The Amazon fires are Bolsonaro’s political crimes and call for urgent action

By "Political Ecology from the South/Abya Yala" Working Group of the Latin American Social Science Council (CLACSO) (scroll down for translations into Español, Portuges, Français, e Italiano; you can add your signature here) The recent images of fires in the Amazon, in Pantanal, Cerrado and Chaco as well as the smoke clouds hovering over São …

Traveling abroad to “save” the planet

By Laura Betancur Alarcón White savior complex, elite studies in the green Scandinavia and other millennial adventures. Can the political ecology approach shed light on the incongruities, flaws and political struggles behind “traveling abroad to save the world”? I am attending a sustainability class in one of the best universities in the world. A ‘privilege’ …

Who is guarding whom?

By Mihnea Tanasescu Does good environmentalism mean humans have to become guardians of nature? Triggered by her research in New Zealand, Mihnea Tanasescu reflects on this idea, which is so widespread as to go unnoticed. If you happen to visit the Wanganui  river or Te Urewera, the ancestral Tūhoe homeland in Aotearoa New Zealand’s North Island, you …

The planned development of Hellenikon: A sacrifice that needs to be contested

What will happen in the area of ​​the former Hellenikon airport and the coast of Ag. Kosmas is not only an issue that concerns the inhabitants of the neighboring municipalities. It transgresses locality - affecting all citizens of Athens - and it questions environmental justice in the city, the access to green and blue amenities, and …

Negotiating longing and despair as frontier citizens of the Indian State

By Mabel Gergan * Mabel Gergan reflects on the shifting relationship between the Indian State and its North-Eastern and Himalayan frontier, exploring the colonial roots of racial discrimination in Indian cities and activist critiques of ongoing development interventions in the region. “The subject of the state is caught and impaled between the longing for justice …

Tania Murray Li: There is no one trajectory of development

The world’s global institutions and governments with decision power on the future of millions of people living in rural areas want to continue with business as usual: industrialization and urbanization. Number two of a two-part video interview with Tania Murray Li. Tania Murray Li, Professor of Anthropology, Canada Research Chair in the Political-Economy and Culture of …

Let’s Degrow Up and Grow Down!

By François Schneider * François Schneider responds to Miklos Antal's criticism of the use of the term degrowth for the alternative economics movement. One of the main critiques of degrowth has been the so-called 'negative' connotation of the term. People understand the term, and very often even agree with the idea it brings, but they are …

Hurricane Matthew is just the latest unnatural disaster to strike Haiti

By Jason von Meding and Giuseppe Forino* In the wake of hurricane Matthew, destruction and suffering in Haiti has returned to the headlines. If we don't acknowledge that the roots of risk and vulnerability lie in colonial history and structural injustice we will see this happening again and again. At least 1,000 people were killed …

‘Green’ development and democracy? Hydropower in Northeast India

Hydropower projects, disguised and depoliticized as green and sustainable, are being imposed as a development solution across the Himalayas. The dam conflicts presented here illustrate how civil society groups have become political actors, rising up against assaults on democracy.* Source: NHPC. Climate change has set an imperative for economies around the world to revise their …

Diarrhoea and sanitation: let’s get over “panacea” approaches to disease

by Panagiota Kotsila About a year ago, journalist Rose George gave a TED-talk about sanitation and diarrhoea in which she invited people to “talk crap, seriously” and got almost 1.5 million views. Today, after four years of researching this topic, I realize we need to question George’s speech. It is indeed a frustrating reality that …