology, Critical Geography, Anarchism, Mexico, Media Studies, Energy Policy, Environmental Studies, Social Anthropology, Space and Place, Decolonial Thought, Decolonization, Modernity/coloniality/decoloniality, and Food Sovereigntyedit
- Alexander Dunlap, currently a research fellow at the Institute for Global Sustainability, Boston University, & holdin... moreAlexander Dunlap, currently a research fellow at the Institute for Global Sustainability, Boston University, & holding a Docentship in the Global Development Studies Department, University of Helsinki, works across anthropology, geography and political ecology. Their work critically examines police-military transformations, market-based conservation, wind energy development and extractive projects more generally in both Latin America, Europe and the United States. Dunlap is also currently the European editor of Human Geography.edit
Presented below is a guide, or table of contents, that seeks to resist this fall into the academic abyss or irrelevance by offering a guide to contextualize themes, concepts and the general focus within the academic work developed by... more
Presented below is a guide, or table of contents, that seeks to resist this fall into the academic abyss or irrelevance by offering a guide to contextualize themes, concepts and the general focus within the academic work developed by Alexander Dunlap. This guide emerged spontaneously in an attempt to offer a 'platter' or overview of their work to a co-host of a beloved radio station, allowing them to navigate, pick, choose and taste the wide range of articles and themes. This guide is now presented beyond this radio show co-host, which allows new or old readers to find the works that interest them, drawing connections to various or lost themes. Overall, the idea is to assist people in locating articles and books by Alexander Dunlap that could support their own projects-whether academic, artistic or subversive as they mutually reinforce each other. Let this themed guide be a useful tool, allowing greater ease of access to these works, to discourage plagiarism and promote the greater uptake and engagement with these works.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Political Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, and 15 morePolitical Geography and Geopolitics, Economic Geography, Anthropology, Development Studies, Renewable Energy, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Energy and Environment, Environmental Sustainability, Cultural Anthropology, Political Ecology (Anthropology), and Antropología
The POLLEN 2024 Conference is organized to support the development of a special issue on The Pluriverse of Transitions in Human Geography. The proposed panels for POLLEN 2024 will be a site of greeting, congregation, and exchanging... more
The POLLEN 2024 Conference is organized to support the development of a special issue on The Pluriverse of Transitions in Human Geography. The proposed panels for POLLEN 2024 will be a site of greeting, congregation, and exchanging editorial feedback collectively before submitting to the special issue. Upon acceptance into the panels (decision by December 2, 2023), this means complete manuscripts drafts should be submitted to us by no later than May 15th, 2024. This allows time for each other, or select people, to read each other's papers before the conference.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, Cultural Geography, and 13 moreAfrican Studies, Latin American Studies, Anthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, Political Ecology, Political Anthropology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Political Science, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Decolonial Thought, Feminist Political Ecology, and Postdevelopment Theory
Panel description All over the globe, initiatives to mitigate climate change, including projects to promote a 'green' energy transition and the drastic increase of the protected area network, are accelerating. This process can be... more
Panel description All over the globe, initiatives to mitigate climate change, including projects to promote a 'green' energy transition and the drastic increase of the protected area network, are accelerating. This process can be described as a rapid expansion of the 'green extractivist' frontier. It includes (1) the arrival of large-scale wind, solar, title wave, ecotourism, agricultural or hydrological dam projects, which leads to new enclosures and forms of displacement and dispossession; and (2) the onset of new mining projects justified in the name of low-carbon infrastructures or green militarization (e.g., to produce equipment used for enforcing conservation), often focusing on the extraction of cobalt, iron ore, lithium, zinc, silver and rare earth minerals (Dunlap, 2021a; Verweijen & Dunlap, 2021). As is the case with frontier dynamics more generally (Rasmussen & Lund, 2018), the ensuing socio-ecological disruptions and political-economic transformations both shape and are shaped by dynamics of conflict and violence (Fairhead et al., 2012). First, competition for access to and control over 'low carbon' resources can feed into geopolitical tensions, with reverberations far beyond areas of resource extraction (Berling et al., 2021). Second, many low-carbon energy or conservation projects are located on disputed or Indigenous lands, where the presence of both green and conventional extractivist projects is endorsed and enforced by national and regional governments. Opposition to government-supported national or transnational projects frequently leads to different intensities of social contestation and violence by state and non-state actors (BHRRC, 2021). Third, 'green extractivist' projects may be rolled out in areas that are already immersed in armed conflict, thereby intensifying and transforming ongoing violence. Many of these processes are already under way. For instance, the arrival of large wind and solar projects in the Western Sahara is fuelling conflict in this occupied territory (Allan et al., 2021). In Oaxaca, Mexico, large-scale wind projects have fed into a violent conflict between Indigenous groups opposing land grabbing on the one hand and wind energy corporations and their allies, including the Mexican state, on the other (Dunlap, 2017). The European Commission (EC), in turn, anticipates that mining justified by low-carbon infrastructures will generate increasing conflict. It is therefore sponsoring pre-emptive efforts to disable opposition and organize 'social acceptance' through such means as "[p]ublic relation campaigns, transparent stakeholder dialogues, and cultural heritage (mining museums, local heritage ceremonies)" (EC 2021: 27; see also Dunlap 2021b). These ongoing developments make comparative enquiry into the multifaceted connections between 'green extractivism' and violent conflict timely. This panel looks for fresh empirical and theoretical insights into the ways 'decarbonization', 'green growth' and climate change mitigation policies shape and are shaped by dynamics of conflict and violence. We invite contributions looking at, for instance:
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, and 15 moreAnthropology, Development Studies, Peace and Conflict Studies, Climate Change, Political Ecology, Community Development, Political Science, Peace & Conflict Studies, Sustainable Rural Development, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Climate Change Impacts, Critical Development Studies, Cultural and Social Anthropology, Political Ecology and Economy, and Renewable Energy and Climate Change
Xander is one of the foremost researchers on the unfolding relationship between ecocide, colonialism, extractivism, and green capitalism. The reason he is able to unmask the realities of the supposed solutions to the ecological... more
Xander is one of the foremost researchers on the unfolding relationship between ecocide, colonialism, extractivism, and green capitalism. The reason he is able to unmask the realities of the supposed solutions to the ecological crisis-profitable platitudes like 'green energy'-unlike so many professional academics who continue to dilute their critiques or even promote the very activities that are pushing us over the brink, is that he has cast his lot with the communities and movements that are fighting for our collective survival. This book is an important new contribution to his work. "
Research Interests: Sociology, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Anthropology, Development Studies, and 11 moreSocial Sciences, Climate Change, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchist Studies, Rural Development, Environmental Sustainability, Political Geography, and Political Ecology (Anthropology)
Policing and ecological crises – and all the inequalities, discrimination, and violence they entail – are pressing contemporary problems. Ecological degradation, biodiversity loss, and climate change threaten local communities and... more
Policing and ecological crises – and all the inequalities, discrimination, and violence they entail – are pressing contemporary problems. Ecological degradation, biodiversity loss, and climate change threaten local communities and ecosystems, and, cumulatively, the planet as a whole. Police brutality, wars, paramilitarism, private security operations, and securitization more widely impact people – especially people of colour – and habitats. This edited collection explores their relationship, and investigates the numerous ways in which police, security, and military forces intersect with, reinforce, and facilitate ecological and climate catastrophe. Employing a case study-based approach, the book examines the relationships and entanglements between policing and ecosystems, revealing the intimate connection between political violence and ecological degradation.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Political Sociology, Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, and 15 moreSocial Geography, Anthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, Renewable Energy, Political Ecology, Political Anthropology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchist Studies, Traditional Ecological Knowledge, Climate Change Adaptation And Mitigation Strategies, Political Geography, and Political Ecology (Anthropology)
The earth and its inhabitants are on a trajectory of cascading socio-ecological crisis driven by techno-capitalist development. Presenting the aim and scope of this book, the introduction lays out the key conceptual issue of total... more
The earth and its inhabitants are on a trajectory of cascading
socio-ecological crisis driven by techno-capitalist development. Presenting the aim and scope of this book, the introduction lays out the key conceptual issue of total extractivism, naming the spirit and amalgamation of violent technologies comprising the totalizing imperative and tension at the heart of the present catastrophic trajectory. Total extractivism denotes how the techno-capitalist world system harbors a rapacious appetite for all life—total consumption of human and non-human resources—that destructively reconfigures the earth. Drawing on hostile, dissident authors and their companions—humans who have resisted techno-capitalism—the introduction sets the scene for viewing the Leviathanic capitalist state system and its expanding grid of extractive infrastructures as the Worldeater(s).
socio-ecological crisis driven by techno-capitalist development. Presenting the aim and scope of this book, the introduction lays out the key conceptual issue of total extractivism, naming the spirit and amalgamation of violent technologies comprising the totalizing imperative and tension at the heart of the present catastrophic trajectory. Total extractivism denotes how the techno-capitalist world system harbors a rapacious appetite for all life—total consumption of human and non-human resources—that destructively reconfigures the earth. Drawing on hostile, dissident authors and their companions—humans who have resisted techno-capitalism—the introduction sets the scene for viewing the Leviathanic capitalist state system and its expanding grid of extractive infrastructures as the Worldeater(s).
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Social Theory, Geography, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, and 14 moreAnthropology, Social Anthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, Political Ecology, Political Anthropology, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Anarchist Studies, Environmental Sustainability, Political Geography, Environmental Humanities, Political Ecology (Anthropology), and Political Ecology and Economy
Renewing Destruction examines how wind energy projects impact people and their environments. Wind energy development, in Mexico and most countries, fall into a ‘roll out’ neoliberal strategy that is justified by climate change mitigation... more
Renewing Destruction examines how wind energy projects impact people and their environments. Wind energy development, in Mexico and most countries, fall into a ‘roll out’ neoliberal strategy that is justified by climate change mitigation programs that are continuing a process of land and wind resources grabbing for profit. The result has been an exaggeration of pre-existing problems in communities around land, income-inequality, local politics and, contrary to public relations stories, is devastating traditional livelihoods and socio-ecological relationships. Exacerbating pre-existing social and material problems in surrounding towns, wind energy development is placing greater stress on semi-subsistence communities, marginalizing Indigenous traditions and indirectly resulting in the displacement and migration of people into urban centers.
Based on intensive fieldwork with local groups in Oaxaca, Mexico, this book provides an in-depth study, demonstrating the complications and problems that emerge with the current regime of ‘sustainable development’ and wind energy projects in Mexico, which has wider lessons to be drawn for other regions and countries. Put simply, the book reveals a tragic reality that calls into question the marketed hopes of the green economy and the current method of climate change mitigation. It shows the variegated impacts and issues associated with building wind energy parks, which extends to recognizing the destructive effects on Indigenous cultures and practices in the region. The book, however, highlights what to consider or, more importantly, what to avoid if one is working with industrial-scale wind energy systems.
Based on intensive fieldwork with local groups in Oaxaca, Mexico, this book provides an in-depth study, demonstrating the complications and problems that emerge with the current regime of ‘sustainable development’ and wind energy projects in Mexico, which has wider lessons to be drawn for other regions and countries. Put simply, the book reveals a tragic reality that calls into question the marketed hopes of the green economy and the current method of climate change mitigation. It shows the variegated impacts and issues associated with building wind energy parks, which extends to recognizing the destructive effects on Indigenous cultures and practices in the region. The book, however, highlights what to consider or, more importantly, what to avoid if one is working with industrial-scale wind energy systems.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Geography, Human Geography, Anthropology, Political Economy, and 15 morePolitical Philosophy, Development Studies, Climate Change, Political Theory, Renewable Energy, Wind Energy, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Climate change policy, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Rural Development, Environmental Sustainability, and Renewable Energy and Climate Change
What is so-called 'green' extractivism and where did it come from? The introduction to this Special Section examines the origins and implications of the concept, linking it to a long history of exploitation, dispossession and... more
What is so-called 'green' extractivism and where did it come from? The introduction to this Special Section examines the origins and implications of the concept, linking it to a long history of exploitation, dispossession and (neo)colonialism under the guise of green-washing notions such as 'sustainable development.' Conducting an in-depth literature review, we first revisit the concept of extractivism, exploring its origins, development and analytical purchase. We link extractivism to 'extra-action,' implying taking more than what is viable for ecosystems and argue for a supply-web oriented, rather than a point of extraction-focused understanding. Subsequently, we examine key theoretical frameworks in political ecology that paved the way to the study of 'green' extractivism, notably Ecological Distribution Conflicts (which we argue could better be labeled Ecological Destruction Conflicts) and green grabbing. Based on this, we discuss the core features of green extractivism, which are twofold: (1) the use of socioecological and climate crises to reinforce existing or generate new markets and profit-generation opportunities; and (2) the mobilization of claims of ecological sustainability and 'carbon neutrality' to legitimize and rationalize extraction. After outlining the Special Section contributions, we end by considering gaps in existing scholarship on green extractivism and suggest ways forward.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Social Theory, Geography, Human Geography, and 15 moreSocial Geography, Social Anthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, Renewable Energy, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Political Science, Anarchism, Energy and Environment, Political Geography, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Sustainble development, Post Extractivismo Y Derechos De La Naturaleza, and Renewable Energy and Climate Change
This introduction provides an initial approach to the conceptual framework of infrastructural harm. It draws upon existing scholarship to discuss infrastructures as relational arrangements co-formative of harm. By approaching... more
This introduction provides an initial approach to the conceptual framework of infrastructural harm. It draws upon existing scholarship to discuss infrastructures as relational arrangements co-formative of harm. By approaching infrastructures as sites of ongoing socio-political and environmental antagonism, we pay attention to the ways in which infrastructural harm is generated, accretes, and transmutes across different scales and contexts. We consider harm as a process that exceeds the (in)direct consequences of infrastructure operation to extend to other arrangements. Building upon the diverse case studies discussed in this special issue, we investigate how the political and necropolitical properties of infrastructures are entangled with different technologies, judicial forms, policies, regulations and everyday processes. By foregrounding these diverse manifestations of infrastructural harm, together with its material and immaterial expressions, we expand on the existing literature in order to further explore critical codifications of contemporary socio-technical arrangements.
Research Interests: Sociology, Political Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, Cultural Geography, and 15 moreUrban Geography, Anthropology, Social Anthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, Renewable Energy, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Urban Studies, Political Geography, Political Ecology (Anthropology), and Infrastructure
The Debates in Post-Development and Degrowth Journal, published by Tvergastein, is an academic journal dealing with debates and works focused on advancing postdevelopment & degrowth thought. This journal arises as an outcome of the Centre... more
The Debates in Post-Development and Degrowth Journal, published by Tvergastein, is an academic journal dealing with debates and works focused on advancing postdevelopment & degrowth thought. This journal arises as an outcome of the Centre for Development and the Environment (SUM) course 4034: Debates in Post-development & Degrowth, thereby establishing a publishing space for the works emerging from within it. The journal hopes to create the desired academic space to organize the understanding and reconciliation of the present socioecological and climate catastrophe, but also to make efforts in subverting this disaster-ridden pathway. Let this journal serve as a forum for liberatory experimentation, allowing people to organize and align their thoughts, values and actions to raise awareness and create positive social change wherever they stand.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, Anthropology, and 14 morePolitical Economy, Development Studies, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Social Movements (Political Science), Political Ecology (Anthropology), DeGrowth, Decolonial Thought, Geografia, Postdevelopment Theory, and Environmental Sutainability
This journal, Debates in Post-Development & Degrowth: Volume 1, published in collaboration with Tvergastein, emerges from the conversations, thinking, and course papers of the Spring 2021 course Debates in Post-Development & Degrowth at... more
This journal, Debates in Post-Development & Degrowth: Volume 1, published in collaboration with Tvergastein, emerges from the conversations, thinking, and course papers of the Spring 2021 course Debates in Post-Development & Degrowth at the Centre for Development and the Environment (SUM), University of Oslo, Norway. The University of Oslo (UiO) and, particularly, SUM – as we will discuss below – continues to sit at an important juncture between rejecting and embracing the ideology of “sustainable development” and “green growth.” This journal seeks to discuss this history, struggle, and (lack of) debate. The enthusiasm of students, eager participation, and their critical engagement with the course material inspired the making of this journal, which provided students with a publication outlet to air their thoughts, concerns, provocations – and, overall, join this rapidly evolving conversation. Here, we offer exciting new papers and engagements that have undergone editorial and literal peer review by staff and students. The journal’s intention is to not only widen engagements in the post-development conversation, but also expand the political thought and practice at SUM, which includes academic debates concerning the problems of development, resistance, so-called “energy transition” and, most of all, the propagation of the green growth myth.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Marxism, Renewable Energy, and 15 morePolitical Ecology, Agroecology, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Energy, Resistance (Social), Political Geography, Sustainable Rural Development, Political Ecology (Anthropology), DeGrowth, Postdevelopment Theory, Abolitionism, Critical Development Studies, Permaculture Design, and Renewable Energy and Climate Change
Ecological catastrophe and global inequality are pressing, yet socio-ecologically destructive natural resource extraction continues unabated. This special issue explores the strategies and tactics employed by large-scale mining and energy... more
Ecological catastrophe and global inequality are pressing, yet socio-ecologically destructive natural resource extraction continues unabated. This special issue explores the strategies and tactics employed by large-scale mining and energy companies to render extraction socio-politically feasible in the face of multi-pronged opposition. Extraction, we contend, does not only need physical engineering, but requires social engineering as well. This entails shaping the behavior of people to 'manage' dissent and 'manufacture' consent. Situating the social engineering of extraction in key debates in the literature, this special issue introduction traces the evolution of its main technologies and techniques, related to colonialism, wars of decolonization, neoliberalism and the 'green' economy, respectively. We conclude by outlining a number of ways to advance research on the social engineering of extraction.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Environmental Engineering, Sociology, Social Theory, Geography, and 15 moreHuman Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Anthropology, Development Studies, Social Sciences, Climate Change, Renewable Energy, Political Ecology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Political Violence and Terrorism, Environmental Sustainability, Political Geography, Political Ecology (Anthropology), and Counterinsurgency
Where did postdevelopment thought go? Was its anti-development message too much for academia? While acknowledging some overlap between postdevelopment and mainstream academic decolonial thought, we argue that postdevelopment, and its... more
Where did postdevelopment thought go? Was its anti-development message too much for academia? While acknowledging some overlap between postdevelopment and mainstream academic decolonial thought, we argue that postdevelopment, and its conceptualization of the pluriverse directly challenges extractivism, statism, and capitalism or, in a word, development. After discussing aspects of mainstream decolonial thought, seven main points of postdevelopment criticism are reviewed and debunked. We demonstrate that resistance and 'attack' are enduring feature of postdevelopment praxis from the Zapatistas to the countless other (socio)ecological struggles across the world. Responding to critique, this article presents three postdevelopment practices: the Organización Popular Francisco Villa de Izquierda Independiente (OPFVII) in the Acapatzingo community, Mexico City; the Zone-to-Defend (Zone à Défendre, ZAD) concept formalized in France; and the Global Tapestry of Alternatives (GTA) initiative. The conclusion stresses the importance of postdevelopment and a pluriverse working towards anti-capitalism/statism/extractivism/patriarchal world to avoid (neo)colonial recuperations of anti-colonial/statist struggle.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, Anthropology, and 11 moreDevelopment Studies, Social Sciences, Postcolonial Studies, Political Ecology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchist Studies, Environmental Sustainability, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Decolonial Thought, and Postdevelopment Theory
This Perspective article responses to the article 'Pluralizing energy justice: Incorporating feminist, anti-racist, Indigenous, and postcolonial perspectives' (Sovacool et al., 2023). While Sovacool and colleagues seeks to expand and,... more
This Perspective article responses to the article 'Pluralizing energy justice: Incorporating feminist, anti-racist, Indigenous, and postcolonial perspectives' (Sovacool et al., 2023). While Sovacool and colleagues seeks to expand and, rightfully, address criticism of energy justice, we contend that by maintaining the framework of justice within the article implicitly maintains the Eurocentric developmental models (e.g., statist modernism). As the article is currently phrased, issues of the state (e.g., statism), extractivism (e.g., modernist development) and capitalism, as they intersect, are not adequately confronted. This, we contend, relates to how the 'colonial' is conceptualized in relationship to the state. This conceptualization will impact how (neo)colonialism is identified and decolonial or anti-colonial struggle is understood. We position energy justice as the 'bare political minimum' or starting point, meanwhile rooting ourselves in post-development and visions of total liberation to advocate for an insurrection in energy research and developing energy autonomy. Energy justice, we worry, risks thwarting real possibilities towards post-development and total liberation: the active struggle against domination for all-humans, nonhumans, (non)genders and peoples. This article seeks to advance a constructive conversation with the authors of 'Pluralizing Energy Justice' by discussing the critical challenge to how terms like feminist, anti-racist, Indigenous, and postcolonial perspectives are employed in academia and are absorbed by the statist institutions capitalist operations.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, Development Studies, and 14 moreClimate Change, Renewable Energy, Political Ecology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Anarchist Studies, Energy and Environment, Environmental Sustainability, Political Geography, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Decolonial Thought, Postdevelopment Theory, and Political Ecology and Economy
The European Union (EU) is highly dependent on importing raw materials for low-carbon infrastructures from around the globe. This material dependence has, since 2019, initiated legislation and efforts to intensify mining within the EU.... more
The European Union (EU) is highly dependent on importing raw materials for low-carbon infrastructures from around the globe. This material dependence has, since 2019, initiated legislation and efforts to intensify mining within the EU. The Iberian Peninsula remains a principle target area for the EU's critical raw material (CRM) mining initiatives. This article explores the making of the "Mina do Barroso" (Barroso Mine) in northern Portugal, which threatens a "Globally Important Agricultural Heritage System" and will potentially become the largest open-pit lithium mine of Western Europe. This prospective mining project represents an investment and public funding opportunity for mining companies. The European Commission and the Portuguese government are applying increasing political pressures to establish this mine to make international decarbonization benchmarks through rapidly expanding electric vehicles (EVs) and energy storage system (ESS). The Barroso agrarian communities are threatened with extensive socio-ecological impacts, leading locals, (some) climate activists and environmental organizations to reject this mining project. Company personnel and the Portuguese government are confronting growing opposition, blockades and a resolute "Minas Não!" (No to Mines!). We explore the subtle efforts attempting to engineer the social acceptance of the Mina do Barroso, revealing the 'slow' social warfare tactics employed by the company to infiltrate rural social bonds, exploit psycho-social vulnerabilities and attempt to disable anti-mining organizing and unity within the region. This article demonstrates the insidious social technologies of pacification employed to engineer extraction and assemble an open-pit lithium mine with severe socio-ecological impacts in northern Portugal.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Political Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, Cultural Geography, and 14 morePolitical Geography and Geopolitics, Anthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, Political Ecology, Political Anthropology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Anarchist Studies, Environmental Sustainability, Political Ecology (Anthropology), and Renewable Energy and Climate Change
As old as industrialism or civilization itself, socio-ecological problems are nothing new. Despite all efforts to resolve environmental dilemmas, socio-ecological catastrophe has only intensified. Governments, in response, have unveiled... more
As old as industrialism or civilization itself, socio-ecological problems are nothing new. Despite all efforts to resolve environmental dilemmas, socio-ecological catastrophe has only intensified. Governments, in response, have unveiled the green economy to confront ecological and climate catastrophe. The green economy, however, has worsened socio-ecological conditions, invigorating the present trajectory of (techno)capitalist development. This article argues that the green economy serves as a tool of global counterinsurgency, managing, preempting and redirecting the inevitable ecological anxiety that could mobilize for radical social change. While fragmenting ecological opposition, the green economy meanwhile serves as a "force multiplier" for market expansion and capitalist development, as opposed to actually working towards real socio-ecological mitigation and remediation. The article proceeds by defining counterinsurgency, and indicating its relevance to the green economy. Dissecting the technics of the green economy, the next section reviews its origins and epistemological foundations by investigating the concepts and operationalization of 'energy', 'biodiversity' and 'carbon'. Then, briefly, the article reviews the extractive reality of low-carbon infrastructures, revealing the socio-ecological harm implied and justified by the green economic and decarbonization schemes. The green economy, it concludes, is a governmental technology, preventing collective self-reflection and action to (adequately) rehabilitate ecosystems and address the structural socio-ecological problems threatening the planet, thus preforming a counterinsurrectionary function in the service of state and capital.
Research Interests: Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, Anthropology, International Relations, and 13 moreDevelopment Studies, Climate Change, Political Theory, Renewable Energy, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchist Studies, Environmental Sustainability, Political Geography, Political Ecology (Anthropology), and Decolonial Thought
Where are green anarchist and anti-civilization thoughts in academia? This article offers an encounter between green anarchism and decolonial theory to demonstrate its relevance as an action-oriented practice carried out across the world... more
Where are green anarchist and anti-civilization thoughts in academia? This article offers an encounter between green anarchism and decolonial theory to demonstrate its relevance as an action-oriented practice carried out across the world by groups or individuals rejecting domination and subjugation by state, capital, and other forms of power. This article begins with an anecdote to reveal weak points within academic decolonial theory, specifically readings of non-Western civilizations, political ambiguities, and corresponding engagements with the state–corporate nexus. Next, it revisits anti-civilizational anarchism, highlighting theoretical development, conflictive debates, and insights. The article concludes by encouraging anarchist decolonial perspectives that articulate permanent tensions against divisions of labour, hierarchies, statist-colonial organizational forms, and industrial/digital technologies. These mechanisms necessitate careful attention to avoid reproducing coloniality and extractivism under different names.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Human Geography, Anthropology, Development Studies, and 15 moreClimate Change, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Political Science, Critical Social Theory, Anarchist Studies, Protest, Political Geography, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Post-Anarchism, Decolonial Thought, Critical Development Studies, Anarquismo, Decolonialidad, and Modernity/coloniality/decoloniality
This article critically examines the GND (Green New Deal) platform by exploring the reality of energy development under the European Green Deal (EGD). Taking a special interest in degrowth positions on energy development, the article... more
This article critically examines the GND (Green New Deal) platform by exploring the reality of energy development under the European Green Deal (EGD). Taking a special interest in degrowth positions on energy development, the article argues that the European Green Deal is an exercise in necropolitics; intensifying market relationships, extraction, and infrastructural colonization. The article proceeds by reviewing and discussing recent environmental justice and degrowth positions on energy infrastructural development. The methodology outlines desk-based research on resource extraction as well as on the European energy markets. This accompanies multi-sited ethnographic fieldwork, charting environmental conflicts along a 400kv high-tension power line. This line goes across France, Catalonia and Southern Spain, stretching into Morocco and occupied Western Sahara. Unconventional research techniques, such as hitchhiking, enabled mobility and expanding the informal interview pool. Outlining the objectives of the EGD, the next section examines three aspects of its necropolitics. First, necropolitical economy reveals the reality of energy market liberalization under the EGD. Second, necropolitical extraction examines the expansion of mining and mineral processing, which are necessary for the EGD and 'mainstream' GNDs. Third, necropolitical operation reveal the reality of 'a rapid rollout of renewable energy deployment' by examining infrastructure conflicts along a 400kv power line between France and Spain. The process of infrastructural colonization is detailed, which also introduces different land defender perspectives on degrowth. Affirming the argument that the EGD is an exercise in necropolitics, the conclusion discusses important ways to expand degrowth, energy ecologies and real energy transition.
Research Interests: Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Anthropology, and 15 moreDevelopment Studies, Climate Change, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Climate change policy, Infrastructure Planning, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchist Studies, Rural Development, Environmental Sustainability, Cultural Anthropology, Political Ecology (Anthropology), DeGrowth, and Renewable Energy and Climate Change
This article highlights the misleading calculations, reductions and overstatements of the recent Perspective article: 'More transitions, less risk: How renewable energy reduces risks form mining, trade and political dependence' by Jim... more
This article highlights the misleading calculations, reductions and overstatements of the recent Perspective article: 'More transitions, less risk: How renewable energy reduces risks form mining, trade and political dependence' by Jim Kane and Robert Idel. While in theory we might agree with the general claim of Jim Kane and Robert Idel 'that a transition from coal to wind involves an enormous decrease in mined materials', we demonstrate that this claim is misleading. This article stresses five essential points to correct their analysis and calculations in order to offer approximations that are more accurate and, thus, revealing the extent of complications and problems facing real energy transition. This entails challenging the fossil fuel versus renewable energy dichotomy; critically interrogating data and research scope; acknowledging the realities of capitalism; paying closer attention to policy objectives; and recognizing the underexplored reality of green extractivism. This is done not only to encourage environmental and energy policy taking ecological crises seriously, but also-more immediately-to prevent the misuse and decontextualization of Jim Kane and Robert Idel's claims to advance the agendas of socially and ecologically destructive companies.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, Anthropology, and 13 morePolitical Economy, Social Anthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, Renewable Energy, Political Ecology, Community Development, Political Science, International Political Economy, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Development, DeGrowth, and Renewable Energy and Climate Change
Climate change now serves to justify new mandates for increasing ‘clean’ and ‘renewable’ energy, which affirms the existing European trajectory of infrastructural expansion. Employing a multi-sited political ecology analysis of... more
Climate change now serves to justify new mandates for increasing ‘clean’ and ‘renewable’ energy, which affirms the existing European trajectory of infrastructural expansion. Employing a multi-sited political ecology analysis of infrastructure (MSPEAI), this article connects five environmental conflicts via a 400-kV high-voltage power line (HVPL). The conflicts span across France, Catalonia and Spain, revealing how the European ‘green’ transition entrenches infrastructural harm by branding it ‘green’. The European Green Deal, and other climate change legislation, are intensifying the infrastructural colonization of the countryside and the neoliberalization of the energy sector. By examining five interlinked environmental conflicts, this article, contrary to public relations efforts and European policy, demonstrates how there is no ‘renewable’ energy transition, only electrical grid expansion (e.g. increasing material and energy-use) and conflict resulting in green infrastructural harm. The conclusion, thereby, reveals the necessity of enacting degrowth policy proposals immediately to lessen and stop the spread of ecological and climate catastrophe.
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14747731.2021.1996518
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14747731.2021.1996518
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Geography, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Anthropology, and 15 moreSocial Anthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, Renewable Energy, Political Ecology, Community Development, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Sustainable Development, Energy, Energy and Environment, Political Geography, Sustainable Rural Development, Political Ecology (Anthropology), DeGrowth, and Renewable Energy and Climate Change
Local support is instrumental to natural resource extraction. Examining militarization beyond the battlefield, this article discusses the organization of volunteers in three controversial resource extraction projects. Drawing on the... more
Local support is instrumental to natural resource extraction. Examining militarization beyond the battlefield, this article discusses the organization of volunteers in three controversial resource extraction projects. Drawing on the political ecology of counter-insurgency and 4 years of research that examined wind energy development in Mexico, coal mining in Germany, and copper mining in Peru, this article examines the weaponization of volunteers in environmental conflicts. It is argued that political acquiescence to natural resource extraction is manufactured by various means of coercion and reward, meanwhile volunteerism-or the appearance thereof-seeks to manipulate people's ambitions and desires. The manufacturing of volunteerism expresses a 'local' counterinsurgency approach, designed to counter-resistance groups by articulating a form of counter-organizing to defend extractive development projects (and transnational capital). The fact remains, however, that these groups often qualify for welfare programs, are paid, or are recipients of 'donations' to ensure a supportive presence in the target areas. Volunteerism, in the conventional sense, is 'hybridized' with paid work posturing as unpaid to organize legitimacy. Discussing counter-organizations and their relationship to armed and unarmed volunteerism, the article details how communities are divided to support natural resource extraction in times of widespread ecological and climate crises.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, and 10 moreAnthropology, Development Studies, Political Ecology, Political Anthropology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Political Geography, Political Ecology (Anthropology), and Extractivismo
What radical tactics might those seeking transformational action on climate or environmental sustainability undertake? What options are capable of stopping actors and institutions who already realize their actions and behavior may harm... more
What radical tactics might those seeking transformational action on climate or environmental sustainability undertake? What options are capable of stopping actors and institutions who already realize their actions and behavior may harm millions, degrade the biosphere, and contaminate the climate, but continue to do so, despite the scientific or moral reasons not to? This paper explores efforts that can vigorously confront apathy and inaction and potentially subvert power relations currently perpetuating climate catastrophe and environmental destruction. We examine the tactics employed over time from civil disobedience and (strict) nonviolence, antiauthoritarian strategies and self-defense as well as guerrilla warfare perspectives, and distill from them options for potential climate action. In doing so, we offer a comprehensive inventory of 20 distinct direct action tactics that, while unsavory in some contexts, offer a chance of creating social change. In doing so, we also draw from the wealth of knowledge regarding protests, social movements, self-organization, and an array of different struggles and strategies.
Research Interests:
This Perspective article, offers a commentary intervention to the article, 'Transactional Colonialism in Wind Energy Investments: Energy Injustices against Vulnerable People in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec' by Jacobo Ramirez and Steffen... more
This Perspective article, offers a commentary intervention to the article, 'Transactional Colonialism in Wind Energy Investments: Energy Injustices against Vulnerable People in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec' by Jacobo Ramirez and Steffen Böhm. After the introduction, the first section highlights numerous issue with the term transactional colonialism, which relates to the poor use of 'internal colonialism'. While the generality of their claims are agreeable, the authors' argument implies that 'unequal economic transactions and cognitive injustices' are somehow different and/or new from 'European colonialism' and 'internal colorization', which-among other points-I believe is a mistake. The subsequent section, then, confronts how the article actively reduces the complexity of actors in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, which is poorly justified-appearing arbitrary and politically self-serving. Thirdly, and common in energy research, speaks to the largely uncritical appraisal of wind energy technologies and Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 7. The conclusion then summaries the article, making the final points. In this sense, merely "bearing witness" to genocide serves little purpose (other than allowing the witnesses to claim a feeble moral superiority…). Relatedly, the notion that "speaking truth to power" about what is witnessed-as if those holding power were somehow oblivious to the effects of the manner in which they wield it-can in itself remedy the situation is at best a mythic proposition.-Ward Churchill
Research Interests: Social Theory, Geography, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Climate Change, and 15 moreRenewable Energy, Political Ecology, Critical Thinking, Sustainable Development, Critical Social Theory, Energy, Colonialism, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Mexico, Critical Development Studies, Oaxaca, Anti-Colonialism, Political Ecology and Economy, Colonialism and Imperialism, and Renewable Energy and Climate Change
This article examines the struggle against the new Électricité de France (EDF) wind park, Gunaa Sicarú, in Unión Hidalgo (UH), Mexico. Foregrounding Indigenous land defense, the article refers to wind energy as ‘wind factories’ to discuss... more
This article examines the struggle against the new Électricité de France (EDF) wind park, Gunaa Sicarú, in Unión Hidalgo (UH), Mexico. Foregrounding Indigenous land defense, the article refers to wind energy as ‘wind factories’ to discuss agrarian change in the region. Revealing the counterinsurgency colonial model as a foundational approach to extractive development, the article argues that the distribution of money, Sicarios (hitmen) and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are instrumental to engineering ‘social acceptance’. Moreover, the liberalism underlining NGOs, if not careful, advances processes of infrastructural colonization and, consequently, wider trajectories of (neo)colonialism.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Social Theory, Geography, Human Geography, and 15 morePolitical Geography and Geopolitics, Anthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, Renewable Energy, Political Ecology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Environmental Sustainability, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Development, Climate Change Impacts, Decolonization, and Cultural and Social Anthropology
This article introduces the concept of renewable energy in relation to concepts like 'Peace' and 'Justice'. This is followed by analyzing reality of 'renewable energy' via raw material exaction; land contracting; operational impacts;... more
This article introduces the concept of renewable energy in relation to concepts like 'Peace' and 'Justice'. This is followed by analyzing reality of 'renewable energy' via raw material exaction; land contracting; operational impacts; energy-use; and decommissioning. This demonstrates the serous stakes involved in the uncritical embrace and celebration of so-called “renewable energy” for peace and justice studies. The final section concludes by discussing what appropriate low-carbon technologies might look like and forms of renewable energy we should aim to create.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Criminal Justice, Development Studies, Peace and Conflict Studies, Climate Change, and 13 moreRenewable Energy, Wind Energy, Infrastructure Planning, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Energy, Peace Movements, Environmental Sustainability, Peace & Conflict Studies, Sustainable Rural Development, Development, Wind Power, and Renewable Energy and Climate Change
This article proposes a political ecology of resistance. This is done by putting forward insurrectionary political ecology as a lens of research and struggle, through the confluence of the complementary "political" practice of... more
This article proposes a political ecology of resistance. This is done by putting forward insurrectionary political ecology as a lens of research and struggle, through the confluence of the complementary "political" practice of insurrectionary anarchism and the "ecological" method of "no-till natural farming." While seemingly different, the article argues that these practices are compatible, animating a political ecology of resistance around anti-authoritarian political and ecological lifeways. This direction, or compass, of insurrectionary political ecology is discussed in relation to other autonomous tendencies, as it complements and strengthens existing critical schools of thought heavily influenced by political ecology, such as (decolonial) degrowth, environmental justice and post-development. Insurrectionary political ecology deepens connections with scholarly rebels in political and ecological struggles outside-and rejecting-the university system. The article includes discussions of research ethics, various conceptions of "activism", autonomous tendencies and existing differences between the concepts of "revolution" and "insurrection", in order to debate notions of "counter-hegemony" and "duel-power." The overall purpose here is to offer a theoretical ethos for a political ecology of resistance that invigorates political praxis to subvert the ongoing socio-ecological catastrophes.
French & Spanish Abstract: https://journals.uair.arizona.edu/index.php/JPE/article/view/23751/22498
French & Spanish Abstract: https://journals.uair.arizona.edu/index.php/JPE/article/view/23751/22498
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Geography, Anthropology, Indigenous Studies, Development Studies, and 15 moreClimate Change, Political Ecology, Agroecology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Critical Social Theory, Anarchist Studies, Climate Change Adaptation And Mitigation Strategies, Environmental Sustainability, Permaculture, Political Geography, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Autonomist Marxism, and Permaculture Design
Governments and corporations exclaim that “energy transition” to “renewable energy” is going to mitigate ecological catastrophe. French President Emmanuel Macron makes such declarations, but what is the reality of energy infrastructure... more
Governments and corporations exclaim that “energy transition” to “renewable energy” is going to mitigate ecological catastrophe. French President Emmanuel Macron makes such declarations, but what is the reality of energy infrastructure development? Examining the development of a distributional energy transformer substation in the village of Saint-Victor-et-Melvieu, this article argues that “green” infrastructures are creating conflict and ecological degradation and are the material expression of climate catastrophe. Since 1999, the Aveyron region of southern France has become a desirable area of the so-called renewable energy development, triggering a proliferation of energy infrastructure, including a new transformer substation in St. Victor. Corresponding with this spread of “green” infrastructure has been a 10-year resistance campaign against the transformer. In December 2014, the campaign extended to building a protest site, and ZAD, in the place of the transformer called L’Amassada. Drawing on critical agrarian studies, political ecology, and human geography literatures, the article discusses the arrival process of the transformer, corrupt political behavior, misinformation, and the process of bureaucratic land grabbing. This also documents repression against L’Amassada and their relationship with the Gilets Jaunes “societies in movement.” Finally, the notion of infrastructural colonization is elaborated, demonstrating its relevance to understanding the onslaught of climate and ecological crisis.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Geography, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Anthropology, and 15 moreDevelopment Studies, Climate Change, Renewable Energy, Wind Energy, Political Ecology, Climate Change Adaptation, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Energy, Energy and Environment, Political Geography, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Anarcho-autonomism and political transformation, and Renewable Energy and Climate Change
Dans cet article, Alexander Dunlap, chercheur en écologie politique et en anthropologie à l'université d'Oslo, s'intéresse aux infrastructures énergétiques, notamment dans le secteur des fameuses « énergies vertes » ainsi que les... more
Dans cet article, Alexander Dunlap, chercheur en écologie politique et en anthropologie à l'université d'Oslo, s'intéresse aux infrastructures énergétiques, notamment dans le secteur des fameuses « énergies vertes » ainsi que les résistances qu'elles rencontrent partout dans le monde. Après des travaux sur les éoliennes au Mexique et les mines de charbon en Allemagne, il livre ici une enquête de longue haleine sur le projet de transformateur éléctrique de Saint-Victor, en Aveyron, et les luttes qu'il suscite depuis plusieurs années. Deux années durant, il est allé interroger toutes celles et ceux concernés par le projets : maires, habitants, militants, etc. Il en ressort un discours critique sur ce qu'il appelle la « colonisation verte », avec laquelle notre époque n'a surement pas fini de nous bassiner. Bonne lecture. ****** « Je ne veux pas me mettre à genou pour de l'argent. Je ne veux pas me mettre à genou tout court, donc je dirais « Non ». Je ne peux pas l'accepter. Je ne peux pas me regarder dans le miroir en sachant que j'ai dit 'Oui'. » Marie Bénédicte Vernhet.
See: https://lundi.am/L-accaparement-bureaucratique-des-terres-pour-une-colonisation-par-les
See: https://lundi.am/L-accaparement-bureaucratique-des-terres-pour-une-colonisation-par-les
Research Interests: Climate Change, Political Ecology, Anarchism, Anarchist Studies, Environmental Sustainability, and 12 morePolitical Ecology (Anthropology), Anthropologie De Terrain, Anthropologie, Sciences Politiques, Sociologie Urbaine, Décroissance, Changement Climatique, Géographie, Géologie/ Eau/ Environnement, Anthropologie Sociale Et Culturelle, Géographie Sociale Et Culturelle, and Renewable Energy and Climate Change
At the root of techno-capitalist development – popularly marketed as “modernity,” “progress” or “development” – is the continuous and systematic processes of natural resource extraction. Reviewing wind energy development in Mexico, coal... more
At the root of techno-capitalist development – popularly marketed as “modernity,” “progress” or “development” – is the continuous and systematic processes of natural resource extraction. Reviewing wind energy development in Mexico, coal mining in Germany and copper mining in Peru, this article seeks to strengthen the post-liberal or structural approach in genocide studies. These geographically and culturally diverse case studies set the stage for discussions about the complications of conflictual fault lines around extractive development. The central argument is that “green” and conventional natural resource extraction are significant in degrading human and biological diversity, thereby contributing to larger trends of socio-ecological destruction, extinction and the potential for human and nonhuman extermination. It should be acknowledged in the above-mentioned case studies, land control was largely executed through force, notably through “hard” coercive technologies executed by various state and extra-judicial elements, which was complemented by employing diplomatic and “soft” social technologies of pacification. Natural resource extraction is a significant contributor to the genocide-ecocide nexus, leading to three relevant discussion points. First, the need to include nonhuman natures, as well as indigenous ontologies and epistemologies, into genocide studies to dispel an embedded anthropocentrism in the discipline. Second, acknowledges the complications of essentializing identity and the specific socio-cultural values and dispositions that are the targets of techno-capitalist development. Third, that socio-political positionality is essential to how people will relate and identify ecocidal and genocidal processes. Different ontologies, socio-ecological relationships (linked to “the Other”), and radical anti-capitalism are the root targets of techno-capitalist progress, as they seek assimilation and absorption of human and nonhuman “natural resources” into extractive economies. Genocide studies and political ecology – Anthropology, Human Geography and Development Studies – would benefit from greater engagement with each other to highlight the centrality of extractive development in sustaining ecological and climate catastrophe confronting the world today.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Social Theory, Geography, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, and 15 moreAnthropology, Technology, Development Studies, Climate Change, Political Ecology, Climate Change Adaptation, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Genocide Studies, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Colonialism, Cultural Anthropology, Political Ecology (Anthropology), and Renewable Energy and Climate Change
The multiplicity of violent techniques employed to impose land control and extraction remains under acknowledged. This article reviews research conducted between the years 2014 and 2018 and draws on three case studies: wind energy... more
The multiplicity of violent techniques employed to impose land control and extraction remains under acknowledged. This article reviews research conducted between the years 2014 and 2018 and draws on three case studies: wind energy development in Mexico, coal mining in Germany, and copper mining in Peru. The idea of 'engineering extraction' is advanced through counterinsurgency to acknowledge the extent of extractive violence, arguing that the term 'land grabbing' is indeed a more appropriate term than 'land deals'. Engaging with the land grabbing literature, the three cases seek to advance discussions around 'the political reactions "from below"' by emphasizing 'insurrectionary' positions with resistance movements fighting land deals and extractive projects. This is followed by offering a typology of 'hard' coercive techniques and 'soft' technologies of social pacification that surfaced in each case. The conclusion reflects on the social technologies of resource extraction, recognizing how social discord, ecological and climate crises are engineered and enforced.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Social Theory, Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, and 15 moreAnthropology, Social Anthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, Renewable Energy, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Agrarian Studies, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Critical Geography, Environmental Sustainability, Political Ecology (Anthropology), and Agrarian Social Movements
This article identifies an emerging faultline in critical geography and political ecology scholarship by reviewing recent debates on three neoliberal environmental governance initiatives: Payments for Ecosystem Services, the United... more
This article identifies an emerging faultline in critical geography and political ecology scholarship by reviewing recent debates on three neoliberal environmental governance initiatives: Payments for Ecosystem Services, the United Nations programme for Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in Developing Countries and carbon-biodiversity offsetting. These three approaches, we argue, are characterized by varying degrees of contextual and procedural-or superficial-difference, meanwhile exhibiting significant structural similarities that invite critique, perhaps even rejection. Specifically, we identify three largely neglected 'social engineering' outcomes as more foundational to Payments for Ecosystem Services, Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in Developing Countries and carbon-biodiversity offsetting than often acknowledged, suggesting that neoliberal environmental governance approaches warrant greater critical attention for their contributions to advancing processes of colonization, state territorialization and security policy. Examining the structural accumulation strategies accompanying neoliberal environmental governance approaches, we offer the term 'accumulation-by-alienation' to highlight both the objective appropriations accompanying Payments for Ecosystem Services, Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in Developing Countries and offsetting and the relational deficiencies accompanying the various commodifying instrumentalizations at the heart of these initiatives. We concur with David Harvey's recent work proposing that understanding the iterative and consequential connections between objective/material and subjective/psychological dimensions of alienation offers 'one vital key to unlock the door of a progressive politics for the future'. We conclude (with others) by urging critical geography and political ecology scholars to cultivate research directions that affirm more radical alternatives, rather than reinforcing a narrowing focus on how to improve Payments for Ecosystem Services, Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in Developing Countries and offsetting in practice.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Geography, Human Geography, Development Studies, Climate Change, and 10 moreConservation Biology, Conservation, Political Ecology, Sustainable Development, Rural Development, Neoliberalism, REDD+, Payment for Environmental Services, Payments for Ecosystem Services (PES), and Neoliberalismo
Wind parks are widely propagated as ‘a solution’ or in many ways as ‘a gift’ to mitigate climate change and instigate economic growth, which should be ‘rolled inside community gates’ through new legislation enabling investments. This... more
Wind parks are widely propagated as ‘a solution’ or in many ways as ‘a gift’ to mitigate climate change and instigate economic growth, which should be ‘rolled inside community gates’ through new legislation enabling investments. This paper dissects two experiences of wind energy development in Crete, Greece and Oaxaca, Mexico, exploring key commonalities and differences. It demonstrates that land/green grabbing, but more specifically ‘accumulation by wind energy’, is taking place in both
regions. The specific processes and outcomes of ‘accumulation by wind energy’ differ according to the socio-political and ecological context of each case. There are, however, various similarities in logics, methods and strategies facilitating accumulation by wind energy that reveal defining features and similar outcomes. Wind energy development in Crete and Oaxaca is continuing the existing trajectory
of energy extraction companies, resulting in an intensification of existing income-inequality, ecological degradation and social conflict, whilst spreading coercive cultural change. Based on these cases and critical (wind park) literature, we argue, that in actuality wind energy development represents a ‘Trojan horse’ for capitalism’s ongoing growth intensifying socio-ecological crisis through ‘accumulation by
wind energy’. Wind parks serve as ‘Trojan horses’ for, amongst others, corporate land grabbing and temporarily mediating capitalism’s key contradictions.
regions. The specific processes and outcomes of ‘accumulation by wind energy’ differ according to the socio-political and ecological context of each case. There are, however, various similarities in logics, methods and strategies facilitating accumulation by wind energy that reveal defining features and similar outcomes. Wind energy development in Crete and Oaxaca is continuing the existing trajectory
of energy extraction companies, resulting in an intensification of existing income-inequality, ecological degradation and social conflict, whilst spreading coercive cultural change. Based on these cases and critical (wind park) literature, we argue, that in actuality wind energy development represents a ‘Trojan horse’ for capitalism’s ongoing growth intensifying socio-ecological crisis through ‘accumulation by
wind energy’. Wind parks serve as ‘Trojan horses’ for, amongst others, corporate land grabbing and temporarily mediating capitalism’s key contradictions.
The Tía Maria copper mine situated above the agricultural Tambo Valley, southwest Peru, has sparked nearly ten years of protracted conflict. This conflict began in 2009, yet Southern Copper Peru or Southern, a subsidiary of Grupo Mexico,... more
The Tía Maria copper mine situated above the agricultural Tambo Valley, southwest Peru, has sparked nearly ten years of protracted conflict. This conflict began in 2009, yet Southern Copper Peru or Southern, a subsidiary of Grupo Mexico, has faced ardent resistance. This article explores the ‘political reactions from above’, examining how Southern and the Peruvian government have negotiated the popular rejection of the mine. Residents have organized a popular consultation, large-scale demonstrations, road blockades and general strikes, which has been met with violent repression. Reviewing the political ecology of counterinsurgency, which studies the socio-ecological warfare techniques employed to control human and natural resources, and relating it to social war discourse, this section lays the theoretical foundations to discuss the coercion and ‘social war component’ present in natural resource extraction. This leads to an overview of the relationship between Peruvian security forces and extraction industries, followed by a brief chronology of the Tía Maria conflict. The subsequent two sections offer a political ecology analysis of various ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ counterinsurgency techniques employed by the Peruvian state and Southern in an attempt to pacify social unrest and socially engineer acceptance of the project. The concluding section discusses the ‘whole-of-government’ counterinsurgency approach employed, recognizing how the present institutional arrangements and business imperatives are designed to override popular socio-ecological concerns. Supporting social war discourse, the article contends that the state apparatus and politics itself serve as an instrument of social pacification and ecological exploitation regardless of widespread ecological and climatic concerns.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Social Theory, Geography, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, and 15 moreLatin American Studies, Anthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Anarchist Studies, Rural Development, Critical Geography, Mining, Political Geography, Political Ecology (Anthropology), and LIMA PERU
Providing a glimpse into the reality of wind energy development, the story of Álvaro Obregón is one of resistance. Álvaro Obregón is a primarily Zapotec semi-subsistence community located near the entrance of the Santa Teresa sand bar... more
Providing a glimpse into the reality of wind energy development, the story of Álvaro Obregón is one of resistance. Álvaro Obregón is a primarily Zapotec semi-subsistence community located near the entrance of the Santa Teresa sand bar (Barra), where in 2011 Mareña Renovables initiated the process of building 102 wind turbines. Demonstrating the complicated micro-politics of land acquisition, conflict and unrest, this article argues that climate change mitigation initiatives are sparking land grabs and conflict with the renewed valuation of wind resources. Insurrection against the Mareña Renovables wind project has spawned a long-term conflict, which has created social divisions and a type of low-intensity civil war within the town. This article will chronicle the uprising against the wind company, battles with police, and the town hall takeover, which includes analyzing the conflict taking place between the cabildo comunitario and the constitucionalistas. Subsequent sections examine the different perspectives within the village and how this battle between the Communitarians and the wind company continues today. The article reveals the complications associated with land deals, the conflict generating potential of climate change mitigation practices and, finally, concludes by reflecting on the difficulties of formulating alternatives to development within a conflict situation.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Social Theory, Geography, Human Geography, Cultural Geography, and 47 morePolitical Geography and Geopolitics, Social Geography, Environmental Geography, Latin American Studies, Development Economics, Economic Geography, Anthropology, Social Anthropology, Development Studies, Social Sciences, Climate Change, International Development, Political Ecology, Climate Change Adaptation, Latin American politics, Political Anthropology, Community Development, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Climate change policy, Environmental Anthropology, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Critical Social Theory, Anarchist Studies, Rural Development, Critical Geography, Climate Change Adaptation And Mitigation Strategies, Political Geography, Mexico (Anthropology), Cultural Anthropology, Critical and Cultural Theory, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Post-Anarchism, Anarchism & Postmodern Theory, Green Anarchism, Mexico, México, Latin America, Critical Agrarian Studies, Critical Development Studies, Anarquismo, Climate change adaptation measures, Climate Change in Developing Countries, Climate Politics, Anthropology of Infrastructure, Social Science, and Green Grabbing
The German Rhineland is home to the world's largest opencast lignite coal mine and human-made hole e the Hambach mine. Over the last seven years, RWE, the mine operator, has faced an increase in militant resistance, culminating in the... more
The German Rhineland is home to the world's largest opencast lignite coal mine and human-made hole e the Hambach mine. Over the last seven years, RWE, the mine operator, has faced an increase in militant resistance, culminating in the occupation of the Hambacher Forest and acts of civil disobedience and sabotage. The mine provides a European case study to examine the repressive techniques deployed by RWE to legitimise coal mining in the face of a determined opposition. Drawing on political ecology literature and work on corporate counter-movements, this paper peers into extractive industries and their corporate social responsibility (CSR) engagements through the lens of corporate counterinsurgency. We first provide some background to the mine and RWE's unique position in the German political economy. After explaining the rise of resistance, the paper then discusses counterinsurgency in relation to CSR by outlining the different techniques used to win the 'hearts' and 'minds' of people around the mine. This includes securing the support of political leaders, lobbying, involvement in social events, infrastructure projects, astroturf groups and ecological restoration/offsetting work, which combine with overtly repressive techniques by public and private security forces that together attempt to legitimise the mine and stigmatise, intimidate and criminalise activists. This paper contents that counterinsurgency techniques are becoming normalised into the everyday operations of RWE, naturalising its image as 'good corporate citizen' and legitimising and invisibilising the violence towards (non)human nature inherent in the corporate-state-mining-complex, as mining is becoming part of the 'green economy' and made 'sustainable'.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Social Theory, Geography, Human Geography, Cultural Geography, and 43 morePolitical Geography and Geopolitics, Social Geography, Environmental Geography, Development Economics, Anthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, Political Theory, Natural Resources, International Development, Political Ecology, Climate Change Adaptation, Community Development, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Agrarian Studies, Climate change policy, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Critical Social Theory, Anarchist Studies, Rural Development, Resistance (Social), Natural Resource Management, Insurgency/Counterinsurgency(COIN), Protest, Economic Development, Critical Geography, Extractive industries (Economic Anthropology), Renewable energy resources, Environmental Sustainability, Political Geography, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Development, Climate Change Impacts, Development Induced Displacement, Feminist Political Ecology, Resistence, Protest Movements, Coal Mining, Critical Agrarian Studies, EXTRACTION, Post Extractivismo Y Derechos De La Naturaleza, and Neo-extractivism
This article provides an overview of published research and thought in 2016-2017, which includes a case study of the military buying a wind park to power their operations in the Isthmus of Tehuanptec region of Oaxaca, Mexico. Protests... more
This article provides an overview of published research and thought in 2016-2017, which includes a case study of the military buying a wind park to power their operations in the Isthmus of Tehuanptec region of Oaxaca, Mexico. Protests continue against this wind park for destroying a cultural site, which is violently repressed by police and extra-judical forces. The military's use of wind energy and the repression used to impose them alludes to the way wind energy is sustaining repressive and violent forces, thereby offering a sample of "sustainble violence."
Research Interests: Geography, Human Geography, Cultural Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Environmental Geography, and 40 moreLatin American Studies, Development Economics, Green Economics, Anthropology, Medical Anthropology, Social Anthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, International Development, Wind Energy, Political Ecology, Climate Change Adaptation, Latin American politics, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Adaptation to Climate Change, Climate change policy, Ecological Anthropology, Ecological Economics, Infrastructure Planning, Green Infrastructure, Sustainable Development, Central America and Mexico, Anarchism, Anarchist Studies, Rural Development, Critical Geography, Political Economy of Development, Climate Change Adaptation And Mitigation Strategies, Environmental Sustainability, Political Geography, Mexico (Anthropology), Cultural Anthropology, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Development, Mexico, Green Energy, Latin America, Climate Change Mitigation, Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation Nexus, and MEXICO
The coastal Isthmus of Tehuantepec region of Oaxaca, Mexico – known locally as the Istmo – is regarded as one of the best wind energy generating sites in the world. Marketed as a preeminent solution to mitigating climate change, wind... more
The coastal Isthmus of Tehuantepec region of Oaxaca, Mexico – known locally as the Istmo – is regarded as one of the best wind energy generating sites in the world. Marketed as a preeminent solution to mitigating climate change, wind energy is now applying increasing pressure on indigenous groups in the region. The article begins by outlining a definition of colonialism that assists in identifying the temporal continuity of the colonial project to understand its relationship with wind energy development. The next section briefly reviews colonial genocide studies, discussing disciplinary debates between liberal and post-liberal genocide scholars, the relevance of self-management within colonial systems, the genocide-ecocide nexus and the ‘intent’ of destructive development projects. This leads into reviewing the claims and findings that emerged from fieldwork in the Istmo, which is divided into the north and south to show the different, yet similar dynamics taking place in the region. Finally, the article concludes that wind energy development as a ‘solution’ to climate change not only distracts from its dependence on fossil fuels and mining, but renews and continues a slow industrial genocide, assimilating and targeting (indigenous) people who continue to value their land, sea and cultural relationships.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, Cultural Geography, and 66 morePolitical Geography and Geopolitics, Social Geography, Environmental Geography, Latin American Studies, Development Economics, Economic Geography, Anthropology, Social Anthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, Human Rights Law, Human Rights, Colonial America, Political Ecology, Climate Change Adaptation, Latin American politics, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Climate change policy, Genocide Studies, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Central America and Mexico, Anarchism, Critical Social Theory, Colonialism, Anarchist Studies, Rural Development, Post-Colonialism, Critical Geography, Climate Change Adaptation And Mitigation Strategies, Environmental Sustainability, Political Geography, Mexico (Anthropology), Decolonialization, Cultural Anthropology, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Development, 'Decolonization' and the politics of settler state/Indigenous relations, Latin American Colonial Literature, Post-Anarchism, Settler Colonial Studies, Decolonisation, Mexico, México, Colonial Latin American History, Decolonial Thought, Green Technology, Latin America, Climate Change Mitigation, Decolonization, Holocaust and Genocide Studies, Settler/Indigenous relations, Settler colonialism, Green Economy, Environmental Economics, Ecological Economics, Green Economy, Climate Change and Food Security, Anarchist Economics, Climate Change in Developing Countries, Pensamiento decolonial, Climate Politics, Modernity/coloniality/decoloniality, (Settler) Colonialism and Decolonization, Colonial Genocide, Colonialism and Imperialism, Nationalism and Decolonization, and Decoloniality Thought
In November 2014 the first Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) consultation was called for the Eólica del Sur wind project in Juchitán de Zaragoza, Mexico. Lasting eight months, the consultation was responding not only to the UN... more
In November 2014 the first Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) consultation was called for the Eólica del Sur wind project in Juchitán de Zaragoza, Mexico. Lasting eight months, the consultation was responding not only to the UN International Labor Organization’s (ILO) convention 169 that Mexico signed in 1990 but also to widespread uprisings against wind energy projects in the region. This article begins with a FPIC literature review, followed by sections examining the consultation in Juchitán, its spatial layout, the actors involved and its repressive atmosphere. The subsequent section analyzes the discursive techniques deployed by the FPIC technical committee (TC) which—despite unanswered questions and popular opposition to the wind energy project—granted project approval on June 30, 2015. The final section concludes that the FPIC consultation undermines Indigenous autonomy and serves as a counter-insurrectionary device, reinforcing a context of substantial political and economic asymmetry between state, corporate and elite interest and Indigenous fishermen and farmers. The FPIC consultation in Juchitán reinforced state power and simultaneously serves as a marketing platform for development projects, thereby creating an illusion of real dialogue, negotiation and, by extension, democratic decision making. Despite efforts to have the wind project approved, resistance groups’ temporarily halted construction.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Social Movements, Social Theory, Geography, Human Geography, and 36 moreCultural Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Latin American Studies, Anthropology, Political Economy, Development Studies, Corporate Social Responsibility, Climate Change, International Development, Political Ecology, Climate Change Adaptation, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Climate change policy, Genocide Studies, Critical Thinking, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Colonialism, United Nations, Anarchist Studies, Rural Development, Latin American social movements, Social movements and revolution, Climate Change Adaptation And Mitigation Strategies, Cultural Anthropology, Post-Anarchism, Mexico, Colonial Latin American History, Latin America, Critical Agrarian Studies, Oaxaca, Land Grabbing, Anarquismo, Post-colonailst theory, FPIC, and Instiutional Economics
The Isthmus of Tehuantepec region of southwest Oaxaca, Mexico, known locally as the Istmo, was identified in 2003 as a prime site for wind energy development. Supported by climate change mitiga-tion legislation, a 'wind rush' engulfed the... more
The Isthmus of Tehuantepec region of southwest Oaxaca, Mexico, known locally as the Istmo, was identified in 2003 as a prime site for wind energy development. Supported by climate change mitiga-tion legislation, a 'wind rush' engulfed the Istmo. Now, La Ventosa sits surrounded by high-tension wires and wind turbines, some only 280 meters from homes. This paper argues that new valuations of wind resources based on market mechanisms and an-thropogenic climate change laws are intensifying the destructive trajectory of the industrial economy. There are benefits for land owners and political authorities, and what amounts to token civil works projects for the town. But the majority of people interviewed expressed dissatisfaction towards the existence of wind parks surrounding the town. Instead of collective benefits, the wind parks brought different degrees of health concerns, enormous increases in land, rent, food, and electricity prices, as well as insecurity. The findings here demonstrate that wind energy development , encouraged by climate change mitigation policies, is intensifying pre-existing trends towards inequality and poverty in La Ventosa. Meanwhile, the destructive operations of the global industrial economy are renewed, using market-based approaches to mitigating anthropogenic climate change.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Social Theory, Geography, Human Geography, Cultural Geography, and 30 moreAnthropology, Indigenous Studies, Social Anthropology, Development Studies, Corporate Social Responsibility, Human Rights, Political Ecology, Political Anthropology, Community Development, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Sustainable Development, Central America and Mexico, Critical Social Theory, Colonialism, Anarchist Studies, Rural Development, Energy and Environment, Neoliberal Economies in the Postcolony, Social Movements, Political Ecology, Indigeneity, Cultures of Disposession, Urban Form in Asia, Non-Linear Systems, Fieldwork and Disruptive Epistemologies, Biopolitics, India, Environmental Sustainability, Mexico (Anthropology), Cultural Anthropology, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Mexico, Decolonial Thought, Decolonization, Political ecology, NGOs, sustainable development, biodiversity, agroecology, amazonia, brazil, global change, environmental actors, protect areas, nature conservation., Environment and Development, Modernity/coloniality/decoloniality, Envionmental geography, and Political Ecology and Economy
Sustainable development and climate change mitigation policies, Dunlap and Fairhead argue, have instigated and renewed old conflicts over land and natural resources, deploying military techniques of counterinsurgency to achieve land... more
Sustainable development and climate change mitigation policies, Dunlap and Fairhead argue, have instigated and renewed old conflicts over land and natural resources, deploying military techniques of counterinsurgency to achieve land control. Wind energy development, a popular tool of climate change mitigation policies, has consequently generated conflict in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec (Istmo) region in Oaxaca, Mexico. Research is based on participant observation and 20 recorded interviews investigating the Fuerza y Energía Bíi Hioxo Wind Farm on the outskirts of Juchitán de Zaragoza. This paper details the repressive techniques employed by state, private and informal authorities against popular opposition to the construction of the Bíi Hioxo wind park on communal land. Providing background on Juchitán, social property and counterinsurgency in Southern Mexico, this paper analyzes the development of the Bíi Hioxo wind park. It further explores the emergence of ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ counterinsurgency techniques used to pacify resistance against the wind park, enabling its completion next to the Lagoon Superior in October 2014. Discussing the ‘greening of counterinsurgency’, this contribution concludes that the Bíi Hioxo wind park has spawned social divisions and violent conflict, and intervened in the sensitive cultural fabric of Istmeño life.
Research Interests: Sociology, Cultural Studies, Social Movements, Social Theory, Geography, and 28 moreHuman Geography, Cultural Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Latin American Studies, Anthropology, Indigenous Studies, Development Studies, Social Sciences, Climate Change, Political Theory, International Development, Postcolonial Studies, Political Ecology, Sustainable Development, Colonialism, Anarchist Studies, Rural Development, Resistance (Social), Ecology, Autonomy, Environmental Sustainability, Political Geography, Post-Development Theory, Political Ecology (Anthropology), DeGrowth, Mexico, Critical Agrarian Studies, and Cultural and Social Anthropology
This paper examines the normalized power and social effects of flushtoilets. Beginning by laying a theoretical foundation with the concepts of structural violence, primitive accumulation, and modernized poverty, the section continues by... more
This paper examines the normalized power and social effects of flushtoilets. Beginning by laying a theoretical foundation with the concepts of structural violence, primitive accumulation, and modernized poverty, the section continues by outlining William Dugger’s four invaluation processes as a framework of approach. Then, a brief history of flush-toilets is sketched before applying the four invaluation processes: contamination, subordination, emulation, and mystification. Flushtoilets are a complex infrasystem that appear to have a surreptitious organizational, social, and ecological effect that is compounded by some of the formulations and practices within the development industry. Notably with the United Nation “sanitation ladder,” Gary White and Matt Damon’s NGO Water.org and Damon’s subsequent “toilet strike.” Providing a reassessment of the social power inherent in flush-toilets, this paper contends that the flush-toilet infrasystem is an accomplice in infrastructural violence and can also be seen as aiding a strategy of primitive accumulation
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Social Movements, Social Theory, Geography, and 44 moreHuman Geography, Cultural Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Social Geography, Environmental Geography, Development Economics, Economic Geography, Institutional Economics, Green Economics, Anthropology, Medical Anthropology, Social Anthropology, Development Studies, Social Sciences, Climate Change, Political Theory, International Development, Climate Change Adaptation, Political Anthropology, Community Development, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Climate change policy, Cultural Theory, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Critical Social Theory, Anarchist Studies, Rural Development, Economic Development, Critical Geography, Climate Change Adaptation And Mitigation Strategies, Political Geography, Cultural Anthropology, Development, Critical Agrarian Studies, Critical Development Studies, Green Economy, Environmental Economics, Ecological Economics, Green Economy, Green Economy, Sustainable Development, Anarchist Economics, Thorstein Veblen, Economics of Sustainable Development, Green Economy, Ecosystem Services; Env Security and Governance, Green Economy and Inclusive Growth, and Instiutional Economics
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This paper provides a comparative analysis of agricultural biotechnology and the United Nations program for reduced emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD). Despite the existing differences between the technical... more
This paper provides a comparative analysis of agricultural biotechnology and the United Nations program for reduced emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD). Despite the existing differences between the technical manipulation of biological systems and a conservation program aimed at reducing carbon and protecting forests, the two share commonalities in ideological origin, application, and values. Presented as positive developments, both seek to address largescale issues such as global hunger and climate change, but while receiving national and international support they remain controversial issues. Both issues are critically assessed, beginning with a brief history, followed by the application of William Dugger’s four invaluation processes: contamination, subordination, emulation, and mystification. This approach unravels the subtle social power of state andmarket forces that seek to control genetic material and forest frontiers as new outlets for growth and investment.
Dunlap, Alexander (2015) "The Expanding Techniques of Progress: Agricultural Biotechnology & UN-REDD," Review of Social Economy, 73 (1): 89-112
Dunlap, Alexander (2015) "The Expanding Techniques of Progress: Agricultural Biotechnology & UN-REDD," Review of Social Economy, 73 (1): 89-112
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Policies addressing climate change are driving major transformations in access to global land, forests and water as they create new ‘green’ markets that reinforce, and attracts the financial grid and its speculators. This leads us to... more
Policies addressing climate change are driving major transformations in access to global land, forests and water as they create new ‘green’ markets that reinforce, and attracts the financial grid and its speculators. This leads us to examine the rise of state violence and subsequent environmental policies in forests, transferring into both ‘fortress’ and ‘participatory’ conservation, enhancing this relationship with new environmental commodity markets. We go on to document how the new and intensifying commodification of the environment associated with climate change is manifest in conflicts linked to the UN-REDD+ program, industrial tree plantations (ITPs), and land-use practices associated with conservation and biofuels. We trace conflicts to business practices associated with land acquisitions and mining practices which claim to address climate change and mitigate ecological crises. This paper thus grabbles with systemic issues of the modern industrial economy and the mechanisms legitimizing and advancing the militarization and marketization of nature.
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Rooted in Michel Foucault’s (2003: 15, 47) conception of politics—“[P]olitics is a continuation of war by other means”—this paper seeks to support and draw attention to the “primitive or permanent war” that underlies society in its modern... more
Rooted in Michel Foucault’s (2003: 15, 47) conception of politics—“[P]olitics is a continuation of war by other means”—this paper seeks to support and draw attention to the “primitive or permanent war” that underlies society in its modern manifestations. This inquiry into permanent warfare is broken down into five sections. The first, briefly answers the simple question raised by Paul Virilio (2012: 23): “By the way, who invented peace?” This section explores the social construction and evolution of peace as a concept and political lever. Second, goes to the ground, examining the planning of society, its construction and use of grids as a means to govern and manage populations. The third, considers Hanna Arendt’s “boomerang effects” that cross-pollinate repressive techniques and technologies between home countries and colonies, escalating repression and state control as it corresponds to resistance. Fourth, delves into counterinsurgency practices and techniques that have “boomeranged” back from colonial wars and the wars in the Middle East back to the United States and elsewhere. This section explores the rise of policing in the military and the militarization of police that flourishes an increasing disingenuous and manipulative social order. Finally, this paper concludes by drawing attention to the current intensification of internal colonization that continues the “permanent war” against people and populations.
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The green economy and ‘green growth’ are not solutions to ecological and climate catastrophe. The dominate trajectory of techno-industrial development has to be reconsidered and placed within ecological limits. The ‘social’, related to... more
The green economy and ‘green growth’ are not solutions to ecological and climate catastrophe. The dominate trajectory of techno-industrial development has to be reconsidered and placed within ecological limits. The ‘social’, related to environmental and climate justice, tends towards subordinating the ecological in the maintenance of modernist infrastructures, and thus towards breaking efforts to achieve socio ecological harmony. The following examines the realities of resource extractivism, but also tensions within academic debates on these matters. This entails locating an important ‘grey area’within these debates, which has significant implications for imagining pathways to address ecological and climate catastrophe. This grey area—questioning the difference between extractivism and industrialism—also persists within archetypal positions on land acquisition and shades of reform in environmental justice studies, and, to a lesser degree, in the (academic) decolonial literature. This chapter contends that environmental justice reinforces modernist development, necessitating and expanding extractivism and ecologically destructive infrastructures. By highlighting ambiguities in critical literatures, it seeks to provide political clarity, reinforcing personal and collective self-determination and, secondarily, to encourage public policy to begin taking climate catastrophe seriously.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, and 14 moreAnthropology, Political Economy, Development Studies, Social Sciences, Political Ecology, Political Science, Anarchism, Anarchist Studies, Environmental Justice, Political Geography, Political Ecology (Anthropology), DeGrowth, Postdevelopment Theory, and Critical Development Studies
Introduction Energy Democracies for Sustainable Futures has 36 chapters discussing the challenges, proposals, and hopes for cultivating energy transition and democracy. The book confronts the realities of "top-down" socio-technical... more
Introduction Energy Democracies for Sustainable Futures has 36 chapters discussing the challenges, proposals, and hopes for cultivating energy transition and democracy. The book confronts the realities of "top-down" socio-technical design, but also the possibilities for reconfiguring these relationships by democratizing energy development. The book's introduction frames the present socio-ecological situation within the history of hydrocarbon and nuclear development, before discussing the onset of renewable energy. This includes recognizing the expansive concerns related to participation, the possibilities for creating global energy transitions as well as the limitations of local politics. The book covers a wide breadth of topics. Part I examines the possibilities created by imagining energy systems differently. Karen Hudlet-Vazquez and colleagues remind us that community energy systems "can reproduce neoliberal values in relation to the roles of the state, the individual and participation," noting that "utopian" futures "can therefore have unexpected consequences." Karen Hudlet-Vazquez and colleagues, however, do not deny an endless amount of alternative energy system possibilities. Rudy Khsar and Ry Brennan demonstrate how decentralization is crucial to forming energy democracies. Brennan applying the bioregional concept to energy infrastructure shows how localizing energy production and consumption into "technoregions" can decrease dependence on decaying wildfire-prone high-tension power lines, meanwhile improving energy efficiency and decreasing consumption. This includes authors reimagining energy systems through social movements, expanded democratic and community governance practices. Part II explores solar transition in India, community adaptations of micro grids in Puerto Rico, and, as Caroline Wright shows, the difficult, but important energy justice possibilities held by energy cooperatives. Demonstrating the transparency, judicial and procedural challenges for offshore wind energy development in Brazil, Thomas Xavier and colleagues outline comprehensive procedural, participatory, and monitoring pathways to improve democratic processes and work toward energy justice. Taking another step toward critical engagement, Part III looks at the "insecurities" and "constraints" of energy democracy. Bidtah Becker and Dana Powell reveal how resource extractivism and energy development collide with CoVID-19 in Navajo territory, with the latter exaggerating existing "disconnection, intergenerational trauma, and infrastructural precarity." Following this is a look into the Argentinian side of the "lithium triangle," examining the impact of lithium mining necessary for the production of lithium-ion batteries instrumental for facilitating the so-called "green" energy transition. The chapters here turn to examine Q1 Q2 s0010 p0010 p0015 p0020 To protect the rights of the author(s) and publisher we inform you that this PDF is an uncorrected proof for internal business use only by the author(s), editor(s), reviewer(s), Elsevier and typesetter SPi. It is not allowed to publish this proof online or in print. This proof copy is the copyright property of the publisher and is confidential until formal publication. These proofs may contain colour figures. Those figures may print black and white in the final printed book if a colour print product has not been planned. The colour figures will appear in colour in all electronic versions of this book. Dunlap A. (2022) Conclusion: A Call to Action, Towards an Insurrection in Energy Research. In: Nadesan MH, Pasqualetti MJ and Keahey J (eds) Energy Democracies for Sustainable Futures. Amsterdam: Elsevier Academic, pp. 339-348 p0025 s0015 p0030 p0035 To protect the rights of the author(s) and publisher we inform you that this PDF is an uncorrected proof for internal business use only by the author(s), editor(s), reviewer(s), Elsevier and typesetter SPi. It is not allowed to publish this proof online or in print. This proof copy is the copyright property of the publisher and is confidential until formal publication. These proofs may contain colour figures. Those figures may print black and white in the final printed book if a colour print product has not been planned. The colour figures will appear in colour in all electronic versions of this book.
Research Interests: Geography, Cultural Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Anthropology, Development Studies, and 13 moreClimate Change, Renewable Energy, Political Ecology, Environmental Anthropology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Energy, Anarchist Studies, Energy and Environment, Environmental Sustainability, Political Geography, and Political Ecology (Anthropology)
The military and police are intimately related to ecological and climate catastrophe. Not only do repressive forces facilitate land grabbing, mining and establishing toxic industries, but they also necessitate these activities for their... more
The military and police are intimately related to ecological and climate catastrophe. Not only do repressive forces facilitate land grabbing, mining and establishing toxic industries, but they also necessitate these activities for their own equipment, vehicles, and, weapons, which damage ecosystems and socio-ecological relationships across the world. While limited in scope, this chapter heuristically explores the extractive cost of the military and the police. It reveals how they both serve to facilitate and preserve imperialism, coercion, class structures and white supremacy, which is inherently an ecological and extractive problem. This chapter examines the material requirements and ecological impacts of the military and police. While ignoring many technologies and repressive forces, it still indicates the severity of the ecological issues associated with policing and warfare that go largely unacknowledged today.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, Anthropology, and 14 moreDevelopment Studies, Climate Change, Renewable Energy, Political Ecology, Security, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Anarchist Studies, Police, Climate Change Adaptation And Mitigation Strategies, Environmental Sustainability, Political Geography, and Political Ecology (Anthropology)
‘Green’ resource extraction is often positioned as solution to biodiversity loss and anthropogenic climate change, based on green capitalist fantasies of de-coupled, or ‘sustainable’ industrial growth and ‘green mining.’ Anarchists, but... more
‘Green’ resource extraction is often positioned as solution to biodiversity loss and anthropogenic climate change, based on green capitalist fantasies of de-coupled, or ‘sustainable’ industrial growth and ‘green mining.’ Anarchists, but specifically green anarchists, have long been conscious of the green economic efforts to rebrand industrial and extractive operations. Providing a privileged lens to examine the green economy, anarchist political ecology is also able to stimulate imaginations and visions on how to immediately transform and appropriate industrial environments. This paper argues for an anarchist political ecology in assessing extractive projects and charting new directions in (re)imagining ecological, unruly and dignified futures. After discussing what an anarchist political ecology could look like, we draw on case studies of Europe’s largest opencast coal mine, the Hambach mine in Germany, and wind parks in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec region (Istmo) of Oaxaca, Mexico, to examine corporate/state strategies of greening resource extraction and repression. This requires critical engagement with fossil fuels extraction, but also renewable energy systems, as manifestations of a green energy-extraction nexus designed to preserve and expand the present industrial-financial system. We then discuss eco-anarchistic social change that challenges the organizational structures of the industrializing colonial model. From initiatives of replacing roads with gardens, developing strategies for experimenting with urban food autonomy and questioning the degree of electricity dependence, this paper seeks to further a discussion on creating radical openings to confront colonial organization and infrastructure that permeates human and nonhuman lives. As scholars, we need to challenge our statist and industrial subjectivities, while developing strategies to deal with corporate/state counter-mobilizations to undermine the current trajectory of ‘progress.’ This means working to maximize ecological and social harmony, while aiming for total liberation against the imposition of market-based environmentalism, ‘green extraction’ and corporate-state projects of social control, ecocide and social death.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, and 14 moreAnthropology, Development Studies, Philosophical Anthropology, Climate Change, Political Ecology, Political Science, Anarchism, Energy, Anarchist Studies, Social Ecology, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Anarcho-autonomism and political transformation, Critical Development Studies, and Renewable Energy and Climate Change
A revised version of the “End Green Delusions” essay (Verso, 2018), this chapter argues that there is no such thing as renewable energy, only fossil fuel+. Raw material resource extraction for so-called renewable energy development... more
A revised version of the “End Green Delusions” essay (Verso, 2018), this chapter argues that there is no such thing as renewable energy, only fossil fuel+. Raw material resource extraction for so-called renewable energy development relates to spreading socio-ecological degradation. Recognizing the supply chain costs for “renewable energy” as well as the socio-ecological impact of implementing wind parks, the chapter contends that fossil fuel+ is a more accurate description of “renewable energy”. Furthermore, it contends that fossil fuel+ infrastructures are breaking ecological and planetary cycles by harnessing the vitality of “renewable resources”. This means widening the lens of renewable energy’s “social acceptance” research to understand the socio-ecological chain of costs for fossil fuel+ development.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, Anthropology, and 14 moreDevelopment Studies, Social Sciences, Climate Change, Renewable Energy, Political Ecology, Infrastructure Planning, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Energy, Sustainable Rural Development, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Development, Cultural and Social Anthropology, and Renewable Energy and Climate Change
The following is an academic writing on social warfare. This project began some years ago with the intention to gain insight into this attractive term and was later put on paper to animate a theory of power that could discuss the old... more
The following is an academic writing on social warfare. This project began some years ago with the intention to gain insight into this attractive term and was later put on paper to animate a theory of power that could discuss the old subtle and evolving techniques of manipulation and management that are used against people in the present. This theory, if only briefly, seeks to sketch some techniques used to integrate political and economic systems into people’s lives, with the hope of making clear the blurred lines of social colonization and usurpation of life—both humans and nonhumans.
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This interview discusses energy justice, the university, academic research and autonomous politics. This dialogue expresses concern with energy, but also environmental, justice scholarship and movements. This entails the failure to... more
This interview discusses energy justice, the university, academic research and autonomous politics. This dialogue expresses concern with energy, but also environmental, justice scholarship and movements. This entails the failure to adequately connect the continuity between (neo)colonialism, capitalism and statism in theory and action, which simultaneously subordinates antiauthoritarian and autonomous politics to liberal academic frameworks (e.g. recognition, procedure, distribution). Extractive development is not adequately challenged by energy justice, meanwhile academic decolonial theory tend to ignore combative struggles and discussion in the Global South or North. Academic decolonial theory remains selective about struggles, simplifies them and/or remains detached from societies-inmovement, which results in tokenizing and ignoring the complexities of autonomous and insurrectionary struggle. Discussing a range of intense topics, this dialogue suggests the need to advance decolonial and anarchist critique of energy and environmental justice scholarship, suggesting the need to move away from justice framings and towards autonomous political conceptions.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, Latin American Studies, and 15 moreAnthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, Renewable Energy, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Energy, Anarchist Studies, Energy and Environment, Political Geography, Political Ecology (Anthropology), and Renewable Energy and Climate Change
Carlos Tornel's (2022) recent review article, "Decolonizing energy justice from the ground up," finally holds energy justice accountable. Energy justice, by emphasizing energy, creates its own niche and avoids the criticisms and... more
Carlos Tornel's (2022) recent review article, "Decolonizing energy justice from the ground up," finally holds energy justice accountable. Energy justice, by emphasizing energy, creates its own niche and avoids the criticisms and self-reflections made on environmental justice.
Research Interests: Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, Anthropology, Development Studies, and 10 moreClimate Change, Renewable Energy, Political Ecology, Community Development, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Energy, Energy and Environment, and Political Ecology (Anthropology)
Featuring Alexander Dunlap, interviewed by Professor Mariel Aguilar-Støen. Available online here: https://medium.com/colloquium/wind-energy-development-conflict-resistance-7cb5a15d95f1
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Anthropology, Development Studies, and 10 moreClimate Change, Renewable Energy, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Genocide Studies, Sustainable Development, Political Ecology (Anthropology), 'Decolonization' and the politics of settler state/Indigenous relations, Geogrpahy, and Decolonization
Revisiting the village of Álvaro Obregón, or Gui'Xhi' Ro in Zapotec, this interview discusses village life since the wind energy conflict of 2012-2015. This interview serves as a companion piece or epilogue to a previously published... more
Revisiting the village of Álvaro Obregón, or Gui'Xhi' Ro in Zapotec, this interview discusses village life since the wind energy conflict of 2012-2015. This interview serves as a companion piece or epilogue to a previously published article in the Journal of Political Ecology (JPE), titled: "Insurrection for land, sea and dignity: resistance and autonomy against wind energy in Álvaro Obregón, Mexico" (2018). The interview discusses the subsequent skirmishes, shootings, debates over state funds, impact of migration, schooling programs and cultural revitalization projects that are shaping the autonomous process taking shape in Gui'Xhi' Ro.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Social Movements, Social Theory, Geography, Human Geography, and 15 morePolitical Geography and Geopolitics, Latin American Studies, Anthropology, Philosophy, Development Studies, Peace and Conflict Studies, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Conflict, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Anarchist Studies, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Mexico, and Anarquismo
This paper was a critique of a paper, but also intended to trigger a debate from this critique around the political implications of Security Policy in the UK.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Social Theory, Geography, Human Geography, Anthropology, and 9 moreDevelopment Studies, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, International Security, Sustainable Development, Security Studies, Anarchist Studies, Security and development, and Critical Terrorism Studies
Reply in debate
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The generic template cover, £120 price point, no back cover description, and no paperback edition does a disservice to this book. If I had not systematically witnessed other mediocre books suffer this same fate, I would speculate that... more
The generic template cover, £120 price point, no back cover description, and no paperback edition does a disservice to this book. If I had not systematically witnessed other mediocre books suffer this same fate, I would speculate that this was industry censorship. This book deserves the widest possible readership, and expensive hardbacks inhibit distribution (though an ebook is available). Extractivism and Universality: Inside an Uprising in the Amazon offers crucial theoretical applications and methodological innovation, but also insights into politics, academic debates, and revolutionary struggle. While this review generates a dialogue, verging toward criticism, this book remains highly recommend. That is, if you can access it.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Social Theory, Geography, Human Geography, and 15 moreAnthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, Marxism, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Anarchist Studies, Political Geography, Cultural Anthropology, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Autonomist Marxism, and EXTRACTION
Isabelle Fremeaux & Jay Jordan. 2022. We are 'nature' defending itself: Entangling art, activism and autonomous zones. London, Pluto Press. 138 pp. + Endnotes and Index. £14.99(Paperback), ISBN 978-0-7453-4587-1 Reviewed by Alexander... more
Isabelle Fremeaux & Jay Jordan. 2022. We are 'nature' defending itself: Entangling art, activism and autonomous zones. London, Pluto Press. 138 pp. + Endnotes and Index. £14.99(Paperback), ISBN 978-0-7453-4587-1
Reviewed by Alexander Dunlap.
Reviewed by Alexander Dunlap.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, Cultural Geography, and 12 morePolitical Geography and Geopolitics, Anthropology, Development Studies, Political Theory, Contemporary Art, Political Ecology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Anarchist Studies, Political Ecology (Anthropology), and Visual Arts
Book Review by Alexander Dunlap on The Solutions are Already Here: Tactics for Ecological Revolution From Below, by Peter Gelderloos
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Political Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, and 13 moreAnthropology, Political Economy, Development Studies, Climate Change, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Anarchist Studies, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Autonomist Marxism, and Social Conflict
Research Interests: Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Anthropology, and 12 moreDevelopment Studies, Climate Change, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Genocide Studies, Political Science, Anarchism, Anarchist Studies, Political Geography, Cultural Anthropology, Political Ecology (Anthropology), and Critical Development Studies
This is a book review article of Ben McKay's (2020) book, The political economy of agrarian extractivism: Lessons from Bolivia. The article introduces and outlines the book, before acknowledging strengths, followed by offering critique... more
This is a book review article of Ben McKay's (2020) book, The political economy of agrarian extractivism: Lessons from Bolivia. The article introduces and outlines the book, before acknowledging strengths, followed by offering critique and discussing wider issues related to the concept of extractivism.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Geography, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Anthropology, and 15 moreDevelopment Studies, Political Ecology, Organic agriculture, Agrarian Studies, Peasant Studies, Sustainable Development, Permaculture, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Development, Decolonization, Critical Development Studies, Permaculture Design, Extractivismo, Political Ecology and Economy, and Renewable Energy and Climate Change
The Case for Degrowth is a short, accessible—even friendly—exhibition of degrowth history, ideas and proposals. Summarizing the book, the review expresses concern with how the book engages the Green New Deal, ignores anarchist... more
The Case for Degrowth is a short, accessible—even friendly—exhibition of degrowth history, ideas and proposals. Summarizing the book, the review expresses concern with how the book engages the Green New Deal, ignores anarchist contributions to social struggle and omits squatting as an existing degrowth pathway and form of political struggle. Despite these concerns, the book is another valuable contribution collectively authored by four leading degrowth scholars.
Research Interests: Geography, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Economics, Development Economics, and 14 moreAnthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, Political Ecology, Community Development, Ecological Economics, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Anarchist Studies, Political Ecology (Anthropology), DeGrowth, Squatting, Political Economy and History, and Renewable Energy and Climate Change
Conservation, as we all know, can do better at slowing ecological catastrophe, let alone stopping it. Yet it remains one of the most important concepts in terms of environmental policy, and climate change mitigation. The overall failures... more
Conservation, as we all know, can do better at slowing ecological catastrophe, let alone stopping it. Yet it remains one of the most important concepts in terms of environmental policy, and climate change mitigation. The overall failures of conservation, especially as it relates to the lesser-known issues (e.g. a tendency to be associated with militarization, mass displacement, ecotourism for the wealthy, and collaboration with extractive industries), emerge as the central point of intervention in The conservation revolution: radical ideas for saving nature beyond the Anthropocene.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, and 14 moreAnthropology, Political Economy, Development Studies, Climate Change, Ecotourism, Conservation Biology, Conservation, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Sustainable Development, Sustainable Tourism, Environmental Sustainability, Political Ecology (Anthropology), and Ecotourism and Sustainable Development
The Sterling Professor of Political Science and Anthropology at Yale University, James C. Scott stands as a highly influential anarchist anthropologist with a books including: Weapons of the Weak (1980), Seeing Like a State (1998) and The... more
The Sterling Professor of Political Science and Anthropology at Yale University, James C. Scott stands as a highly influential anarchist anthropologist with a books including: Weapons of the Weak (1980), Seeing Like a State (1998) and The Art of Not Being Governed (2009). Peter Gelderloos has not accommodated the university system in the same way. Instead positioning himself within self-organized spaces and the anarchist movement, Gelderloos is also, though more recently, a prolific anarchist author with books such as How Non-violence Protects the State (2007), Anarchy Works (2010) and The Failure of Nonviolence (2013) among others. From different generations and geographic locations (New England and Catalunya), one is positioned “inside” and the other “outside” the academy. Yet both authors share an anarchist identity and have coincidentally published books on the same topic, in the same year. These two well-known and respected authors have created a perfect storm to disrupt the narratives of the Leviathanic state, its origins and techniques of political control.
Research Interests: Social Movements, Geography, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Development Economics, and 15 moreAnthropology, Social Anthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Anarchist Studies, Resistance (Social), History of Anarchism, Social Movements (Political Science), Social movements and revolution, Political Geography, Cultural Anthropology, and Anarcho-autonomism and political transformation
Book Review: Jaume Franquesa. 2018. Power Struggles: Dignity, Value, and The Renewable Energy Frontier in Spain, Bloomington, University of Indiana Press.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Social Movements, Geography, Human Geography, Anthropology, and 15 moreSocial Anthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, Renewable Energy, Wind Energy, Political Anthropology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Iberian Studies, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Rural Development, Energy and Environment, Renewable energy resources, Environmental Sustainability, and Critical Development Studies
This is a book review of Anna Feigenbaum's (2017) Tear Gas: From the Battlefield of World War I to the Streets of Today, which offers a summary and discussion of the book.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Social Movements, Social Theory, Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, and 15 moreLatin American Studies, Anthropology, Development Studies, Environmental Geology, Political Ecology, Environmental Studies, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Anarchist Studies, Protest, Critical Geography, Social movements and revolution, and Political Ecology (Anthropology)
This is a book review by Alexander Dunlap of The Anarchist Roots of Geography: Toward Spatial Emancipation by Simon Springer Minnesota, Minnesota University Press, 2016
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Social Theory, Geography, Human Geography, Cultural Geography, and 15 morePolitical Geography and Geopolitics, Environmental Geography, Anthropology, Political Economy, Development Studies, Critical Geopolitics, Political Ecology, Political Anthropology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Anarchism, Anarchist Studies, Political Geography, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Anarchism & Postmodern Theory, and Political Ecology and Economy
Alexander Dunlap* reviews the book The ZAD and NoTAV: Territorial Struggles and the Making of a New Political Intelligence (Verso Books), by the Mauvaise Troupe Collective. See here:... more
Alexander Dunlap* reviews the book The ZAD and NoTAV: Territorial Struggles and the Making of a New Political Intelligence (Verso Books), by the Mauvaise Troupe Collective. See here: https://entitleblog.org/2018/09/06/the-politics-of-the-zad-and-notav/
Research Interests: Sociology, Social Movements, Social Theory, Geography, Human Geography, and 15 moreEnvironmental Geography, Anthropology, Social Anthropology, Development Studies, Political Theory, Political Ecology, Political Anthropology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Social Movement, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Anarchist Studies, Political Geography, Political Ecology (Anthropology), and Territory
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Social Theory, Geography, Human Geography, Cultural Geography, and 26 moreSocial Geography, Urban Geography, Environmental Geography, Latin American Studies, Development Economics, Economic Geography, Anthropology, Forensic Anthropology, Social Anthropology, Development Studies, International Development, Political Anthropology, Community Development, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Sustainable Development, Critical Social Theory, Anarchist Studies, Rural Development, Anthropology of Development, Political Geography, Mexico (Anthropology), Cultural Anthropology, Critical and Cultural Theory, US-Mexico Borderlands, Mexico, and Latin America
Excerpt from review: "The most impressive aspect of State Crime on the Margins of Empire is the level of detail regarding how Rio Tinto/BCL sparked a civil war and its role within a two year long counterinsurgency campaign. Rio Tinto/BCL... more
Excerpt from review: "The most impressive aspect of State Crime on the Margins of Empire is the level of detail regarding how Rio Tinto/BCL sparked a civil war and its role within a two year long counterinsurgency campaign. Rio Tinto/BCL is both familiar with counterinsurgency and has actively participated in coordinating war efforts with PNG and Australian government. This acknowledgment could re-situate the rise of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and The Global Mining Initiative (GMI) that encourage corporations to seek ‘social license’ to operate and rebrand mining activities as environmentally ‘sustainable’ (see Seagle, 2012). These initiatives are preemptive responses to the anticipated resistance (and potential insurgencies) generated by large-scale development and mining projects. Corporate social technologies emerge from a continuum of environmental warfare, representing a (manipulative) strategic adaptation to advance company interests, which simultaneously attempt to reduce the economic and social costs for participating (directly or indirectly) in ‘hard’ counterinsurgency campaigns."
Research Interests: Geography, Human Geography, Cultural Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Social Geography, and 34 moreEnvironmental Geography, Development Economics, Economic Geography, Anthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, Political Theory, Human Rights Law, Human Rights, Political Ecology, Climate Change Adaptation, State crime, Community Development, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Climate change policy, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, International Human Rights Law, Green Criminology, Anarchist Studies, Rural Development, Ecology, Critical Geography, Political Geography, Environmental Law and Human Rights, Cultural Anthropology, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Green, Criminology, White Collar Crime, State Crimes, Neo-extractivism, Extractivismo, Political Ecology and Economy, and Ecological Distribution Conflicts
Book Review of Licensed Larceny: Infrastructure, Financial extraction and the Global South by Nicholas Hildyard
Research Interests: Geography, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Social Geography, African Studies, and 20 moreAnthropology, Political Economy, Social Anthropology, Development Studies, International Development, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Environmental Anthropology, Green Infrastructure, Africa, Anarchist Studies, Rural Development, Cultural Anthropology, Infrastructure, Critical Agrarian Studies, Critical Development Studies, International Development Cooperation, Development Studies and Public Policy, International Aid and Development, and Anarchist Architecture
Book review of Redefining Genocide: Settler Colonialism, Social Death and Ecocide, by Damian Short
Research Interests: Sociology, Social Theory, Geography, Human Geography, Development Economics, and 17 moreAnthropology, Political Economy, Indigenous Studies, Development Studies, Political Ecology, Community Development, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Genocide Studies, Sustainable Development, Critical Social Theory, Indigenous Knowledge, Indigenous Peoples Rights, Indigenous Peoples, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Crtitical Theory, Holocaust and Genocide Studies, and Colonial Genocide
BOOK REVIEW Green Transformations or Rebranding Dystopia? The Politics of Green Transformations, edited by Ian Scoones, Melissa Leach, and Peter Newell, Oxford, Routledge, 2015, 220 pp. + Bibliography and Index, £25.49 GBP (Paperback),... more
BOOK REVIEW
Green Transformations or Rebranding Dystopia?
The Politics of Green Transformations, edited by Ian Scoones, Melissa Leach, and Peter Newell, Oxford, Routledge, 2015, 220 pp. + Bibliography and Index, £25.49 GBP (Paperback), ISBN 978-1-138-79290-6
Green Transformations or Rebranding Dystopia?
The Politics of Green Transformations, edited by Ian Scoones, Melissa Leach, and Peter Newell, Oxford, Routledge, 2015, 220 pp. + Bibliography and Index, £25.49 GBP (Paperback), ISBN 978-1-138-79290-6
Research Interests: Social Movements, Social Theory, Geography, Human Geography, Anthropology, and 11 morePolitical Economy, Development Studies, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Sustainable Development, Critical Social Theory, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Green Energy, Book Review, Critical Agrarian Studies, and Green and Sustainability Practices
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
This speech was given at the 10th Conference of Critical Justice in Latin America (X Conferencia Latinoamericana de Crítica Jurídica) on April 23, 2015 on a panel titled: “Rights, Dependency and Capitalist Accumulation in Latin America”... more
This speech was given at the 10th Conference of Critical Justice in Latin America (X Conferencia Latinoamericana de Crítica Jurídica) on April 23, 2015 on a panel titled: “Rights, Dependency and Capitalist Accumulation in Latin America” (Mesa Derecho, dependencia y acumulación capitalista en América Latina). Based on and builds from the paper, “The Militarisation and Marketisation of Nature: An Alternative Lens to ‘Climate-Conflict,” published in the Journal of Geopolitics special issue: Rethinking Climate Change, Conflict and Security. This speech, updated with some footnotes, which goes through the basic ideas of that paper and then discusses some examples of studying wind turbine development in the coastal area of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec region in Oaxaca Mexico, also known as the Istmo.
Research Interests:
Summarizing a recent conversation in Globalizations, this article seeks to provoke a dialogue on environmental and energy justice, political affinity, statism, everyday warfare and the concept of activism. See here:... more
Summarizing a recent conversation in Globalizations, this article seeks to provoke a dialogue on environmental and energy justice, political affinity, statism, everyday warfare and the concept of activism. See here: https://undisciplinedenvironments.org/2023/07/18/energy-justice-discussing-war-the-state-academia-and-activism/
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Geography, Human Geography, Anthropology, Development Studies, and 13 morePolitical Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Energy, Anarchist Studies, Environmental Justice, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Autonomist Marxism, Protest Movements, Postdevelopment Theory, and Energy justice
Below is a transcribed talk by Peter Gelderloos. This talk emerges from the book tour for The Solutions are Already Here: Strategies for an Ecological Revolution from Below. This talk polemically recapitulates themes within the book,... more
Below is a transcribed talk by Peter Gelderloos. This talk emerges from the book tour for The Solutions are Already Here: Strategies for an Ecological Revolution from Below. This talk polemically recapitulates themes within the book, advocating for an anti-authoritarian ecological revolution and, consequently, chastising the terms 'climate crisis' and Anthropocene. The lecture extends beyond the book's content. Confronting the audience and challenging its reader, the lecture delves into how authorities administer ecological crisis, which extends to criticizing the dominant institutions and science. This includes exploring how people are disembodied and separated from their habitats, thinking 'like a state' or planner, and, consequently, stifling their imaginations and working against revolutionary futures. This lecture also discusses the important qualities and directions for a decentralized ecological revolution from below, what to avoid, ideas to consider, and outlining a general direction for collective struggle.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Political Sociology, Social Theory, Geography, and 13 moreHuman Geography, Climate Change, Marxism, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Political Science, Anarchism, Anarchist Studies, Environmental Sustainability, Political Geography, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Green Anarchism, and Renewable Energy and Climate Change
SEE ONLINE HERE: https://www.sum.uio.no/forskning/blogg/terra-nullius/alexander-dunlap/degrowth-care-two-commentaries-worth-mentioning.html Degrowth debates increase with its popularity, but scholars favoring degrowth are starting to... more
SEE ONLINE HERE: https://www.sum.uio.no/forskning/blogg/terra-nullius/alexander-dunlap/degrowth-care-two-commentaries-worth-mentioning.html
Degrowth debates increase with its popularity, but scholars favoring degrowth are starting to raise concern with 'degrowth reformism' and its potential for cooptation by mainstream interests.
Degrowth debates increase with its popularity, but scholars favoring degrowth are starting to raise concern with 'degrowth reformism' and its potential for cooptation by mainstream interests.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Economics, Development Economics, Development Studies, Climate Change, and 14 morePostcolonial Studies, Political Ecology, Community Development, Genocide Studies, Ecological Economics, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Rural Development, Political Ecology (Anthropology), DeGrowth, Decolonial Thought, Steady-State Economy, Degrowth, Ecological Economics, Evolution of Economics, Sustainable Lifestyles, Behavioral Change, Human Development, Evolution of Consciousness, Intentional Communities, Grassroots Movements, FOUNEATION OF DEVELOPMENT STUDIES, and Renewable Energy and Climate Change
Why do degrowth intellectuals publicly neglect combative self-defense against “growth” projects? The connection between degrowth and anti-capitalist, autonomist and (ecological) anarchist movements exists, and it can be strengthened by... more
Why do degrowth intellectuals publicly neglect combative self-defense against “growth” projects? The connection between degrowth and anti-capitalist, autonomist and (ecological) anarchist movements exists, and it can be strengthened by acknowledging the legitimacy of a diversity of tactics as necessary pathways towards degrowing the techno-capitalist system and protecting habitats form infrastructural invasion.
See here: https://undisciplinedenvironments.org/2020/12/02/recognizing-the-de-in-degrowth/
See here: https://undisciplinedenvironments.org/2020/12/02/recognizing-the-de-in-degrowth/
Research Interests: Social Movements, Anthropology, Climate Change, Political Ecology, Ecological Economics, and 14 moreSustainable Development, Anarchism, Anarchist Studies, Resistance (Social), Climate Change Adaptation And Mitigation Strategies, Environmental Sustainability, Political Geography, Political Ecology (Anthropology), DeGrowth, Autonomia, Geogrpahy, Postdevelopment Theory, Protest and resistance, and Antiglobalization Social Movements
On 8 October 2019, riot police and other armed security forces violently evicted what had come to be known as L’Amassada, a ZAD (Zone-to-Defend) occupation in Saint-Victor-et-Melvieu in southern France. The following, written a year after... more
On 8 October 2019, riot police and other armed security forces violently evicted what had come to be known as L’Amassada, a ZAD (Zone-to-Defend) occupation in Saint-Victor-et-Melvieu in southern France. The following, written a year after the eviction, outlines the goals, structure, and accomplishments of the occupation as well as the political and environmental context of ongoing ZAD struggles against the economic and ecological destruction required by “green” development.
Available online: https://www.versobooks.com/blogs/4869-this-is-what-energy-transition-looks-like-l-amassada-eviction-one-year-later
Available online: https://www.versobooks.com/blogs/4869-this-is-what-energy-transition-looks-like-l-amassada-eviction-one-year-later
Research Interests: Social Movements, Geography, Anthropology, Climate Change, Renewable Energy, and 12 morePolitical Ecology, Climate Change Adaptation, Sustainable Development, Anarchist Studies, Energy and Environment, Climate Change Adaptation And Mitigation Strategies, Environmental Sustainability, Political Geography, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Anarcho-autonomism and political transformation, Autonomia, and Political Ecology and Economy
"[T]his article briefly examines how anarchism might be useful for decolonization: what is anarchist decolonization or decoloniality?" See online here:... more
"[T]his article briefly examines how anarchism might be useful for decolonization: what is anarchist decolonization or decoloniality?"
See online here: https://medium.com/tvergastein-journal/compost-the-colony-exploring-anarchist-decolonization-5e3f4301664a
See online here: https://medium.com/tvergastein-journal/compost-the-colony-exploring-anarchist-decolonization-5e3f4301664a
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Social Movements, Geography, Human Geography, Indigenous Studies, and 15 morePolitical Ecology, Anarchism, Critical Social Theory, Anarchist Studies, Protest, Environmental Sustainability, Political Ecology (Anthropology), 'Decolonization' and the politics of settler state/Indigenous relations, Decolonial Thought, Anarchy, Anarquismo, Decolonialidad, Modernity/coloniality/decoloniality, Antiglobalization Social Movements, and Nationalism and Decolonization
Despite its serious flaws, Jeff Gibbs’s documentary Planet of the Humans powerfully exposes how optimism for “renewable energy” transitions is misplaced, and how mainstream environmentalism is becoming a force for green capitalism. See... more
Despite its serious flaws, Jeff Gibbs’s documentary Planet of the Humans powerfully exposes how optimism for “renewable energy” transitions is misplaced, and how mainstream environmentalism is becoming a force for green capitalism.
See here: https://undisciplinedenvironments.org/2020/05/20/renewables-and-environmental-leaders-wont-save-us/
See here: https://undisciplinedenvironments.org/2020/05/20/renewables-and-environmental-leaders-wont-save-us/
Research Interests: Geography, Development Studies, Climate Change, Renewable Energy, Political Ecology, and 12 moreSustainable Development, Energy, Energy and Environment, Climate Change Adaptation And Mitigation Strategies, Environmental Sustainability, Wind Energy (Engineering), Political Ecology (Anthropology), Climate Change Impacts, Environmentalism, Protest Movements, Energy transition, and Renewable Energy and Climate Change
"El desarrollo de las energías renovables, principalmente las eólicas en el Istmo de Tehuantepec, "renuevan la destrucción" y ponen en jaque los derechos y las… leer más del autor SinEmbargo mayo 18, 2020 Figure: Las energías renovables... more
"El desarrollo de las energías renovables, principalmente las eólicas en el Istmo de Tehuantepec, "renuevan la destrucción" y ponen en jaque los derechos y las… leer más del autor SinEmbargo mayo 18, 2020 Figure: Las energías renovables al centro del debate.
See: https://www.sinembargo.mx/18-05-2020/3788207
See: https://www.sinembargo.mx/18-05-2020/3788207
Research Interests: Geography, Political Ecology, Political Science, Central America and Mexico, Political Ecology (Anthropology), and 10 moreBook Reviews, Ciencia Politica, Geografia, Cambio climático, Cooperación Internacional Para El Desarrollo, Energías Renovables, Medio Ambiente, Desarrollo Sustentable, América Latina, and Desarrollo Sociopolìtico cultural y econòmico
What does Controlavirus mean?
Available here: https://medium.com/tvergastein-journal/controlavirus-clarification-b203c79b2c1
Available here: https://medium.com/tvergastein-journal/controlavirus-clarification-b203c79b2c1
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Social Theory, Geography, Anthropology, Development Studies, and 11 moreGovernment, Political Ecology, Social Movement, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Urban Studies, Environmental Sustainability, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Urban Political Ecology, and COVID-19 PANDEMIC
The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) place a strong focus on "rule of law" and "good governance" in achieving sustainable development. But in practice these strategies often result in the expansion of degrading socio-ecological... more
The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) place a strong focus on "rule of law" and "good governance" in achieving sustainable development. But in practice these strategies often result in the expansion of degrading socio-ecological development practices.
Available here: https://www.sum.uio.no/forskning/blogg/terra-nullius/sustainable-development-goals-and-household-governance.html
Available here: https://www.sum.uio.no/forskning/blogg/terra-nullius/sustainable-development-goals-and-household-governance.html
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Social Theory, Geography, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, and 14 moreDevelopment Economics, Anthropology, Development Studies, Political Ecology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, United Nations, Environmental Justice, Environmental Sustainability, Cultural Anthropology, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Counterinsurgency, Political Ecology and Economy, and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
The degradation, conflict and cumulative climatic effects of industrial expansion demand a new language to identify extractive and infrastructural megaprojects. We are not dealing with "development", but with deranged worms, octopuses and... more
The degradation, conflict and cumulative climatic effects of industrial expansion demand a new language to identify extractive and infrastructural megaprojects. We are not dealing with "development", but with deranged worms, octopuses and the construction of Worldeater(s).
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Geography, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Development Studies, and 11 moreSocial Sciences, Climate Change, Renewable Energy, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Anthroplogy, Political Ecology and Economy, and Renewable Energy and Climate Change
As a researcher who has worked in these areas since January 2015, it is clear that the earthquakes underscored the importance of natural Zapotec buildings and design as a key mechanism of community wellness. But that story cannot be told... more
As a researcher who has worked in these areas since January 2015, it is clear that the earthquakes underscored the importance of natural Zapotec buildings and design as a key mechanism of community wellness. But that story cannot be told without looking at how wind farms in the region are often in direct conflict with traditional building styles.
Available here: https://towardfreedom.org/story/disaster-breeds-disaster-in-oaxaca/
Available here: https://towardfreedom.org/story/disaster-breeds-disaster-in-oaxaca/
Research Interests: Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Anthropology, Social Anthropology, Development Studies, and 15 moreRenewable Energy, Wind Energy, Community Resilience, Climate Change Adaptation, Resilience, Community Development, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Sustainable Development, Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), Resilience (Sustainability), Disaster Management, Green architecture, Oaxaca (Anthropology), Geogrpahy, and Human Geogrpahy
Research Interests: Mexico, Colonialismo, Resiliencia, Cambio climático, Philosophia, and 14 moreEnergías Renovables, Medio Ambiente, Capitalismo, Teoría Crítica, Relacion Medio Ambiente Y Sociedad, América Latina, Teoria Crítica Social, Desarrollo sostenible, Economia Verde, Neoliberalismo, Post Extractivismo Y Derechos De La Naturaleza, Ciencias De La Tierra, Extractivismo, and Las “Economías De Frontera” En La Historia Del Capitalismo
Bernie’s Green New Deal (GND) is not a clear-cut green capitalist swindle. Instead, it is an impressive environmental policy vision that retains serious miscalculations that demand immediate consideration and redress. See here:... more
Bernie’s Green New Deal (GND) is not a clear-cut green capitalist swindle. Instead, it is an impressive environmental policy vision that retains serious miscalculations that demand immediate consideration and redress.
See here: https://www.sum.uio.no/forskning/blogg/terra-nullius/green-new-deal-part-II-good-bad-and-the-ugly.html
See here: https://www.sum.uio.no/forskning/blogg/terra-nullius/green-new-deal-part-II-good-bad-and-the-ugly.html
Research Interests: Sociology, Geography, Anthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, and 15 morePolitical Ecology, Climate Change Adaptation, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Climate change policy, Political Science, Anarchism, Green Marketing, Green architecture, Green New Deal, New Social Movements, Green Movement, Environmentalism, Sutainable Development, Clean technologies innovation and introduction, Political Ecology and Economy, Renewable Energy and Climate Change, and Public Policy
The Green New Deal has serious implications for rural landscapes. In fact, GND is not all that “green” and risks exaggerating extractive activities. Published on Terra Nullius Blog:... more
The Green New Deal has serious implications for rural landscapes. In fact, GND is not all that “green” and risks exaggerating extractive activities.
Published on Terra Nullius Blog: https://www.sum.uio.no/forskning/blogg/terra-nullius/preliminary-comments-on-the-green-new-deal-part-i-.html
Published on Terra Nullius Blog: https://www.sum.uio.no/forskning/blogg/terra-nullius/preliminary-comments-on-the-green-new-deal-part-i-.html
Research Interests: Geography, Human Geography, Development Economics, Economic Geography, Anthropology, and 10 moreDevelopment Studies, Climate Change, Political Ecology, Climate Change Adaptation, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Sustainable Development, Green Economy & Green Jobs Perspectives, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Geogrpahy, and Green Technology
Using anarchist critique to unearth the ‘roots’ of authoritarian populism can offer a productive gateway for understanding the origins and continuation of socio-ecological and economic crises.... more
Using anarchist critique to unearth the ‘roots’ of authoritarian populism can offer a productive gateway for understanding the origins and continuation of socio-ecological and economic crises.
https://entitleblog.org/2019/02/07/reflections-on-authoritarian-populism-democracy-technology-and-ecological-destruction/
https://entitleblog.org/2019/02/07/reflections-on-authoritarian-populism-democracy-technology-and-ecological-destruction/
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Social Theory, Geography, Human Geography, and 15 morePolitical Geography and Geopolitics, Anthropology, Development Studies, Political Ecology, Political Anthropology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Political Science, Anarchism, Anarchist Studies, Populism, Resistance (Social), Political Geography, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Authoritarianism, and Post-Anarchism
The Peruvian state is laying military siege to enforce extraction operations; ironically, land defenders are the ones branded as terrorists.
https://entitleblog.org/2018/06/14/two-tales-of-terrorism-from-the-tia-maria-conflict-peru/
https://entitleblog.org/2018/06/14/two-tales-of-terrorism-from-the-tia-maria-conflict-peru/
Research Interests: Geography, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Social Geography, Latin American Studies, and 27 moreDevelopment Economics, Anthropology, Social Anthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, Political Ecology, Climate Change Adaptation, Community Development, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Climate change policy, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Anarchist Studies, Rural Development, Anthropology of Development, Climate Change Adaptation And Mitigation Strategies, Political Geography, Peruvian History, Cultural Anthropology, Political Ecology (Anthropology), Anthropology of Peru, Geogrpahy, Latin America, Critical Agrarian Studies, Latinoamerica, South America, and Climate Change in Developing Countries
Industrial-scale renewable energy does nothing to remake exploitative relationships with the earth, and instead represents the renewal and expansion of the present capitalist order. Read here:... more
Industrial-scale renewable energy does nothing to remake exploitative relationships with the earth, and instead represents the renewal and expansion of the present capitalist order.
Read here: https://www.versobooks.com/blogs/3797-end-the-green-delusions-industrial-scale-renewable-energy-is-fossil-fuel
Read here: https://www.versobooks.com/blogs/3797-end-the-green-delusions-industrial-scale-renewable-energy-is-fossil-fuel
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Social Theory, Geography, Human Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, and 40 moreEnvironmental Geography, Latin American Studies, Anthropology, International Relations, Social Anthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, International Studies, International Development, Wind Energy, Geopolitics, Climate Change Adaptation, Social and Cultural Anthropology, International Security, Climate change policy, Environmental Anthropology, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, International Political Economy, Anarchist Studies, Rural Development, Critical Geography, Extractive industries (Economic Anthropology), Anthropology of Development, Climate Change Adaptation And Mitigation Strategies, Political Geography, Mexico (Anthropology), Environmental Security, Latin American Cultural Studies, Post-Anarchism, Mexico, México, Latin America, Solar & Wind Energy, Climate Change and Food Security, EXTRACTION, Interntional Relation, Climate change adaptation measures, Climate Change in Developing Countries, and Anthropology of Infrastructure
This is a blog post on the Standplaats Wereld anthropology website that discusses extraction and the politics of anthropology turning a blind eye to the impacts of the green economy. SEE LINK:... more
This is a blog post on the Standplaats Wereld anthropology website that discusses extraction and the politics of anthropology turning a blind eye to the impacts of the green economy.
SEE LINK: http://standplaatswereld.nl/2017/11/24/spreading-sacrifice-areas-in-anthropology/
SEE LINK: http://standplaatswereld.nl/2017/11/24/spreading-sacrifice-areas-in-anthropology/
Research Interests: Geography, Human Geography, Cultural Geography, Political Geography and Geopolitics, Social Geography, and 26 moreEnvironmental Geography, Development Economics, Economic Geography, Anthropology, Forensic Anthropology, Medical Anthropology, Social Anthropology, Development Studies, Climate Change, International Development, Climate Change Adaptation, Political Anthropology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Climate change policy, Anthropology of Food, Sustainable Development, Critical Geography, Climate Change Adaptation And Mitigation Strategies, Political Geography, Cultural Anthropology, Development, Sustainable Developments, Climate Change Impacts, Green Technology, Green Energy, and Climate Change and Food Security
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An essay version of a speech: The Green Economy is the Continuation of War By Other Means, published on the Capitalism, Nature, Socialism (CNS) Website, Febuary 2, 2016.
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This op-ed article briefly summarized the conflict over wind energy development in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, Mexico. Published online at CounterPunch on June 4, 2015 this article was written in the mists of social upheaval over... more
This op-ed article briefly summarized the conflict over wind energy development in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, Mexico. Published online at CounterPunch on June 4, 2015 this article was written in the mists of social upheaval over elections in Southern Mexico, where the town of Alvaro Obregon, fending off industrial wind turbine and fighting for indigenous autonomy, was facing threat of military occupation.
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This paper charts outlines the way states and market mechanisms continuously expand their organizations and processes against human and non-human life. This is done using a complex mixture of coercive force, social engineering, and... more
This paper charts outlines the way states and market mechanisms continuously expand their organizations and processes against human and non-human life. This is done using a complex mixture of coercive force, social engineering, and concessions that has created a self-perpetuating ‘social machine’ that harnesses people and their vital forces. Broken down into four sections, this paper begins with the recent history of the 1940s to discuss the formal national security concern of isolation, in first the village and later the inner city. The third section will bring up some fundamental traits and processes that propel the industrial economy and individual obedience to a system of subjugation that regiments dependency and addiction. Finally the paper will conclude with a brief discussion of the total war of integration as a means to harness people for the perpetuation of an industrial state and its economic system.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Cultural Studies, Geography, Human Geography, Cultural Geography, and 20 moreAnthropology, Media and Cultural Studies, Development Studies, Political Theory, International Development, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Critical Social Theory, Colonialism, Anarchist Studies, Modernity, 'Decolonization' and the politics of settler state/Indigenous relations, Colonization, Decolonization, Infrastructure, Critical Social Research, Space Colonization, Modernity/coloniality/decoloniality, Colonialism and Imperialism, and Nationalism and Decolonization
Industrial infrastructure has come to embody the notion of modernization, while mainstream development industries seek to spread modern infrastructures. With the increased militarization of cities north and south of the globe, the... more
Industrial infrastructure has come to embody the notion of modernization, while mainstream development industries seek to spread modern infrastructures. With the increased militarization of cities north and south of the globe, the question of “infrastructural violence”—the violence of architecture and city planning—comes into question. What has been the history and outcome of developing modern infrastructure? While acknowledging the tremendous natural environmental cost incurred by developing and operating modern infrastructure, the focus of this inquiry are the techniques of spatial control used to further the modern industrial economy. This means assessing the structural process of progress that established modern cities. Using a historical genealogical approach and focusing primarily on the progression of European and American spatial control techniques, this paper seeks to draw a connection between linear perspective, war and modernity. In support of Paul Virilio ([1983]), this paper argues that war—both low and high-intensity—is the vehicle of urban planning and progress, while commerce is its engine stabilising and propelling the social relations embodied in the various manifestations of the shopping mall. Infrastructural control and its continued trends create a global export and standard for modernization, which appears to establish and advance the progression of internal colonization.
[*Seeking Interested Journal]
[*Seeking Interested Journal]
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Social Theory, Human Geography, Development Studies, International Development, and 20 moreCommunity Development, War Studies, Infrastructure Planning, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Critical Social Theory, International Political Economy, Anarchist Studies, Colonisation, Decolonisation and Regional/ Global Integration, 'Decolonization' and the politics of settler state/Indigenous relations, Settler Colonial Studies, Warfare, Colonization, Spatial planning, Decolonization, Infrastructure, Socio-Spatial Control, Critical Information Infrastructure Protection, Space Colonization, and Nationalism and Decolonization
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Providing a glimpse into the reality of wind energy development, the story of Álvaro Obregón is one of resistance. Álvaro Obregón is a primarily Zapotec semi-subsistence community located near the entrance of the Santa Teresa sand bar... more
Providing a glimpse into the reality of wind energy development, the story of Álvaro Obregón is one of resistance. Álvaro Obregón is a primarily Zapotec semi-subsistence community located near the entrance of the Santa Teresa sand bar (Barra), where in 2011 Mareña Renovables initiated the process of building 102 wind turbines. Demonstrating the complicated micro-politics of land acquisition, conflict and unrest, this article argues that climate change mitigation initiatives are sparking land grabs and conflict with the renewed valuation of wind resources. Insurrection against the Mareña Renovables wind project has spawned a long-term conflict, which has created social divisions and a type of low-intensity civil war within the town. This article will chronicle the uprising against the wind company, battles with police, and the town hall takeover, which includes analyzing the conflict taking place between the cabildo comunitario and the constitucionalistas. Subsequent sections examine the different perspectives within the village and how this battle between the Communitarians and the wind company continues today. The article reveals the complications associated with land deals, the conflict generating potential of climate change mitigation practices and, finally, concludes by reflecting on the difficulties of formulating alternatives to development within a conflict situation.
L"histoire d"Álvaro Obregón, dans le panorama des différents projets de développement de l"énergie éolienne, est une histoire de résistance. Álvaro Obregón est une communauté semi-autonome zapotèque près de l"entrée du bar de sable de Santa Teresa à Oaxaca, au Mexique. Là, en 2011, Mareña Renovables a commencé le processus de construction de 102 éoliennes. Élaborant les micropolitiques compliquées de l"acquisition des terres, des conflits et de l"agitation, l"article soutient que les initiatives visant à atténuer les effets du changement climatique conduisent souvent à l"expropriation des terres et aux conflits sociaux. La résistance au projet Mareña Renovables a conduit à un conflit prolongé, créant des divisions sociales et une sorte de guerre civile de faible intensité. L"article reconstruit chronologiquement la résistance contre l"entreprise, les batailles avec la police et l"occupation de la municipalité, et comprend une analyse du conflit entre deux partis locaux, le conseil de la communauté et les constitutionnalistes. Les sections suivantes examinent ces différentes perspectives au sein de la communauté et reconstruisent la façon dont la bataille entre la communauté et l"entreprise s"est poursuivie. L"article révèle ainsi toutes les complications qui se présentent dans des cas comme les conflits fonciers, la possibilité de générer des conflits forts à cause des pratiques visant à atténuer les changements climatiques et la réflexion sur les difficultés de formulation d"alternatives de développement. dans des situations de conflit.
La historia de Álvaro Obregón, dentro del panorama de diferentes proyectos de desarrollo de energía eólica, es una historia de resistencia. Álvaro Obregón es una comunidad zapoteca, semi autosustentable, ubicada cerca a la entrada de la barra de arena Santa Teresa, en Oaxaca, México. Allí, en 2011, la empresa Mareña Renovables inició el proceso de construcción de 102 turbinas eólicas. Exponiendo las complicadas micro-políticas de adquisición de tierras, del conflicto y la agitación, el artículo sostiene que iniciativas para mitigar efectos del cambio climático, muchas veces llevan a la expropiación de tierras y conflictos sociales. Resistencia contra el proyecto de Mareña Renovables llevó a un prolongado conflicto, creando en esta población, divisiones sociales y una suerte de guerra civil de baja intensidad. El artículo reconstruye cronológicamente la resistencia contra la empresa, las batallas con la policía, y la ocupación de la municipalidad, e incluye un análisis del conflicto entre dos partidos locales, el cabildo comunitario y los constitucionalistas. Las siguientes secciones examinan estas diferentes perspectivas dentro de la comunidad, y cómo la batalla entre los comunitarios y la empresa ha persistido hasta hoy. El artículo así revela todas la complicaciones que surgen en casos como éste, cubriendo temas como conflictos sobre tierra, el potencial de generar fuertes conflictos a causa de prácticas dirigidas a atenuar cambios climáticos, y concluye con una reflección sobre las dificultades de formular alternativas de desarrollo dentro de situaciones de conflicto.
L"histoire d"Álvaro Obregón, dans le panorama des différents projets de développement de l"énergie éolienne, est une histoire de résistance. Álvaro Obregón est une communauté semi-autonome zapotèque près de l"entrée du bar de sable de Santa Teresa à Oaxaca, au Mexique. Là, en 2011, Mareña Renovables a commencé le processus de construction de 102 éoliennes. Élaborant les micropolitiques compliquées de l"acquisition des terres, des conflits et de l"agitation, l"article soutient que les initiatives visant à atténuer les effets du changement climatique conduisent souvent à l"expropriation des terres et aux conflits sociaux. La résistance au projet Mareña Renovables a conduit à un conflit prolongé, créant des divisions sociales et une sorte de guerre civile de faible intensité. L"article reconstruit chronologiquement la résistance contre l"entreprise, les batailles avec la police et l"occupation de la municipalité, et comprend une analyse du conflit entre deux partis locaux, le conseil de la communauté et les constitutionnalistes. Les sections suivantes examinent ces différentes perspectives au sein de la communauté et reconstruisent la façon dont la bataille entre la communauté et l"entreprise s"est poursuivie. L"article révèle ainsi toutes les complications qui se présentent dans des cas comme les conflits fonciers, la possibilité de générer des conflits forts à cause des pratiques visant à atténuer les changements climatiques et la réflexion sur les difficultés de formulation d"alternatives de développement. dans des situations de conflit.
La historia de Álvaro Obregón, dentro del panorama de diferentes proyectos de desarrollo de energía eólica, es una historia de resistencia. Álvaro Obregón es una comunidad zapoteca, semi autosustentable, ubicada cerca a la entrada de la barra de arena Santa Teresa, en Oaxaca, México. Allí, en 2011, la empresa Mareña Renovables inició el proceso de construcción de 102 turbinas eólicas. Exponiendo las complicadas micro-políticas de adquisición de tierras, del conflicto y la agitación, el artículo sostiene que iniciativas para mitigar efectos del cambio climático, muchas veces llevan a la expropiación de tierras y conflictos sociales. Resistencia contra el proyecto de Mareña Renovables llevó a un prolongado conflicto, creando en esta población, divisiones sociales y una suerte de guerra civil de baja intensidad. El artículo reconstruye cronológicamente la resistencia contra la empresa, las batallas con la policía, y la ocupación de la municipalidad, e incluye un análisis del conflicto entre dos partidos locales, el cabildo comunitario y los constitucionalistas. Las siguientes secciones examinan estas diferentes perspectivas dentro de la comunidad, y cómo la batalla entre los comunitarios y la empresa ha persistido hasta hoy. El artículo así revela todas la complicaciones que surgen en casos como éste, cubriendo temas como conflictos sobre tierra, el potencial de generar fuertes conflictos a causa de prácticas dirigidas a atenuar cambios climáticos, y concluye con una reflección sobre las dificultades de formular alternativas de desarrollo dentro de situaciones de conflicto.
Research Interests: Climate Change, Wind Energy, Political Ecology, Sustainable Development, Cambio climático, and 17 moreResistance, Ecología Política, Oaxaca, Resistencia, Ecologia Política, Changement Climatique, Développement Durable, écologie Politique, Résistance, Energia Eólica, Desarrollo sostenible, Cambio Climatico, Green Grabbing, Álvaro Obregón, énergie éolienne, poignée verte, and agarre verde
Replying to criticism to the term infrastructural colonization, this commentary article discusses the colonial and how colonization is conceived. Infrastructural colonization, as opposed to colonialism, takes a literal approach to... more
Replying to criticism to the term infrastructural colonization, this commentary article discusses the colonial and how colonization is conceived. Infrastructural colonization, as opposed to colonialism, takes a literal approach to territorial control, landscape and socio-cultural change, exploring the literal colonization of habitats, people, social fabrics and more-than-human networks. Colonization-discrimination, control and extraction-operates on numerous scales and across various actors and places, accumulating into large-scale irreparable socioecological consequences. While it should not be conflated with (settler) colonialism, infrastructural colonization seeks to identify the roots and mechanisms of the colonial model, specifically how habitats and peoples are captured, psycho-politically captivated and together accumulated into an extractivist political economy. As an approach, infrastructural colonization implicitly recognizes state formation as colonialism, statism as (neo)colonialism and the state as colonial model(s). States, in their relative diversity, are understood as a structure of political and socioecological conquest.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, Sociology, Geography, Human Geography, Cultural Geography, and 12 morePolitical Geography and Geopolitics, Anthropology, Political Economy, Development Studies, Political Ecology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Political Science, Sustainable Development, Anarchism, Environmental Sustainability, Political Geography, and Political Ecology (Anthropology)
Revisiting the village of Álvaro Obregón, or Gui'Xhi' Ro in Zapotec, this interview discusses village life since the wind energy conflict of 2012-2015. This interview serves as a companion piece or epilogue to a previously published... more
Revisiting the village of Álvaro Obregón, or Gui'Xhi' Ro in Zapotec, this interview discusses village life since the wind energy conflict of 2012-2015. This interview serves as a companion piece or epilogue to a previously published article in the Journal of Political Ecology (JPE), titled: "Insurrection for land, sea and dignity: resistance and autonomy against wind energy in Álvaro Obregón, Mexico" (2018). The interview discusses the subsequent skirmishes, shootings, debates over state funds, impact of migration, schooling programs and cultural revitalization projects that are shaping the autonomous process taking shape in Gui'Xhi' Ro.