Suchergebnisse

Hay un amplio reconocimiento sobre el hecho de que los cambios ambientales globales actuales no pueden ser entendidos, analizados y respondidos sin reconocer el rol de la globalización neoliberal en su misma perpetuación y exacerbación. El feedback y la superposición entre estos dos principales cambios globales llevan a dobles exposiciones, donde las vulnerabilidades se hacen irremisiblemente visibles y la intervención adaptativa para salvaguardar intereses políticos y económicos se convierte en imperativa. Los resultados de la investigación sobre este campo sugieren que las asimetrías de poder, los intereses particulares y diversos valores presentes en las políticas de adaptación al cambio climático y el desarrollo nacional son decisivas en la elección de unos u otros caminos de adaptación. Estos caminos, cargados también de valores morales, pueden limitar las políticas nacionales a soluciones técnicas y de gestión, al minusvalorar las medidas políticas de redistribución social y por lo tanto ocluir el debate político sobre imaginarios futuros alternativos. Basándose en tres estudios empíricos sobre la agricultura de trabajo intensivo en Turquía, esta tesis explora cómo las intervenciones adaptativas dirigidas por el Estado configuran las vulnerabilidades, y a la vez fracasan en su intento de reducirlas, al no obstaculizar la continuidad de la acumulación de capital. Con esta finalidad, esta tesis utiliza las herramientas de la ecología política para analizar un grupo de población relativamente poco estudiado pero clave para la agricultura de trabajo intensivo: los trabajadores agrícolas de migración estacional. En consecuencia, esta tesis identifica cómo la política de adaptación al cambio climático en la agricultura turca, mediante su visión del sector agrícola como una unidad homogénea, facilita el desplazamiento de los costes socio-ecológicos. Indudablemente, esta situación se origina en una excesiva simplificación de las desequilibradas relaciones de poder en el sector agrícola de trabajo intensivo, así ...

The overall aim of this project was threefold. By organizing workshops at the science-policy interface, the project wanted to: 1. Raise awareness for climate change in Turkish cities and the necessity to develop response action at the local level; 2. Further the exchange between different actors such as academicians, politicians, representatives from the private sector, and civil society as well as between Germany and Turkey in particular; 3. Work on the transfer of solutions to combat climate change at the local level. ; Bu projenin genel hedefi 3 kısımdan oluşmaktadır. Bilim ve politika arabiriminde çalıştaylar organize ederek, 1. Türkiye kentlerinde iklim değişikliği etkileri hakkında farkındalık yaratmak ve yerel düzeyde politika oluşturmak; 2. Devamında akademisyenler, politikacılar, özel sektör tem- silcileri ve sivil toplumdan farklı aktörler ile Almanya ve Türkiye özelinde karşılıklı ziyaretler düz- enlenmesi; 3. İklim değişikliği ile yerelde mücadelede çözümler üzerine çalışmak.

The green economy is often defined as an economic configu ration that results in improved human well - being and social equity, while reducing (or at least decoupling from) environmental risks . It is elusive, and can be read as a new way of ensuring and maintaining capital accumulation accompanied by neoliberal austerity policies , where a green rationale is required to maintain the structural roots of the global political economy. As such, critics often identify its self -contradictory nature , in giving legitimacy and coherence to a number of public policies. This article critically examines the post- politicisation of the green economy , by tracing its social construction and meaning -making . In doing so, it follows the green economy debate in the post -politicization of the environment in Turkey, a rapidly developing country with significant socio -ecological challenges. Th e analysis suggests that the green economy will become more important at Turkey tr ies to meet international environmental agreements . Th e article sheds light on its preparatory report for the Rio+20 Summit, titled Turkey' s sustainable development report: claiming the futu re 2012 . We find that the green economy serves as a useful discursive tool to legitimize a state - facilitated, market -driven, full -frontal assault on ecosystems in Turkey, particularly in the energy sector. We argue that a clear rejection of such framings and the development of alternatives to post - politicization, are the two key challenges facing the environmental movement in the country. ; QC 20210922

Migration and climate change are hot topics generating widespread concerns and fears in European public opinion. However, a striking difference between them is the 'efficacy' of the fears that surround the two topics. For migration, the spectre of a looming invasion and similar narratives translate into immense impacts and a securitisation of the matter. For climate change, growing awareness over the prospect of a climate emergency only sporadically translates into urgent action. This article engages with this remarkable difference of great political relevance. While analyses of fear and securitisation of migration and climate have privileged inter-state politics and international discourses, here we investigate how fear is produced, mobilised, and contested in sub-national political arenas. Rather than on a spectacular case (as Lampedusa or a Pacific Island) we focus on Sardinia, an ordinary region that, for both climate change and migration, is not under the spotlight – there are no melting glaciers nor climate refugees. Drawing on focus groups and interviews with Sardinian local authorities, we detail how mayors and municipality feel on the frontline against both climate change and migration. However, rather than as security issues, both emerge tangled with questions such as austerity, spopolamento(depopulation), economic decline, and rural-urban dynamics. But while fears over migration translate into strong citizen pressure mayors feel compelled to react to, concerns about climate change instead lead to a sort of fatalism or deferral. We conclude the paper with reflections on the implications that this important difference has for broader debates on climate and migration.

Migration and climate change are hot topics generating widespread concerns and fears in European public opinion. However, a striking difference between them is the 'efficacy' of the fears that surround the two topics. For migration, the spectre of a looming invasion and similar narratives translate into immense impacts and a securitisation of the matter. For climate change, growing awareness over the prospect of a climate emergency only sporadically translates into urgent action. This article engages with this remarkable difference of great political relevance. While analyses of fear and securitisation of migration and climate have privileged inter-state politics and international discourses, here we investigate how fear is produced, mobilised, and contested in sub-national political arenas. Rather than on a spectacular case (as Lampedusa or a Pacific Island) we focus on Sardinia, an ordinary region that, for both climate change and migration, is not under the spotlight – there are no melting glaciers nor climate refugees. Drawing on focus groups and interviews with Sardinian local authorities, we detail how mayors and municipality feel on the frontline against both climate change and migration. However, rather than as security issues, both emerge tangled with questions such as austerity, spopolamento(depopulation), economic decline, and rural-urban dynamics. But while fears over migration translate into strong citizen pressure mayors feel compelled to react to, concerns about climate change instead lead to a sort of fatalism or deferral. We conclude the paper with reflections on the implications that this important difference has for broader debates on climate and migration.

Migration and climate change are hot topics generating widespread concerns and fears in European public opinion. However, a striking difference between them is the 'efficacy' of the fears that surround the two topics. For migration, the spectre of a looming invasion and similar narratives translate into immense impacts and a securitisation of the matter. For climate change, growing awareness over the prospect of a climate emergency only sporadically translates into urgent action. This article engages with this remarkable difference of great political relevance. While analyses of fear and securitisation of migration and climate have privileged inter-state politics and international discourses, here we investigate how fear is produced, mobilised, and contested in sub-national political arenas. Rather than on a spectacular case (as Lampedusa or a Pacific Island) we focus on Sardinia, an ordinary region that, for both climate change and migration, is not under the spotlight – there are no melting glaciers nor climate refugees. Drawing on focus groups and interviews with Sardinian local authorities, we detail how mayors and municipality feel on the frontline against both climate change and migration. However, rather than as security issues, both emerge tangled with questions such as austerity, spopolamento (depopulation), economic decline, and rural-urban dynamics. But while fears over migration translate into strong citizen pressure mayors feel compelled to react to, concerns about climate change instead lead to a sort of fatalism or deferral. We conclude the paper with reflections on the implications that this important difference has for broader debates on climate and migration.

In this article we introduce a Special Issue of Energy Research and Social Science focused on energy infrastructure and the political economy of national development. Many countries are experiencing transformational growth in energy infrastructure, such as transmission and distribution systems; import, export and storage facilities; the development of domestic energy resources; and construction of new power generating stations based on wind, water, coal, gas and nuclear sources. Large-scale projects like these are frequently justified by appeals to grand narratives – promoting economic growth, securing energy supply, modernizing energy service provision, and transitioning to more environmentally sustainable energy systems - in which the fate of the nation is closely tied to infrastructural development. The papers in this collection present compelling empirical evidence of how claims for energy infrastructure's national significance and/or necessity intersect with the (re)production of political and economic power. Drawing on case material from Africa, the Americas, Asia, Australia and Europe, they highlight the capacity of different energy technologies and infrastructural assemblages to shape political and economic outcomes beyond their role in storing, transporting or transforming energy. This Introduction to the Special Issue does three things. First, it characterises the scale and significance of the contemporary 'infrastructural moment', observing how, in many national contexts, energy policy-making remains centralised and divorced from public participation. Second, it critically differentiates existing literature on the political economy of energy infrastructure to identify five distinctive ways in which research understands the 'political work' infrastructure performs. Third, it introduces the papers in the Special Issue and organises them into four key themes. Overall, the Introduction affirms the importance for social science of understanding the economically and politically constitutive power of energy infrastructures. The critical reflexivity this requires is essential to moving towards energy infrastructures that are just, equitable and sustainable.

In this chapter, we take a critical look at the historical transformation of grassroots mobilization and political engagement in Aliağa in the period between these two historical moments (1990 and 2016) by using archival material from two national newspapers with wide circulation, secondary literature, and indepth interviews with some of the key actors. Aliağa appears to be a curious case for neglect in the scholarly literature on environmental activism in Turkey, a history of victories and defeats only partially told. This is particularly relevant and important since the powerful coalition that had emerged in the 1990s (formed by locals, the Green Party, the main social democratic opposition party in parliament, the Union of Chambers of Turkish Engineers and Architects and labor unions) fought and won a major victory giving way to the cancellation of the government's plans and the birth of a combatant environmental movement in the region. Although it was one of the fi rst nationally debated environmental justice successes of this scale in Turkey ( Şahin, 2010 ), anti-coal movement in Aliağa still remains somewhat under-investigated in the country's history of environmental movements. Thus, providing a micro-historical account would not only give the Aliağa anti-coal movement the due credit it deserves, but also help us illustrate the changing nature and shifting contours of environmental mobilizations in Turkey at large in a time of re-escalating authoritarianism. Since "there is not a right or wrong environmentalism, but narratives and practices of environmentalism which are historically produced" ( Armiero and Sedrez, 2014 : 11), our effort here also helps to reveal some hidden narratives and practices which are equally relevant for contemporary environmental movement in Turkey. To this end, we describe how the hegemonic state – in a counter-movement – reacted to the legal developments and the activism in Aliağa by changing the rules of the game; amending institutional and legal frameworks for investment ...

This book is an exploration of the environmental makings and contested historical trajectories of environmental change in Turkey. Despite the recent proliferation of studies on the political economy of environmental change and urban transformation, until now there has not been a sufficiently complete treatment of Turkey's troubled environments, which live on the edge both geographically (between Europe and Middle East) and politically (between democracy and totalitarianism). The contributors to Transforming Socio-Natures in Turkey use the toolbox of environmental humanities to explore the main political, cultural and historical factors relating to the country's socio-environmental problems. This leads not only to a better grounding of some of the historical and contemporary debates on the environment in Turkey, but also a deeper understanding of the multiplicity of framings around more-than-human interactions in the country in a time of authoritarian populism. This book will be of interest not only to students of Turkey from a variety of social science and humanities disciplines but also contribute to the larger debates on environmental change and developmentalism in the context of a global populist turn.

In this research design challenge, we focus on the 'how' question of transdisciplinary study of energy systems and futures, taking into consideration the challenges of control. However, as Stirling (2014) reminds us, deterministic pictures of control can be problematic. Rather, our overarching aim here is to contribute to the emerging literature on energy research and social science by grounding it with contributions from three distinct perspectives (organization studies, political ecology and societal metabolism). We identify some opportunities for mending the gap between qualitative and quantitative approaches to energy research and suggest potential entry points to unpack energy decisions and their consequences, both expected and unexpected. We first start with a presentation of multiple epistemologies on energy and reflect on the multiplicity of knowledge. Then we move on to reflect on different ways of approaching energy questions including a specific focus on embracing the inherent complexity in societally relevant energy research. In the penultimate section, we turn to questions of power, scale and space. We conclude with some bottlenecks and opportunities for a truly transdisciplinary energy research that is societally relevant, just, equitable, sustainable and useful at once. ; QC 20180411

This perspective piece sets to contribute to the academic and practitioner debates around energy democracy in the age of climate crisis. In tackling the present-day energy transition challenges in a democratic, equitable, just and sustainable manner, we argue that sound research shall take alternative currents to centralized access to and control of energy decision making at its core as well as exploring new and novel ways to deal with production and distribution issues. Critical research on new actors, materialities, values, worldviews, democracy, and justice on energy is well-situated to meet these challenges. Navigating value systems, exploring enabling or disabling material qualities, focusing on ruptures, continuities, and emerging new geographies all carry a promise in critical energy research. We contend that 'normative, political and embodied' research strategies must be used to defeat the far right's the particularly mischievous approach to planetary futures. ; Peer Reviewed ; Postprint (published version)

This perspective piece sets out to contribute to the academic and practitioner debates around energy transitions and democracy initiatives in the age of a climate crisis. For tackling present-day energy challenges in a democratic, equitable and just manner, critical social science and humanities research on meaning and materialities, new actors and narratives, values and democracy is indispensable. In doing so, we centralize our work around three fundamental axes: The Concept, reflecting on the energy itself and revitalizing its essence; The Political, embracing the value laden, political and gendered nature of energy, and recognizing citizens' initiatives as counter currents to centralized energy decision-making; and The People, anticipating the far right's post-truth narratives that jeopardize planetary futures. We contend that "normative, political and embodied" research and praxis can serve for diversifying the energy transition debate as well as energizing bottom-up community led initiatives in order to democratize the energy playing field of recent times.

This perspective piece sets out to contribute to the academic and practitioner debates around energy transitions and democracy initiatives in the age of a climate crisis. For tackling present-day energy challenges in a democratic, equitable and just manner, critical social science and humanities research on meaning and materialities, new actors and narratives, values and democracy is indispensable. In doing so, we centralize our work around three fundamental axes: The Concept, reflecting on the energy itself and revitalizing its essence; The Political, embracing the value laden, political and gendered nature of energy, and recognizing citizens' initiatives as counter currents to centralized energy decision-making; and The People, anticipating the far right's post-truth narratives that jeopardize planetary futures. We contend that "normative, political and embodied" research and praxis can serve for diversifying the energy transition debate as well as energizing bottom-up community led initiatives in order to democratize the energy playing field of recent times.

At the root of energy policy are fundamental questions about the sort of social and environmental futures in which people want to live and how decisions over different energy pathways and energy futures are made. The interdisciplinary field of political ecology has the capacity to address such questions, while also challenging how energy policy conventionally gets done. We outline a political ecology perspective on EU energy policy that illuminates how the distribution of social power affects access to energy services, participation in energy decision-making and the allocation of energy's environmental and social costs.

Quantitative systems modelling in support of climate policy has tended to focus more on the supply side in assessing interactions among technology, economy, environment, policy and society. By contrast, the demand side is usually underrepresented, often emphasising technological options for energy efficiency improvements. In this perspective, we argue that scientific support to climate action is not only about exploring capacity of "what", in terms of policy and outcome, but also about assessing feasibility and desirability, in terms of "when", "where" and especially for "whom". Without the necessary behavioural and societal transformations, the world faces an inadequate response to the climate crisis challenge. This could result from poor uptake of low-carbon technologies, continued high-carbon intensive lifestyles, or economy-wide rebound effects. For this reason, we propose a framing for a holistic and transdisciplinary perspective on the role of human choices and behaviours in influencing the low-carbon transition, starting from the desires of individuals and communities, and analysing how these interact with the energy and economic landscape, leading to systemic change at the macro-level. In making a case for a political ecology agenda, we expand our scope, from comprehending the role of societal acceptance and uptake of end-use technologies, to co-developing knowledge with citizens from non-mainstream and marginalised communities, and to defining the modelling requirements to assess the decarbonisation potential of shifting lifestyle patterns in climate change and action.