Suchergebnisse

The predominant approach of protecting or restoring floral and faunal life after harming, displacing, or destroying them in service of human interests does not hold much promise for nature on Earth in the age of the Anthropocene. Such approaches fail to address the ethical and political-economic cores of what tend to be presented as techno-scientific or ecological problems. If the planet is to remain home to life beyond the human, mainstream human societies need to rethink their place, role, and entitlements on Earth, and relearn to cohabit with human and nonhuman others, even in the face of risk and uncertainty.

When so many facets of nonhuman life are commodified daily with little challenge, this paper looks to shed light on what is objectionable about commodifying nonhuman life. As a contribution in this direction, we undertake a comparative examination of the formation of two different but equally lively, and international, commodities: Exotic pets and ecosystem carbon. In this paper we first set out to understand what characteristics of life matter in the production of the commodity. We argue that a particular mode of value-generating life predominates in each commodity circuit: in exotic pet trade, an individualized, 'encounterable' life; in ecosystem services, an aggregate, reproductive life. Second, we find that hierarchies between humans and other beings are highly generative in the formation and effects of lively commodities. On one hand, these hierarchies cast nonhumans in a disposable state that is integral to the functioning of exotic pet trade; on the other hand, these hierarchies are partly what ecosystem services are designed to address. Nevertheless, we find that reproduction of uneven species geographies is at work in both economies. The degree and nature of effect on the material conditions of nonhuman lives is, however, distinct, and our conclusion calls for greater attention to these differences.

The objective of this chapter is to consider the relationship between neoliberalism and environments. The neoliberal era involves governments overhauling regulatory environments that govern access to and control of nature. This entails shifting regulatory regimes, not merely eviscerating them – a re-regulation. We centre our chapter on three processes of re-regulation in the neoliberal era: 1) new regulatory conditions that allow for further exploitation of natural resources; 2) innovations in private and voluntary forms of governance; and 3) the transformation of environmental problems into market-like solutions. But all is not "neo", of course; neoliberalism inherited from liberalism particular ideas about what are the "right" ways for ecologies and subjects to be governed, the right practices through which humans should relate to and use the environments in which they are situated. For liberals, old and new, when all individuals pursue their self-interest economically, when they relate to nature and land through market logic as a resource to be constantly "improved," all of society will be wealthier. Yet liberal and neoliberal governing strategies rely on the violent rendering of whole peoples and places as less valuable, making certain people, species, lands, waters available to be sacrificed, developed for the supposed 'common good'.