Class contents. European Space Agency Sociology of the Environment. Environment vs nature

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1 Sociology Module SOC 3067: Sociology of the Environment Cover photograph: Typhoon Yagi, heading west across the Pacific Ocean on a path toward Tokyo, Sept, 21, 2006 Session I: Introduction. Sociology and the environment: mapping the field Prof José Esteban Castro School of Geography, Politics and Sociology European Space Agency 4 February 2009 Class contents Sociology and the environment Environment vs nature Environment and nature in social theory Sociology and interdisciplinary environmental research j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 3 Sociology and the environment Researching the causes of environmental problems Understanding and explaining the raise of environmental awareness and social action about environmental problems Hannigan Exploring how patterns of social relationships, cultural forms, political practices and economic institutions are interwoven with environmental change Benton and Redclift j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 4 Environmental sociology explanations (examples) Environmental sociology explanations (examples) On the causes of environmental destruction Ecological explanations e.g. Catton and Dunlap s theory of competing environmental functions The environment as supply depot, living space, and waste repository On the causes of environmental destruction political economy explanations e.g. Schnaiberg s theory of the treadmill of production A self-reinforcing mechanism driven by the search for private profit that leads to unsustainable levels of environmental degradation j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 5 j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 6 1

2 Environmental sociology explanations (examples) On the raise of environmental awareness and social action The reflection hypothesis e.g. Dunlap and Scarce s link between evidence of environmental degradation and the rise of environmental mobilization since the 1970s The post-materialist hypothesis e.g. Inglehart s argument about post-materialist values The new social movements hypothesis Let s move back for some conceptual clarification Environment? Nature? Ecological? What is their link with sociology? Environmental mobilization arising from internal tensions in Western society (e.g. Habermas) j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 7 j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 8 Environment vs nature Nature as opposed to environment Environment or nature Nature Nature as an abstract conception of the nonhuman world (the conditions of life in general) Environment as the most immediate surrounding elements and conditions Environment of subject A Subject A Environment as a relational concept j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 9 j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 10 Environment or nature However, environment is also used to mean the non-human world = nature (entities, species, ) the surrounding (what surrounds or environs) the non-natural, artificial world (human, social, built environment) Nature/natural Human and non-human nature Positive and negative connotations Nature as pristine and untouched vs Nature as wild and backward Environment or nature Nature vs nurture human nature as given, unalterable internal essence vs human or social environment as external influence j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 11 j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 12 2

3 Environment and nature in social theory Criticism directed by some authors to classical social science: the environment taken as a background of human history predominant anthropocentric approach This would have been the result of a reaction to the influence of biological thinking in the social sciences Reaction from humanist traditions of social thought Insistence on distinctiveness between the social and natural orders how do we open up to investigation the relationship between humans and the rest of nature, without letting in the Trojan Horse of biological determinism? (Benton and Redclift, 1994: 4) j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 13 j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 14 Dualistic oppositions characterizing classical sociological thought about the environment (+ gendered) mind culture artificial human [reason] [subject/ivity] [men] matter nature natural non human [emotion] [object/ivity] [women] The natural-artificial continuum green approaches (naturalness) technocentric approaches PRISTINE NATURE HUMAN-MADE OR PERFECTED NATURE j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 15 j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 16 The superiority of the artificial If the artificial is not better than the natural, to what end are all the arts of life? John Stuart Mill Pre-modern and modern strands (perfecting nature; technological determinism..) The naturalist-constructionist divide The environment as given, neutral, objective vs. The environment as constructed t by humans within alternative frames of reference (e.g. urban, rural, etc.) Conceptual vs. material of construction j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 17 j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 18 3

4 Main trends Naturalistic Reductionism Malthusianism Deep Green ecology Ecofeminism (essentialist) Technological Determinism Scientific knowledge autonomous, progressive, tool for mastering nature Extreme forms: Promethean, Cornucopian or optimistic technological determinism Managerialist technological environmentalism Sociological reductionism Oversocialized views of humanity and nature (Benton) Mainstream and critical approaches Examples of critical and mainstream approaches Naturalist Social Constructionist Critical Anarchism, (e.g. Kropotkin) Marxism Political ecology Mainstream Malthusianism Sociobiology Neoclassical economics Barry, The challenge of interdisciplinarity The challenge of interdisciplinarity Producing knowledge about the environment requires both specifying i social patterns and The immanent regularities of social figurations are identical neither with regularities of the mind, of individual reasoning, and their interrelation with natural patterns and Examples: climate change; pollution; biodiversity loss, etc. j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 21 nor with regularities of what we call nature, even though functionally all these different dimensions of reality are indissolubly linked to each other. Norbert Elias, The Civilizing Process j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 22 Example: co-evolving socio-ecological regime Interdisciplinary links (examples) Physics Molecular structures Biology Co-evolving biological, physical, chemical, Co-evolving policyinstitutional, political, cultural, economicfinancial, scientific, and technical Pollution Chemistry Environmental studies Nature/nurture Sociology Ecological/ environmental Social Ozone depletion Common research ground Human ecology Natural baseline Geography Anthropology Currently prevailing socio-natural regime Markets/space Economics Risk/value Time Existing interdisciplinarity j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 23 Adapted from Benton and Redclift, 1994 Shifting priorities j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 24 4

5 The development of an ecologically-informed sociology ecological revolutions : Major transformations in human relations with non-human nature. They arise from changes, tensions, and contradictions that develop between a society s mode of production and its ecology, and between its modes of production and reproduction Merchant, 1989 The evolution of critical social science perspectives Critical political ecology and the role of sociology Slow development of the field, not least because of strong negative connotations linked to 1960s survivalism Neo-Malthusian political-ecologists population biologists and ecologists Garret Hardin (1968) The tragedy of the commons Paul Ehrlich (1968) The Population Bomb William Ophuls (1977), Ecology and the Politics of Scarcity They recognized that ecological problems cannot be resolved by technical means and argued for drastic political intervention j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 25 j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 26 Emergence of political ecology. The concept of political ecology introduced in academic debate by Eric Wolf in 1972 in an article titled ownership and political ecology. In the late 1970s the field developed mainly through empirical studies in radical development geography, anthropology, and sociology largely inspired by neo-marxist theories such as Dependency theory (Frank, Cardoso and Faletto) World Systems Theory (Wallerstein) Modes of Production Theory (Rey, Meillassoux) Examples: P. M. Blaikie, studies on land degradation in Nepal, late 1970s and early 1980s; S. G. Bunker, on extraction and unequal exchange in the Amazon (1984) (main reading for class 9) Early phase Reaction against simplistic claims about population growth and environmental degradation (e.g. by survivalists) Neo-Marxism offered tools for linking local social oppression and environmental degradation to wider political and economic concerns However, the overemphasis on structural factors and the relative neglect of local or grassroots actors by deterministic neo-marxist theories led since the late 1980s to a critical reassessment of political ecological studies and the opening of the field to a wider range of theoretical sources j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 27 j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 28 Second phase late 1980s 1990s Shift in the approaches from structural determinations to a multi-dimensional understanding of power relations in the interactions between humans and the environment (Blaikie and Brookfield, 1987; Guha, 1989; Watts and Peet, 1993, etc.) Phases of political ecology Phase Critical of Theoretical basis Explanation 1970s- mid 1980s Neo-Malthusianism Neo-Marxism Local conflicts and change as the products of the global production process Key problem Patterns of surplus/extraction and class relations Emphasis on the autonomous role of the state (rejection of orthodox Marxist explanations of the state as a tool of the dominant class, inspired by neo-weberian theory (Peluso, 1992; Bryant, 1997) The roles of grassroots actors in environmental conflicts, inspired by social movements theories (Guha, 1989; Peluso, 1992) The relevance of power relations within the household to explain environmental conflicts, following household and ecofeminist theories (Carney, 1993; Schroeder, 1993) Late 1980s-1990s Deterministic neo- Neo-Weberianism Marxism Social Movements Theory Household Theory Feminism 1990s - Structuralism Post-structuralism Discourse theory Conflict and change at all scales as the outcome of interactions between actors possessing unequal power Conflict and change at all scales as the outcome of interactions between material and discursive practices Unequal power relations between actors Motives an interests of actors How discourse, knowledge, and power interrelate and mediate political ecological outcomes From: Bryant and Bailey (1997) j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 29 j.e.castro@ncl.ac.uk 30 5

6 What is the specificity of sociology in this emerging field? Updating the scheme (still simplified) What is the specificity of sociology in this emerging field? Pollution Physics Molecular structures Biology Nature/nurture Proposal: Environmental studies Chemistry Sociology Exploring the legacy of pre-classic and classic sociology on ecological issues Research common ground Ozone depletion Environmental governance Politics Political ecology Human ecology Examining the main contributions of twentiethcentury and contemporary sociology to environmental knowledge and action Adapted from Benton and Redclift Geography Markets/space Economics Risk/value Anthropology Reviewing key sociological concepts in the light of socio-ecological