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Global Environmental Politics in a Turbulent Era

9781802207132 Edward Elgar Publishing

Edited by Peter Dauvergne, Professor of International Relations, Department of Political Science and Leah Shipton, Doctoral Student of International Relations, University of British Columbia, Canada

Publication Date: 2023 ISBN: 978 1 80220 713 2 Extent: 252 pp

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Critical Acclaim

Contributors

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With the rapid destabilization, escalation and convergence of various environmental crises, global environmental politics is facing extreme turbulence. Tracing the causes, consequences and dangers of planetary turbulence, this essential book identifies the emerging opportunities to improve governance in environmental politics and transition the world order toward greater equity, justice and sustainability.

Providing a comprehensive understanding of the nature and breadth of global environmental politics, leading scholars investigate the intersecting crisis events of this turbulent era. Chapters explore the political, environmental and economic issues surrounding growing inequality: soaring food and fuel prices; record numbers of migrants and refugees fleeing persecution and destitution; and the intensification of climate change. Finding the sources of turbulence to be overlapping and reinforcing, the book digs deeper into how various actors generate turbulence, looking closely at state sovereignty, civil society and societal organizations. Forward thinking, it reflects how different practices, conditions, lenses, and tools can create future avenues to imagine, facilitate, and actualize solutions for global sustainability during times of extreme turbulence.

Interdisciplinary and international in scope, this insightful book will be an invaluable resource to students and scholars of environmental politics, policy, and governance; alongside policymakers and organizations looking to realize the Sustainable Development Goals.

Critical Acclaim

‘A genuinely novel take on the broad nature of global environmental politics is a rare thing, but Dauvergne and Shipton have succeeded with gusto. Deploying the concept of turbulence – the sense of constant churn, multiple intersecting crises that never resolve but transform, disrupting lives in myriad ways – to great effect, this book provides an overarching framework for understanding how we might pursue sustainability in this context. It also details this in relation to a wide range of familiar and unfamiliar cases alike. All that is solid may be melting into air, but Dauvergne and Shipton help us guide our way through the turbulence.’
– Matthew Paterson, University of Manchester, UK

‘Dauvergne and Shipton’s remarkable volume brings together an amazing array of scholars who collectively provide a deep engagement with the unsettling forces at the root of overlapping global environmental crises, while also highlighting the opportunities that turbulence brings to transform our world for the better. It is a must read.’
– Matthew Hoffmann, University of Toronto, Canada

Contributors

Contributors include: Mark Axelrod, Semra Aytur, Ahmad Shoaib Azizi, Michele Betsill, Ekaterina Chertkovskaya, Peter Dauvergne, Michael Dede, Nicole Detraz, Julie Greenwalt, Jacob Hasselbalch, Peter J. Jacques, Ibinabo Johnson, Agni Kalfagianni, Chuyu Liu, Rachel Macrorie, Marielle Papin, Hyeyoon Park, Susan Park, Ekta Patel, Philip Schleifer, David Schlosberg, Henrik Selin, Leah Shipton, Hayley Stevenson, Johannes Stripple, Barbara Summers, Yixian Sun, Leslie Paul Thiele, Stacy D. VanDeveer, D.G. Webster, Erika Weinthal, Linda Westman

Contents

Contents:

INTRODUCTION
1 Understanding environmental politics in a turbulent era 1
Leah Shipton and Peter Dauvergne

PART I THE NATURE AND BREADTH OF GLOBAL
ENVIRONMENTAL TURBULENCE
2 Turbulence, converging crises, and environmental justice 13
David Schlosberg
3 Plastic turbulence: illusions of containment, clean-up, and
control, and the emergent promise of diverse economies 25
Ekaterina Chertkovskaya, Jacob Hasselbalch, and Johannes Stripple
4 Rights, resilience, and water in turbulent times 37
Ekta Patel and Erika Weinthal
5 Promoting environmental rights in turbulent times: Latin
America and the Escazú Agreement 49
Hayley Stevenson
6 Compound urban crises in global environmental politics 62
Marielle Papin, Linda Westman, Rachel Macrorie, Ahmad
Shoaib Azizi, Michael Dede, Julie Greenwalt, Ibinabo
Johnson, and Barbara Summers
7 Extractive industries and mineral resources: turbulence all around 75
Stacy D. VanDeveer, Hyeyoon Park, Yixian Sun, and
Michele M. Betsill

PART II ACTORS AS AGENTS OF TURBULENCE OR
TRANSFORMATION
8 People power, disruption, and survival 91
Peter J. Jacques
9 State sovereignty, turbulence, and environmental disasters
in global environmental politics 103
Susan Park
10 How philanthropic foundations fuel transformations and
with what consequences for sustainable food systems 116
Agni Kalfagianni

PART III PATHWAYS TO GLOBAL SUSTAINABILITY
IN A TURBULENT ERA
11 Thinking gender in times of crisis: reflecting on gender,
turbulence, and global environmental politics 130
Nicole Detraz
12 Is technological turbulence sustainable? 142
Leslie Paul Thiele
13 Beyond islands of sustainability? Opportunities and
challenges of jurisdictional approaches in tropical forest
governance 156
Philip Schleifer
14 Advancing global environmental politics research through
systems-oriented analysis 169
Henrik Selin
15 Turbulence and transition to healthy governance 184
D.G. Webster, Mark Axelrod, and Semra A. Aytur
16 Ratcheting-up through competition: global environmental
governance in the era of rising geopolitical tensions
between China and the West 197
Yixian Sun and Chuyu Liu

CONCLUSION
17 Navigating turbulence for sustainability 211
Leah Shipton and Peter Dauvergne

Index 224