Emotions, power, and environmental conflict: Expanding the ‘emotional turn’ in political ecology

Abstract

Building on the framework of emotional political ecology, we seek to expand ways of studying the relationships between emotion, power, and environmental conflict. Our review of work in feminist studies, human geography, social psychology, social movement theory, and social and cultural anthropology suggests the need for a theoretical framework that captures the psychological, more-than-human, collective, geographical, and personal-political dimensions that intersect subjectivities in environmental conflicts. We stress the need to explicitly consider ‘the political’ at stake when researching emotions in environmental conflicts, and develop a conceptual framework for facilitating nuanced conceptualisations and analyses of subjects and power in environmental conflicts.

Commoning for inclusion? commons, exclusion, property and socio-natural becomings

“…As a feminist political ecologist, I understand commoning relationships as intersectional, meaning that social relations of difference such as gender, race, ethnicity, caste, age, disability among others entwine together to shape how individuals experience power. Questions remain about how to 'stay with the trouble' of intersectional, ambivalences of power (Haraway 2016), to recognise and foster the performances and practices that allow collective subjectivities and affective relations to emerge and remain relatively stable over time (Butler 1990(Butler , 1997Nightingale 2013;González-Hidalgo and Zografos 2019). Staying conscious and working with the ambivalences of power will help commoning efforts to avoid inadvertent exclusions and harm to both human and non-human others, exclusions which can undermine long term commoning goals.…”

How Identity Enriches and Complicates the Research Process: Reflections from Political Ecology Fieldwork

“…I was often the only adult male present when women made food. Although this type of "deep hanging out" (Geertz 1998) is the very hallmark of thick ethnographic descriptions, men would often discourage such mundane interactions. They would instead invite me to "leave the women's spaces" and join elderly kinsmen in chatting over a gourd of pito (fermented sorghum beer).…”

“…Throughout interactions with women during the fieldwork, I was never able to engage in what is referred to in ethnography as "deep hanging out" (Geertz 1998;Hammersley and Atkinson 2007). I put in considerable effort to blend in with women as much as possible.…”

К Проблеме Анализа Исследовательских Акцентов В Российской И Зарубежной Политической Социологии

“…В статье «Emotions, Power, and Environmental Conflict: Expanding the 'Emotional Turn' in Political Ecology» [10] рассматривается возрастающее внимание общества к экологическим проблемам, что, с одной стороны, ведет к экологическому активизму, с другой -оказывает влияние на решения в области экологической политики. При этом усиливается эмоциональное отношение к экологии: положительное восприятие и одобрение законов и решений, которые направлены на заботу об окружающей среде; резко негативное отношение и критика политических действий и решений, ухудшающих экологическую ситуацию.…”