| Dear POLLEN Members and Friends, The short and dark days are upon us here in Copenhagen, but seeing all the exciting news across the network always provides plenty of rays of sunshine! 🙂 This month we’ve got an announcement for a POLLEN Meeting, a bunch of new publications, blog posts, CfPs, vacancies – and an introduction by a small POLLEN Node in Sweden! Best wishes, POLLEN Secretariat NOTE: the updates below are a copy of the original newsletter, and therefore might not contain all hyperlinks and content. To access the original with full content, as well as to see previous newsletters, follow this link: https://us20.campaign-archive.com/home/?u=71814a42a0d2d8f390cbee1be&id=3fe97edf35 |
| Getting to know your fellow POLLEN members Every monthly newsletter includes a brief introduction to one of the many POLLEN nodes. We hope this will help build better connections between our community. Our next ‘virtual visit’ is to Sweden’s Lund University. Enjoy! |
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| Short group bioMine Islar, Vasna Ramasar and Wim Carton form a small node at Lund University which connects the Centre for Sustainability Science (LUCSUS) and the Department of Human Geography. We share an interest in climate and environmental justice and pose critical questions of political ecology related to natural resource use including water, energy and land. Our work cuts across different spatial and temporal scales. Some of our research is focused on distinctively global dynamics while other parts of it are more locally situated, with case studies in Nepal, Spain, South Africa, Sweden, and Uganda. Across our two institutions, we also offer Masters education through the programs in Culture, Power and Sustainability (CPS) and the Lund University Masters in Environmental Management and Sustainability (LUMES). Political ecology is part of the curriculum in both of these programs. Mine’s research can be summarized in two trends (1) critical reading of the current governance of sustainability solutions from a justice perspective, and (2) potential role of ‘collective action’ as agency of change for socially and environmentally just futures. Empirically she explores citizen municipal movements in Barcelona as well as renewable energy cooperativism in Nepal evaluating political opportunity structures that collective action is developed in different contexts for mobilizing political capital as a response to everyday sustainability challenges. She is also engaged in science-policy work for pluralistic valuation of nature in the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). Vasna’s interdisciplinary research engages the parallel streams of environmental politics and governance and alternatives to development. She is interested in social and environmental justice and using feminist and decolonial approaches to engage questions of power. She is currently working on a research project looking at justice claims in the energy transition in South Africa and Sweden and another on The Future of Human Rights. She is a core group member of the Global Tapestry of Alternatives and the Post-Develoment Academic-Activist Group (PEDAGOG). She is the director of the Culture, Power and Sustainability Masters in Human Ecology and supervises PhDs in human ecology and critical development studies. Wim’s research is focused on the political ecology of climate change mitigation, with a particular emphasis on the politics of carbon sequestration and carbon removal. His work draws inspiration from theoretical traditions in political economy, critical environmental geography, and science and technology studies. Empirically, his research has in the past involved case studies of carbon offsetting projects in Uganda. Wim currently leads two research projects that examine the tradeoffs, political-economic interests and justice dimensions underlying the recent attention to negative emissions in the climate debate. He is particularly interested in how technological promises and future imaginaries of negative emissions are intersecting with socioeconomic relations in the present. Fun fact All three of us were part of the same PhD research school, which with some exaggeration might be seen as the cradle of political ecology at Lund University! The constellation of this node is a bit random, in that we share many research interests with colleagues at Lund who also take a critical perspective on socioecological questions, but that don’t necessarily identify as political ecologists. One could say that there are plenty closet political ecologists at Lund, who will shortly be receiving a determined invitation to join the cause. |
| Announcement of upcoming POLLEN Meeting During POLLEN22 a POLLEN Assembly was held to discuss the network and appoint a new secretariat host and conference host for POLLEN24. As you know, our good friends at the Crawford School of Public Policy, Canberra, Australia will be hosting the secretariat the coming two years. Yet, since no one made a bid to host POLLEN24 and because a proposal was made to make some changes to the POLLEN principles that needed more reflection, we have called for a POLLEN Meeting that is to be held November 10 at 1-2.30 pm Central European Time. Join the meeting here, https://ucph-ku.zoom.us/j/69720481578 At the meeting, we will hear bids for hosting of POLLEN24! You can still submit a bid – pls write us at the secretariat if you want to make a bid during the meeting. |
| Let’s come together as a network to support the new secretariat! Crawford School of Public Policy, Canberra, Australia are new secretariat hosts. In line with the spirit of inclusivity in POLLEN, the hosts have offered to take this on without having the funding to make it work in practice, but in the hope that the network would step in to collectively support the function financially. Let’s do this! A crowdfunding link has been created, see here. |
| Promoting POLLEN collaboration Do you write with other members of POLLEN? In attempts to promote collaboration across the POLLEN nodes, please consider putting the following statement in the acknowledgements of your paper: ‘This article represents work conducted as part of the Political Ecology Network (POLLEN).’ When you do, please let us know about it so we can tweet it out on @PolEcoNet and get it in the next newsletter! |
| Publications Clapp, J. and W.G. Moseley. 2020. “This Food Crisis is Different: COVID-19 and the Fragility of the Neoliberal Food Security Order. Journal of Peasant Studies. DOI: 10.1080/03066150.2020.1823838. Clapp, J., W.G. Moseley, P. Termine et al. 2020. “Impacts of COVID-19 on food security and nutrition: developing effective policy responses to address the hunger and malnutrition pandemic.” HLPE Issues Paper. High Level Panel of Experts (HLPE), UN Committee on World Food Security (CFS). September. Dutta, Anwesha, and Harry Fischer. Forthcoming. The local governance of Covid-19: Disease prevention and social security in rural India. World Development. Ernwein, M. 2020. Bringing urban parks to life: The more-than-human politics of urban ecological work. Annals of the American Association of Geographers. Online First. Fathoni, H., Setyowati, A and Prest, J. 2021. Is Community Renewable Energy Always Just? Examining Energy Injustices and Inequalities in Rural Indonesia. Energy Research and Social Science. Fleischman, F., Basant, S., Chhatre, A., Coleman, E,. Fischer, H., Gupta, D., Güneralp, B., Kashwan, P., Khatri, D., Muscarella, R., Powers., J., Ramprasad, V., Rana, P., Rodriguez Solorzano, C. Veldman, J. Forthcoming. Pitfalls of tree planting show why we need people-centered natural climate solutions. Bioscience. Flipo, F. (2020) L’impératif de la sobriété numérique. Éditions Matériologiques Haverkamp, J. (Forthcoming). Collaborative survival and the politics of livability: Towards adaptation otherwise. World Development, 137, 105152. (open access link until Nov.15) Hope, J., 2020. The anti‐politics of sustainable development: Environmental critique from assemblage thinking in Bolivia. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers. Koot, S. (2020). Articulations of Inferiority: From Pre-colonial to Post-colonial Paternalism in Tourism and Development among the Indigenous Bushmen of Southern Africa. History and Anthropology. BOOK: Has It Come to This? The Promises and Perils of Geoengineering on the Brink. Edited by J.P. Sapinski, Holly Jean Buck, Andreas Malm. Rutgers University Press. Discount codes: he following discount codes make it almost affordable: USA: “RFLR19”; Canada: “RUTGERS20”; Rest of the world: “RutFriendsFamily” Rahimzadeh, A. Fraternal Polyandry and Land Ownership in Kinnaur, Western Himalaya. Hum Ecol (2020). Setyowati, A. 2021. Mitigating Inequality with Emissions? Exploring Energy Justice and Financing Transitions to Low Carbon Energy in Indonesia. Energy Research and Social Science Setyowati, A. 2020. Beyond technical fixes: Renewable energy policy in Indonesia. Inside Indonesia (October-December edition) Wieckhardt, C., Koot, S. and Karimasari, N. (2020). Environmentality, Green Grabbing, and Neoliberal Conservation: The Ambiguous Role of Ecotourism in the Green Life Privatised Nature Reserve, Sumatra, Indonesia. Journal of Sustainable Tourism. |
| CfPs, Conferences, Talks CfP: American Association of Geographers (AAG) 2021 Annual Conference (online session). Roads, bridges, dams and ports: what does the turn to infrastructure (both empirical and theoretical) mean for Latin American environmental geographies? For specific details, contact Jessica Hope (jch31@st-andrews.ac.uk) Deadline is Friday Nov 13th 2020. CfP: American Association of Geographs (AAG) 2021 Annual Conference (online session). Revisiting India’s forest bureaucracies: situating individuals in the making of political forests. For more information and for sending abstracts of ~250 words, contact Jared Margulies (jdmargulies@ua.edu) and Anwesha Dutta (anwesha.dutta@cmi.no) by November 05th. Two *Virtual* Upcoming Talks on Cities, Finance and Climate Risk: Two public talks on Nov 13-14, 2020 exploring the emerging urban political ecologies of climate and financial risk. Information about the two speakers, their talks and how to sign up can be found here. CfP: European Conference on Politics and Gender (7-9 July, 2021). Fundamental Challenges to European Politics: Gender, Race, Intersectionality, and the More-Than-Human. Deadline for submissions: 29 November, 2020 at 00:00 CET. Read more here. HELSUS Upcoming Webinar: with Leah Temper, Constance McDermott and more. Join us to discuss Justice and Power in the context of Global Bioeconomy. Check more here. (Zoom links will be available soon and “Local time” is GMT+2) CfP: “Storying Indigenous (Life)Worlds” special issue in Genealogy. Submission deadline: May 15, 2021. Find more details here. Contact guest editors Dr. Darren Ranco (darren.ranco@maine.edu) or Dr. Jamie Haverkamp (haverkja@jmu.edu) with questions or paper submissions. |
| Blog posts, articles documentaries, podcasts Childcare & Academia: an interventionByJessica Hope, Charlotte Lemanski, Tanja Bastia, Nina Moeller, Paula Meth, and Glyn Williams. (October 15, 2020). In Liverpool University Press Blog Viral Political Ecology: fall edition By Mihnea Tanasescu. (October 22, 2020). In The Civil Animal Beyond “Koyaanisqatsi”: Reimagining Civilization By Barry Gills. (October 31, 2020). In Common Alternatives |
| From our friends at Undisciplined Environments Beyond handbook tyrannies: Pluralising the practice of feminist political ecology By Rebecca Elmhirst (September 22, 2020) Community Gardens, Gentrification, and Placekeeping in Minneapolis By Kelsey Poljacik and Rebecca Walker (October 6, 2020) From the commons to extractivism and back: The Story of Mahakam River in Indonesia By Siti Maimunah and Sarah Agustiorini (October 15, 2020) To Green Or Not To Green: Four stories of urban (in)justice in Barcelona By Emilia Oscilowicz (October 20, 2020) Covid-19 pandemic and oil spills in the Ecuadorian Amazon: The confluence of two crisis By Jacqueline Gaybor and Wendy Harcourt (October 27, 2020) Not All That Is Green Becomes Gentrified By Ana T. Amorim-Maia (November 3, 2020) |
| From our friends at BIOSEC The BIOSEC Project on illegal wildlife trade, security and conservation has had a busy time in its final months. Alas, the very generous funding from the European Research Council ended in August, but we have lots of work in the pipeline and we are continuing with our collaborations – please check out our website for regular updates https://biosec.group.shef.ac.uk/ We would like to thank the POLLEN community for all your support during the last 4 years – spreading the word about our research and engaging with us intellectually – our team attended the three POLLEN conferences (2016, 2018 and 2020) which provided excellent sounding boards for our work The final weeks of the project have resulted in a flurry of activity: We developed a series of policy briefs: see here. A zine for a quick and fun intro to our work: see here. A series of short themed videos aimed at a wider/popular audience: see here. And our podcasts are now available as a box set – well worth a binge listen – listen here. There is a round-up of all our latest news and end of project releases in our final BIOSEC newsletter: see here. |
| Vacancies and courses PhD: Fishy Food: The power and politics of food systems at the Lancaster University. Supervisors: Professor Christina Hicks, Dr Giovanni Bettini, Dr Philippa Cohen (WorldFish). Deadline for applying: 23 November, 2020. Tenure stream position: Assistant Professor in the area of Environmental Planning. University of Toronto. Starting date: July 1, 2021. Application deadline: November 24, 2020. Read full description here. New Masters program: Political Ecology MA – Lancaster University. The UK’s only Masters framed explicitly around Political Ecology. Read more here. Postdoctoral researcher: Justice and Politics in Global Bioeconomy project (2 positions). Natural Resources Institute Finland (Luke). Deadline to apply: 30/11/2020 16:00. Read more info here. PhD: Position in Comparative Governance of Gene Editing in Food and Agriculture. Department of Environmental Studies at the State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry (SUNY-ESF) starting as soon as January 2021. Guaranteed consideration date: apply by November 9, 2020. For full description and more information,contact Theresa Selfa at tselfa@esf.edu |
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