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Dear list members,
please find below our call for papers for a workshop on the "political
ecology of agrarian change and forest conservation" at the biannual
conference of the German Anthropological Association (GAA - DGV) in
Vienna (14-17 September 2011). The deadline for the submission of
abstracts will be 11 March 2011.
Kind regards,
Daniel
Workshop 25
Contested Environments: The Political Ecology of Agrarian Change and
Forest Conservation
Daniel Muenster in collaboration with Ursula Muenster and Stefan Dorondel
Abstract: In the present post-development and globalization era, the
political and economic dimensions of human-environment relationships are
characterized by controversies over inequality, exploitation, and
marginalization. Theorists labelling the world's present condition as
post-colonial, post-socialist, or neoliberally globalized find it
increasingly essential to engage the issues of environmental justice,
conservation, and agrarian change. Ethnography is particularly well
suited to help understand the local realities behind, as well as the
contestations and ideologies of global ecological concerns, such as
climate change, biodiversity conservation, forest protection,
genetically modified agriculture, global food regimes, water scarcity,
mining, etc.
In this panel we aim in particular at bringing together research on two
central themes in political ecology: the politics and violence
associated with forest conservation and the neoliberalization of
agriculture under the present global food regime (H. Friedmann). There
is a broad interrelation between increasingly protected forest
boundaries and agriculture. In many ethnographic settings “agrarian
frontiers” (cattle, soy beans) extend into forest areas, spurring far
reaching ecological, social, and political consequences that reach
beyond the established trends of forest clearance, decline in
biodiversity, and displacement of indigenous peoples. Global
deforestation, mainly through conversion of forests into agricultural
land, continues at an alarmingly high rate—about 13 million hectares per
year (FAO 2007). On the other hand, authoritarian state forest
protection may deprive local peasants of much needed commons for use as
grazing grounds or as water and wood sources. In other ethnographic
contexts the ecological frontier of forest/agriculture may generate
antagonistic and dynamic divisions of peoples, such as between
indigenous and “mainstream” or between hill and plains societies (J.
Scott, N. Peluso). We also want to reflect on possible differences
between the political ecological dynamics of agrarian change and forest
conservation: Is agrarian transformation driven more by science
(biotechnology, green revolution) and capital, while forest conservation
is the domain of NGOs, transnational institutions, and developmental
states? How do practices of control and regulation in the “greening” of
agriculture (fair trade, organic) and forest management (UNEP standards)
differ? Are the cultural politics of protest and resistance expressed
differently among peasant (agriculture), indigenous (forest), and urban
middle class environmental activists (forest and agriculture)?
In this panel we invite ethnographic contributions to the emerging field
of political ecology, with which we hope to engage regarding recent
theoretical advances in the anthropology of globalization,
post-socialism, and post-colonialism. On the other hand we expect to
stimulate critical social and cultural theory in anthropology by
bringing ecology (back) in.
Please send your proposals for individual papers directly to the
conveners. Deadline: 11/March/2011
Daniel Muenster, Department of Social Anthropology, Halle University,
[log in to unmask]
Ursula Muenster, Department of Social Anthropology/ Rachel Carson
Center, LMU Munich, [log in to unmask]
Stefan Dorondel, Rachel Carson Center, LMU Munich,
[log in to unmask]
see also
http://www.dgv-net.de/tl_files/dokumente/Call_for_Papers.pdf
--
Dr. Daniel Münster
Department of Social Anthropology | University of Halle-Wittenberg
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