CfP NGM 2019: Agency, Institutions, and Empirics in Environmentality Studies
** With apologies for cross-posting ** Agency, Institutions, and Empirics in Environmentality Studies Call for Papers, 8th Nordic Geographers’ Meeting (NGM), Sustainable Geography – Geographies of Sustainability Trondheim, Norway, 16-19 June 2019 Conference website: https://www.ntnu.edu/geography/ngm-2019 <https://www.ntnu.edu/geography/ngm-2019> Session organizers: Connor J. Cavanagh,1 Tor A. Benjaminsen,1 Rob Fletcher2 1 Department of International Environment and Development Studies (Noragric), Norwegian University of Life Sciences 2 Sociology of Development and Change, Wageningen University, the Netherlands Abstract deadline: 10 December 2018 Contact: connor.cavan...@nmbu.no <mailto:connor.cavan...@nmbu.no> In human geography and political ecology, the last three decades have witnessed sustained interest with the ways in which Michel Foucault’s notion of ‘governmentality’ pertains (or does not) to the intertwined governance of human communities and the (bio)physical environment. Following key contributions by Luke (1995, 1999), Agrawal (2005), Fletcher (2010), and others, it might be said that these and similar inquiries have since led to the formation of an implicit sub-field of ‘green governmentality’ or ‘environmentality’ studies. Not least, research in this domain has recently been reinvigorated by a new wave of interest into the “multiple environmentalities” (Fletcher 2017) at work within efforts to address contemporary environment and development challenges, as well as how these may intersect, synergize, or even contradict each other within a variety of distinct historical and geographical conjunctures (see also Singh 2013; Youdelis 2013; Bluwstein 2017; Cavanagh 2018). Many of these studies have greatly enriched our understanding both of how power operates in and through the governance of the environment, as well as how distinct types of “environmental subjects” (Agrawal 2005) can be produced and reproduced over space and time. In doing so, however, they also raise a number of second-order political and methodological questions, which arguably warrant a renewed phase of explicit discussion and reflection. Indeed, the political stakes of these studies are perhaps especially relevant for political ecology if we conceive of the latter as an “explicitly normative” field of inquiry, concerned not only with “the hatchet” of analysis and critique, but also with “planting the seed” of alternative social and ecological relations (e.g. Robbins 2012: 13, see also Cavanagh and Benjaminsen 2017). Can scholars of environmentality, for instance, offer a more robust or detailed theory of individual and collective agency in the pursuit of such alternative ‘seeds’? How do Foucaultian insights into subject formation and “the conduct of conduct” complicate our understanding of both ‘resistance’ or other ‘responses from below’ (e.g. Hall et al. 2015) within the workings of multiple environmentalities? What is the role of variegated institutional arrangements – whether statutory or customary, formal or informal – in mediating, constraining, or enabling diverse environmentalities and the scope of responses to these? Most pressingly, perhaps, how should we conceive the role of historically and geographically diverse empirical data or knowledge in environmentality studies, and where might such knowledge be most productively reasserted as primarily the source or catalyst rather than the object of theoretical reflection? Seeking to contribute to these ongoing discussions and debates, we invite paper proposals engaging the above questions and/or related methodological, political, and conceptual foci. Relevant topics might include, amongst others, the following: · Methodology and the philosophy of science in environmentality studies · Dialogues and debates between or across critical realism, “critical institutionalism” (Cleaver 2012; Hall et al. 2014), and Foucaultian social science · Geographical and historical variegation in the workings of multiple governmentalities or environmentalities · Critical perspectives on institutions and agency in Foucaultian theory and analysis · Interactions between multiple environmentalities across divergently produced scales, spaces, and places · Agency, ‘resistance’, counter-conduct or parrhesia (e.g. Legg 2018), and other ‘responses from below’ (Hall et al. 2015) · Politics and “explicitly normative” (Robbins 2012) argumentation or analysis vis-à-vis Foucaultian theory and philosophy Please send abstracts of approximately 250 words to Connor Joseph Cavanagh (connor.cavan...@nmbu.no <mailto:connor.cavan...@nmbu.no>) by 10 December 2018. Authors will be notified about the status of their submission as soon as possible thereafter. References Agrawal, A. (2005). Environmentality: technologies of government and the making of subjects. Durham: Duke University Press. Bluwstein, J
Final CfP POLLEN18: Political Ecology, the Green Economy, and Alternative Sustainabilities
een past and present varieties of green capitalism and environmental colonialism. * Challenges for and pathways to alternative sustainabilities, such as those rooted in degrowth, postcolonialism or decolonial thought, eco-Marxism, feminism, anarchism, and environmental justice; synergies and tensions between movements of workers, peasants and indigenous peoples; support and opposition to various alternatives from both above and below; prospects for resistances and contestations operating locally as well as across places, spaces, and scales; emerging or mutating forms of rural and urban populism on the political right as well as the left; new racisms and identity-based antagonisms in both the Global North and South. * Conceptual, political and methodological reflections about the role of twenty-first century political ecologies vis-à-vis alternative sustainabilities, including those examining promises and complications of engaged political ecologies; methodological implications of combined scholarship and activism, as well as other methodological and study design challenges in political ecology; the prefiguration of alternative political ecologies and scholarly practices to synergize with alternative sustainabilities. We invite paper and full panel proposals for this conference. Abstracts for paper proposals should be approximately 300 words and include author affiliations and contact information. Panel proposals should include a brief description of the session theme, and a maximum of 4 paper abstracts for 1 panel. Please send these to politicalecolog...@gmail.com <mailto:politicalecolog...@gmail.com> before 15 December 2017. Keynote speakers: 1. Paige West (Barnard College and Columbia University, USA) 2. Tania Murray Li (University of Toronto, Canada) 3. Ashish Kothari (Kalpavriksh, India) Organizing committee Noragric, Norwegian University of Life Sciences: Tor A. Benjaminsen, Connor Joseph Cavanagh, Mikael Bergius, Jill T. Buseth, Shai Divon Oslo and Akershus University College: Hanne Svarstad, Roy Krøvel, Thorgeir Kolshus, Andreas Ytterstad, Berit Aasen Centre for Environment and Development (SUM), University of Oslo: Mariel Aguilar Støen, Susanne Normann, Jostein Jakobsen Advisory board Bram Büscher (Wageningen University, the Netherlands) Christine Noe (University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania) Denis Gautier (CIRAD, Montpellier, France) Sian Sullivan (Bath Spa University, UK) Nitin Rai (ATREE, India) Kathleen McAfee (San Francisco State University, USA) Simon Batterbury (Lancaster University, UK) Tracey Osborne (University of Arizona, USA) Wendy Harcourt (ISS, Erasmus University, the Netherlands) Adrian Nel (University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa) Andrea Nightingale (University of Agricultural Sciences, Sweden) Wolfram Dressler (University of Melbourne, Australia) Rosaleen Duffy (University of Sheffield, UK) Ashish Kothari (Kalpavriksh, India) Susan Paulson (University of Florida, USA) Robert Fletcher (Wageningen University, the Netherlands) Amber Huff (IDS, University of Sussex, UK) Amita Baviskar (Institute for Economic Growth, India) Paul Robbins (University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA) Frances Cleaver (University of Sheffield, UK) Maano Ramutsindela (University of Cape Town, South Africa) Peter Wilshusen (Bucknell University, USA) Noella Gray (University of Guelph, Canada) Marta Irving (Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) Dan Brockington (University of Sheffield, UK) Kristen Lyons (University of Queensland, Australia) Esteve Corbera (ICTA, Autonomous University of Barcelona, Spain) Elizabeth Shapiro-Garza (Duke University, USA) Scott Prudham (University of Toronto, Canada) Lyla Mehta (IDS, University of Sussex, UK) Jim Igoe (University of Virginia, USA) Catherine Corson (Mount Holyoke College, USA) Elizabeth Lunstrum (York University, Canada) Jun Borras (ISS, Erasmus University, the Netherlands) Leah Horowitz (University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA) David Tumusiime (Makerere University, Uganda) Ken MacDonald (University of Toronto, Canada) Marja Spierenburg (Radboud University, the Netherlands) Ben Neimark (Lancaster University, UK) Isabelle Anguelovski (Autonomous University of Barcelona, Spain) Robin Roth (University of Guelph, Canada) Christos Zografos (Johns Hopkins University - Pompeu Fabra University, Spain) Jessica Dempsey (University of British Columbia, Canada) Bill Adams (University of Cambridge, UK) Place and venue: The Norwegian capital of Oslo is beautifully situated on the coastal Oslofjord, straddling the scenic Akerselva river and surrounded by forests and cultural landscapes. The Oslo and Akershus University College is exceptionally well-situated in the centre of the city, within walking distance of major landmarks and attractions. About POLLEN: The Political Ecology Network (POLLEN) is an umbrella organisation of political ecology researchers, groups, projects, networks and nodes across the globe. As the name suggests, POLLEN seeks to prov
