The longest river in Europe bears the imprint of Soviet history. From dams to fishing by way of industrialization, it lies at the heart of the continental upheaval that is unfolding before us.
Throughout the nineteenth century, ecological currents in the agricultural world promoted organic farming and the defense of small producers. The story of these “ecological farmers” sheds light on the forward-looking contract forged between agriculture and society.
To achieve energy transition, we will need to extract as much metal in the next 20 years as we have done in the entire history of mankind. This is ‘one of the great paradoxes of our times’.
Maritime spaces are the focus of the major economic, ecological, and geopolitical challenges of our time. Lest they become the site of routine legal violations (ranging from pollution to overfishing), a government of the seas is necessary.
Is the law doing enough to protect the environment? Through an analysis of the concept of environmental crime, Grégory Salle shows that legal provisions are limited by a social vision that favors the technical and capitalist exploitation of nature.
How do environmental concerns affect forms of democratic participation? Comparing a deliberative process in Poitou to citizens’ mobilization in Ardèche, an ethnographic study examines how citizens engage in politics and conflict.
While agribusiness is the object of ever more criticism, Matthieu Calame claims that no real agricultural transition will be possible as long as political and cultural leaders do not change too.
Alessandro Stanziani recounts the long story of how agriculture embraced capitalism and productivism, from the transformation of seeds and species to producers’ farms, by way of peasant expropriation and the chemistry of fertilizers and pesticides.
The emergence of environmental protection policies in the second half of the twentieth century is the result of compromises between protest movements and economic and urban development—change by bits and pieces, rather than a genuine urban ecological transition.
Accumulation in a world of finite resources: Such is the vortex into which the moderns are thrown. Current ecological concerns, however, should also be viewed as a metamorphosis of the social question.
Philippe Aghion, Céline Antonin and Simon Bunel believe that only technological innovation will allow humanity to meet the social and environmental challenges it faces today. However, capitalism and the “power of creative destruction” come up against the complexity of microeconomic decisions.
What if the impending ecological crisis required a recommitment to republicanism? This is Serge Audier’s thesis: we must not respond to environmental challenges with an anti-modern or anti-statist reflex, but with a new conception of the general interest.
Faced with the Anthropocene, the philosopher Virginie Maris defends a compelling vision of the wilderness. Condemning recent developments in environmental thinking, she urges us to withstand its current refocusing on an exclusively human world.
Socially responsible investment, green bonds, extra-financial rating agencies: ‘climate finance’ has developed over the last few years. Without State involvement, will these tools suffice to finance the transition toward a carbon neutral global economy?
Hollywood cinema tends to represent climate change in catastrophist and sensationalistic movies. By contrast, a new type of ecological cinema emerges in which the issue of sustainability is taken into account not only as a theme, but also within the film production process.
By setting the prices of raw materials, financial markets influence our relation to the environment. Nicolas Bouleau examines the environmental governance of these markets and invites us to shift our priorities away from economic logics toward a concern for nature and for the long term.
By enmeshing infrastructures, power is able to curtail local particularities, exploit resources, and fight group autonomy. Inhabiting territories engaged in struggle makes it possible to resist power. “Being a forest,” whether in Notre-Dame-des-Landes or Borneo, means becoming ungovernable.
The havoc wreaked last year by Hurricane Harvey was yet another example of the devastating effects of climate change. Many ignored the role of the ocean in fueling the tropical cyclone. Yet acknowledging its importance in climate change is vital if we want to save our planet.
Can a mushroom help us understand the changes and deadlocks of capitalism? Studying matsutake foraging and commerce, anthropologist Anna Tsing describes a world that has turned its back on progress and where survival depends upon fragile collaborations between humans and the world surrounding them.
In an unprecedented global history, François Jarrige and Thomas Le Roux explore the political and scientific origins of pollution, and show that its globalization during the industrial age was in no way inevitable.
Water pollution in New Zealand is putting ecological pressure on idyllic locations much favored by tourists. The conservation of lakes and rivers has therefore become a major concern for the Māori population. This stimulating essay discusses the spiritual, ecological and political stakes of the Whanganui River case.
Should our relationships with animals be more diplomatic? This is what Baptiste Morizot suggests as he uses the ‘return of the Wolf’ as an opportunity for a philosophical reflection. As if to better implicitly reaffirm man’s domineering position?
Deforestation and charcoal production are often seen as the principal culprits for the endemic poverty in Haiti. This essay calls for a new narrative. Not only is this picture of Haiti incomplete and inaccurate, it is also counterproductive to the economic development of the country.
Did you think a tree was just branches and leaves? Then enter the fascinating world of spruces, lime trees and oaks, a forest in which trees support and compete with one other, thriving thanks to their boundless ingenuity.
Will Leibniz’s philosophy turn us into ecologists? This is the bet of Pauline Phemister who, building upon Leibniz’s theory of perception and of the interdependence of beings, shows that biodiversity is a form of beauty, and that its destruction impoverishes our experience.
Paleontologists distinguish five periods of mass disappearance of animal species. Are we now entering the sixth period—that of human extinction? Either way, the question brings us back to the fragility of our life conditions. So just a word to the wise!
By studying key concepts such as frontier, wilderness and rewilding in the United States, William Cronon shows that human history unfolds within a geographical framework, using natural resources that profoundly shape it. This serves as a reminder that ecology is a humanism.
Climate change has fueled scientific, economic, and political debates for over fifty years. Roman Felli offers an economic history of the idea of adapting to climate change and denounces the way it has been instrumentalized by market principles at the expense of society’s most vulnerable citizens.
Among the recipients of the 2009 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics was Elinor Ostrom, for her analysis of economic governance, especially in relation to the commons. While this choice took many in the profession by surprise, her life-long quest for an understanding of successful common property resource management holds important lessons for our future.
The climate has become a major stake in international cooperation. The sociologist Jean Foyer, who observed the COP21 at Le Bourget (France) in December 2015, considers the major trends and defining moments of the latest round of climate negotiations.
The national park is not only a space dedicated to walks, recreation, and even wondrous contemplation, it is also a tool used by the Nation. Guillaume Blanc analyses this overlap between environment and politics through the cases of France, Canada, and Ethiopia.
Let’s not tiptoe around it: this essay on excrement—a crucial agricultural, urban, and ecological issue—is fascinating. After all, it’s a hot topic: what are we going to do with all this shit? It leads us, moreover, to an important scientific and democratic debate.
With the publication of a book on the environmental history of Russia, Étienne Forestier-Peyrat analyses the link between politics and environment in Russian and Soviet history, from the Czarist campaigns to expand territories to the current and highly controversial construction of the Sochi Olympic Village.
A selection of four essays recently published on Books & Ideas offers new perspectives on the definition, historiography and potential applications of environmental theory.
An ambitious environmental tax policy must be part of a broader reform that addresses several problems simultaneously: the equity and progressivity of the tax system, reducing social security withholdings, pension finance, and paying down the debt.
If rights and obligations only apply between human beings, how can we feel obliged to protect our environment? Catherine Larrère shows that the answers provided by ecological philosophies are largely based on modern Western thought: if there are values that we should respect in nature, this must mean that we are not alone in the world.
Is man responsible for climate change? Two historians, Jean-Baptiste Fressoz and Fabien Locher, argue that this question is anything but new. Modern thinkers did not wait for the turn of this century to begin reflecting on the impact of human activities on the environment.
Environmentalist icon Lester R. Brown denounces our excessive ecological footprint and the prevailing food insecurity that stems from the current geopolitics of food. From this pessimistic and alarming standpoint he proposes a “Plan B” to help us cope with this vicious cycle. Yet the way out remains uncertain and imprecise.
Timothy Brook gives a new insight into Yuan and Ming history thanks to a broad historical view enriched by climate analyses, which allows him to highlight continuities between the conventionally opposed Mongol and Han dynasties.
Focusing on the two cases of megaregions and global cities, sociologist Saskia Sassen explores how a more equitable distribution of benefits can be reached at the level of great urban conurbations. She calls for new analytical tools to envisage self-sufficiency without exclusion, stimulation without destruction and globalization without annihilation of diversity.
