This article argues that analysis of meta-governance purely in terms of the actions of the state ... more This article argues that analysis of meta-governance purely in terms of the actions of the state can obscure the significant, but less apparent, ways in which private actors may influence the choices and interactions of individuals within various modes of governance coordination. We investigate the networked governance of affordable housing impacts in the Marcellus Shale gas region of the United States to empirically illuminate the dynamics of state and private meta-governance. Drawing on a qualitative research approach, we identify public authorities as exercising what seems to be predominant responsibility for meta-governance, with state government having strong influence over the structure and resourcing of a networked governance response, and county government directly facilitating the collaborative engagement of actors at the local level. Although private oil and gas companies demonstrate little involvement in network governance, the presence of private meta-governance in the alternative form of the design of market governance is shown to have a number of countervailing implications for the form and function of network governance. We suggest that expansion of the concept of " framing " to account for strategies that structure how key governance actors understand a particular problem provides valuable insights for understanding private meta-governance in relation to network governance.
Even as resilience thinking becomes evermore popular as part of strategic programming among devel... more Even as resilience thinking becomes evermore popular as part of strategic programming among development and humanitarian organizations, uncertainty about how to define, operationalize, measure, and evaluate resilience for development goals prevails. As a result, many organizations and institutions have undertaken individual, collective, and simultaneous efforts toward clarification and definition. This has opened up a unique opportunity for a rethinking of development practices. The emergent consensus about what resilience means within development practice will have important consequences both for development practitioners and the communities in which they work. Incorporating resilience thinking into development practice has the potential to radically transform this arena in favor of social and environmental justice, but it could also flounder as a way to dress old ideas in new clothes or, at worst, to further exploit, disempower, and marginalize the world's most vulnerable populations. We seek to make an intervention into the definitional debates surrounding resilience that supports the former and helps prevent the latter. We argue that resilience thinking as it has been developed in social-ecological systems and allied literatures has a lot in common with the concept of food sovereignty and that paying attention to some of the lessons and claims of food sovereignty movements could contribute toward building a consensus around resilience that supports social and environmental justice. In particular, the food sovereignty movement relies on a strategy that elevates rights. We suggest that a rights-based approach to resilience-oriented development practice could contribute to its application in just and equitable ways.
Claims regarding a unitary, coherent ‘‘Celtic’’ culture and its westward spread over centuries ha... more Claims regarding a unitary, coherent ‘‘Celtic’’ culture and its westward spread over centuries have proliferated rapidly over the past 10 to 15 years. We examine both this general phenomenon, and one specific instance of it in detail: the claims of Celtic identity by Wise Use activists in New Mexico in the 1990s. Our primary concern is to examine their significance and utility in contemporary cultural politics. We argue that they have provided a powerful way for many white people in Western Europe and the United States to claim for themselves an ethnic identity strongly associated with oppression and resistance to the state, a position that affords them symbolic resources in negotiating the challenges of both multiculturalism and neoliberalism.
This article is concerned with the environmental dimensions of rescaling. Specifically, it explor... more This article is concerned with the environmental dimensions of rescaling. Specifically, it explores debates around centralization and decentralization, introduces a key distinction between rescaling to jurisdictional spaces and ecosystem spaces, and suggests three future research trajectories: (1) analytical clarification of the differences between rescaling to natural versus jurisdictional scales; (2) examination of rescaling in light of its attendant process of creating new objects of governance; and (3) investigation of rescaling processes through a temporal lens, with the suggestion that rescaled environmental governance may be the site of some of the first and last manifestations of neoliberal governance reforms.
Many have argued that the burning of fossil fuels is an essential component of the socionatural m... more Many have argued that the burning of fossil fuels is an essential component of the socionatural metabolism of capitalism as we know it, and that the anthropogenic climate change it is causing may finally bring about capitalism’s end. In this paper, I explore the potential for, instead, a societal shift towards renewable energy sources as the dominant components of global energy supplies to provide a socioecological ‘fix’ to current forms of crisis. In so doing, I develop a notion of an integrated socioecological fix that combines the central elements of Harvey’s ‘spatial fix’ and of neoliberal environmental ‘fixes’ that maintain accumulation by enrolling new elements of nonhuman nature into circuits of capital. I argue, first, that the capital intensiveness and spatial extensiveness of any such transition could provide a global-scale, if temporary, socioecological fix to capitalist crisis tendencies; and, second, that the creation of global scale geographies of renewable energy production, distribution, and consumption would necessarily involve powerful new rounds of investment in, and claims on, rural areas. These impacts would likely fall disproportionately on rural areas, where land values are lowest and existing users often have less power and fewer formal land rights.
The relationships between neoliberalism and environmental governance have been the topic of much ... more The relationships between neoliberalism and environmental governance have been the topic of much scholarly and policy debate. The recent, and ongoing, economic crisis brings new questions and urgency to these debates. This paper examines whether and how the economic crisis might be understood as a crisis of neoliberalism and what the implications might be for environmental quality and the dominance of ‘neoliberal’ approaches to environmental governance. The paper attempts to delineate some of the major potential relationships between neoliberalism and environmental governance through this crisis. It argues that although such relationships are contingent and subject to political action, in the US context at least the ongoing economic crisis has resulted in a weakening of support for environmental protections, in a manner that does not fit with current claims of the ‘post-political’ condition. The paper concludes by outlining several positive contributions critical geographers and other analysts of nature-society relations could make to challenging the current dominance of neoliberal policies in environmental management.
We have reached a crucial turning point in debates around climate change. A well established scie... more We have reached a crucial turning point in debates around climate change. A well established scientific consensus regarding the physical causes, dynamics, and at least many likely implications of anthropogenic climate change has thus far failed to result in any substantial movement towards mitiga- tion. For many, then, the most urgent questions regarding climate change are now socio-cultural ones, such as: how do people come to hold and act on certain beliefs regarding environmental conditions and pro- cesses; how do institutional forms and histories shape and constrain the views and options of various sorts of actors; and what are relationships among fossil fuels, climate change, and the historical geographies and future trajectories of capitalism? Far from being simpler than physical and life science questions, these social science questions introduce entirely new sorts of actors, dynamics, and methodological challenges into this already complex and dynamic domain. This special issue takes up these topics. In this essay, we chart some of the major contours of contemporary social science thinking regarding climate change and introduce the articles in the special issue. We begin by examining work, from political science and scholar- ship on the commons, that foregrounds questions of sovereignty, territoriality, and cooperation with respect to environmental governance. Then we exam- ine work from neoclassical economics and radical political economy, which frame climate change in terms of externalities, or contradiction and crisis, respectively. Finally, we examine the rapidly prolif- erating work exploring how individuals think and feel about these issues, emphasizing concepts of risk, communication, and governmentality.
Recent work on legal geographies has arguably paid far too little attention to the environment as... more Recent work on legal geographies has arguably paid far too little attention to the environment as both an object of governance and a terrain of struggle with respect to the law. Conversely, political ecology as a field, with its focus on informal and extra-legal dynamics, has arguably engaged too little with the legal geographies that are central to environ- mental conflicts in many locations. This paper examines and theorizes the legal geographies that have been essential ele- ments of the recent boom in extraction of natural gas from the Marcellus Shale in Pennsylvania. Specifically, it examines the ways in which laws and the authority of the state more broadly have been changed, deployed, and invoked, particularly through the passage of Act 13, to enable the extraction of the gas in the shale and its circulation as a viable commodity. This analysis of the relevant multiscalar legal geographies illustrates the productivity of a more direct engagement be- tween political ecology on one hand, and legal geography on the other.
The author demonstrates, through a case study of the Wise Use movement, that the insights and too... more The author demonstrates, through a case study of the Wise Use movement, that the insights and tools of political ecology have much to offer in the study of First World resource conflicts. He uses theories and methods drawn from the literature concerning political ecology and moral economies to argue that many assumptions regarding state capacity, individual and collective identities and motivations, and economic and historical relations in advanced capitalist countries are mistaken or incomplete in ways that have led to important dimensions of environmental conflicts in such locales being overlooked. The argument is based mainly on the author's own research on the Wise Use movement in the rural American West of the 1980s and 1990s but also draws on other recent work in political ecology, historical and economic geography, and environmental history.
Recent multilateral trade agreements are among the major manifestations of neoliberalism. They ar... more Recent multilateral trade agreements are among the major manifestations of neoliberalism. They are also emerging as some of the most important sites of environmental governance in the 21st century. I argue here that these trade agreements, particularly the sweeping new protections they provide for investors, are redefining property rights and environmental governance in fundamental ways. I suggest that in addition to furthering the centuries-long process of the enclosure of nature under capitalism, the neoliberal agenda of NAFTA and similar trade agreements also involves something new: the privatization, or primitive accumulation, of conditions of production as an accumulation strategy. I explore these dynamics through examination of two cases, one in the United States and one in Mexico. I also explore the roles of social movements in these dynamics.
This article argues that analysis of meta-governance purely in terms of the actions of the state ... more This article argues that analysis of meta-governance purely in terms of the actions of the state can obscure the significant, but less apparent, ways in which private actors may influence the choices and interactions of individuals within various modes of governance coordination. We investigate the networked governance of affordable housing impacts in the Marcellus Shale gas region of the United States to empirically illuminate the dynamics of state and private meta-governance. Drawing on a qualitative research approach, we identify public authorities as exercising what seems to be predominant responsibility for meta-governance, with state government having strong influence over the structure and resourcing of a networked governance response, and county government directly facilitating the collaborative engagement of actors at the local level. Although private oil and gas companies demonstrate little involvement in network governance, the presence of private meta-governance in the alternative form of the design of market governance is shown to have a number of countervailing implications for the form and function of network governance. We suggest that expansion of the concept of " framing " to account for strategies that structure how key governance actors understand a particular problem provides valuable insights for understanding private meta-governance in relation to network governance.
Even as resilience thinking becomes evermore popular as part of strategic programming among devel... more Even as resilience thinking becomes evermore popular as part of strategic programming among development and humanitarian organizations, uncertainty about how to define, operationalize, measure, and evaluate resilience for development goals prevails. As a result, many organizations and institutions have undertaken individual, collective, and simultaneous efforts toward clarification and definition. This has opened up a unique opportunity for a rethinking of development practices. The emergent consensus about what resilience means within development practice will have important consequences both for development practitioners and the communities in which they work. Incorporating resilience thinking into development practice has the potential to radically transform this arena in favor of social and environmental justice, but it could also flounder as a way to dress old ideas in new clothes or, at worst, to further exploit, disempower, and marginalize the world's most vulnerable populations. We seek to make an intervention into the definitional debates surrounding resilience that supports the former and helps prevent the latter. We argue that resilience thinking as it has been developed in social-ecological systems and allied literatures has a lot in common with the concept of food sovereignty and that paying attention to some of the lessons and claims of food sovereignty movements could contribute toward building a consensus around resilience that supports social and environmental justice. In particular, the food sovereignty movement relies on a strategy that elevates rights. We suggest that a rights-based approach to resilience-oriented development practice could contribute to its application in just and equitable ways.
Claims regarding a unitary, coherent ‘‘Celtic’’ culture and its westward spread over centuries ha... more Claims regarding a unitary, coherent ‘‘Celtic’’ culture and its westward spread over centuries have proliferated rapidly over the past 10 to 15 years. We examine both this general phenomenon, and one specific instance of it in detail: the claims of Celtic identity by Wise Use activists in New Mexico in the 1990s. Our primary concern is to examine their significance and utility in contemporary cultural politics. We argue that they have provided a powerful way for many white people in Western Europe and the United States to claim for themselves an ethnic identity strongly associated with oppression and resistance to the state, a position that affords them symbolic resources in negotiating the challenges of both multiculturalism and neoliberalism.
This article is concerned with the environmental dimensions of rescaling. Specifically, it explor... more This article is concerned with the environmental dimensions of rescaling. Specifically, it explores debates around centralization and decentralization, introduces a key distinction between rescaling to jurisdictional spaces and ecosystem spaces, and suggests three future research trajectories: (1) analytical clarification of the differences between rescaling to natural versus jurisdictional scales; (2) examination of rescaling in light of its attendant process of creating new objects of governance; and (3) investigation of rescaling processes through a temporal lens, with the suggestion that rescaled environmental governance may be the site of some of the first and last manifestations of neoliberal governance reforms.
Many have argued that the burning of fossil fuels is an essential component of the socionatural m... more Many have argued that the burning of fossil fuels is an essential component of the socionatural metabolism of capitalism as we know it, and that the anthropogenic climate change it is causing may finally bring about capitalism’s end. In this paper, I explore the potential for, instead, a societal shift towards renewable energy sources as the dominant components of global energy supplies to provide a socioecological ‘fix’ to current forms of crisis. In so doing, I develop a notion of an integrated socioecological fix that combines the central elements of Harvey’s ‘spatial fix’ and of neoliberal environmental ‘fixes’ that maintain accumulation by enrolling new elements of nonhuman nature into circuits of capital. I argue, first, that the capital intensiveness and spatial extensiveness of any such transition could provide a global-scale, if temporary, socioecological fix to capitalist crisis tendencies; and, second, that the creation of global scale geographies of renewable energy production, distribution, and consumption would necessarily involve powerful new rounds of investment in, and claims on, rural areas. These impacts would likely fall disproportionately on rural areas, where land values are lowest and existing users often have less power and fewer formal land rights.
The relationships between neoliberalism and environmental governance have been the topic of much ... more The relationships between neoliberalism and environmental governance have been the topic of much scholarly and policy debate. The recent, and ongoing, economic crisis brings new questions and urgency to these debates. This paper examines whether and how the economic crisis might be understood as a crisis of neoliberalism and what the implications might be for environmental quality and the dominance of ‘neoliberal’ approaches to environmental governance. The paper attempts to delineate some of the major potential relationships between neoliberalism and environmental governance through this crisis. It argues that although such relationships are contingent and subject to political action, in the US context at least the ongoing economic crisis has resulted in a weakening of support for environmental protections, in a manner that does not fit with current claims of the ‘post-political’ condition. The paper concludes by outlining several positive contributions critical geographers and other analysts of nature-society relations could make to challenging the current dominance of neoliberal policies in environmental management.
We have reached a crucial turning point in debates around climate change. A well established scie... more We have reached a crucial turning point in debates around climate change. A well established scientific consensus regarding the physical causes, dynamics, and at least many likely implications of anthropogenic climate change has thus far failed to result in any substantial movement towards mitiga- tion. For many, then, the most urgent questions regarding climate change are now socio-cultural ones, such as: how do people come to hold and act on certain beliefs regarding environmental conditions and pro- cesses; how do institutional forms and histories shape and constrain the views and options of various sorts of actors; and what are relationships among fossil fuels, climate change, and the historical geographies and future trajectories of capitalism? Far from being simpler than physical and life science questions, these social science questions introduce entirely new sorts of actors, dynamics, and methodological challenges into this already complex and dynamic domain. This special issue takes up these topics. In this essay, we chart some of the major contours of contemporary social science thinking regarding climate change and introduce the articles in the special issue. We begin by examining work, from political science and scholar- ship on the commons, that foregrounds questions of sovereignty, territoriality, and cooperation with respect to environmental governance. Then we exam- ine work from neoclassical economics and radical political economy, which frame climate change in terms of externalities, or contradiction and crisis, respectively. Finally, we examine the rapidly prolif- erating work exploring how individuals think and feel about these issues, emphasizing concepts of risk, communication, and governmentality.
Recent work on legal geographies has arguably paid far too little attention to the environment as... more Recent work on legal geographies has arguably paid far too little attention to the environment as both an object of governance and a terrain of struggle with respect to the law. Conversely, political ecology as a field, with its focus on informal and extra-legal dynamics, has arguably engaged too little with the legal geographies that are central to environ- mental conflicts in many locations. This paper examines and theorizes the legal geographies that have been essential ele- ments of the recent boom in extraction of natural gas from the Marcellus Shale in Pennsylvania. Specifically, it examines the ways in which laws and the authority of the state more broadly have been changed, deployed, and invoked, particularly through the passage of Act 13, to enable the extraction of the gas in the shale and its circulation as a viable commodity. This analysis of the relevant multiscalar legal geographies illustrates the productivity of a more direct engagement be- tween political ecology on one hand, and legal geography on the other.
The author demonstrates, through a case study of the Wise Use movement, that the insights and too... more The author demonstrates, through a case study of the Wise Use movement, that the insights and tools of political ecology have much to offer in the study of First World resource conflicts. He uses theories and methods drawn from the literature concerning political ecology and moral economies to argue that many assumptions regarding state capacity, individual and collective identities and motivations, and economic and historical relations in advanced capitalist countries are mistaken or incomplete in ways that have led to important dimensions of environmental conflicts in such locales being overlooked. The argument is based mainly on the author's own research on the Wise Use movement in the rural American West of the 1980s and 1990s but also draws on other recent work in political ecology, historical and economic geography, and environmental history.
Recent multilateral trade agreements are among the major manifestations of neoliberalism. They ar... more Recent multilateral trade agreements are among the major manifestations of neoliberalism. They are also emerging as some of the most important sites of environmental governance in the 21st century. I argue here that these trade agreements, particularly the sweeping new protections they provide for investors, are redefining property rights and environmental governance in fundamental ways. I suggest that in addition to furthering the centuries-long process of the enclosure of nature under capitalism, the neoliberal agenda of NAFTA and similar trade agreements also involves something new: the privatization, or primitive accumulation, of conditions of production as an accumulation strategy. I explore these dynamics through examination of two cases, one in the United States and one in Mexico. I also explore the roles of social movements in these dynamics.
Uploads
Papers by James McCarthy