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Feminist Political Ecology

The Lives of Women in a Land Reclamation Project: Gender, Class, Culture and Place in Egyptian Land and Water Management

Citation:

Rap, Edwin, and Martina Jaskolski. 2019. “The Lives of Women in a Land Reclamation Project: Gender, Class, Culture and Place in Egyptian Land and Water Management.” International Journal of the Commons 13 (1): 84–104.

 

 

Authors: Edwin Rap, Martina Jaskolski

Abstract:

This article links feminist political ecology with the academic debate about commoning by focusing on the gendered distribution of common pool resources, in particular land and water. The research is set in the context of a coastal land reclamation project in Egypt’s Nile Delta, in a region where conflicts over resources such as arable land and fresh water are intensifying. Drawing on recent literature on commoning, we analyse the conditions under which different groups of resource users are constrained or enabled to act together. The article presents three case studies of women who represent different groups using land and water resources along the same irrigation canal. Through the concepts of intersectionality, performativity, and gendered subjectivity, this article explores how these women negotiate access to land and water resources to sustain viable livelihoods. The case studies unpack how the intersection of gender, class, culture, and place produces gendered subject positions in everyday resource access, and how this intersectionality either facilitates or constrains commoning. We argue that commoning practices are culturally and spatially specific and shaped by pre-existing resource access. Such access is often unequally structured along categories of class and gender in land reclamation and irrigation projects. 

Keywords: common pool resources, commoning, Egypt, feminist political ecology, gender, intersectionality, Nile, performativity

Topics: Class, Feminisms, Feminist Political Ecology, Gender, Women, Humanitarian Assistance, Context-Appropriate Response to Trauma, Infrastructure, Water & Sanitation, Intersectionality, Livelihoods, Rights, Land Rights Regions: Africa, MENA, North Africa, Middle East Countries: Egypt

Year: 2019

Ecological Masculinities: Theoretical Foundations and Practical Guidance

Citation:

Hultman, Martin, and Paul Pulé. 2018. Ecological Masculinities: Theoretical Foundations and Practical Guidance. Abingdon: Routledge.

Authors: Martin Hultman, Paul Pulé

Annotation:

Summary:
Around the globe, unfettered industrialisation has marched forth in unison with massive social inequities. Making matters worse, anthropogenic pressures on Earth’s living systems are causing alarming rates of thermal expansion, sea-level rise, biodiversity losses in terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems and a sixth mass extinction. As various disciplines have shown, rich white men in the Global North are the main (although not the only) perpetrators of this slow violence. This book demonstrates that industrial/breadwinner masculinities have come at terrible costs to the living planet and ecomodern masculinities have failed us as well, men included.
 
This book is dedicated to a third and relationally focused pathway that the authors call ecological masculinities. Here, they explore ways that masculinities can advocate and embody broader, deeper and wider care for the global through to local (‘glocal’) commons. Ecological Masculinities works with the wisdoms of four main streams of influence that have come before us. They are: masculinities politics, deep ecology, ecological feminism and feminist care theory. The authors work with profeminist approaches to the conceptualisations and embodiments of modern Western masculinities. From there, they introduce masculinities that give ADAM-n for Earth, others and self, striving to create a more just and ecologically viable planet for all of life.
 
This book is interdisciplinary. It is intended to reach (but is not restricted to) scholars exploring history, gender studies, material feminism, feminist care theory, ecological feminism, deep ecology, social ecology, environmental humanities, social sustainability, science and technology studies and philosophy. (Summary from Routledge) 
 
Table of Contents: 
Prologue: Separate Paths Towards A Common Future
 
1. Introduction: Interrogating Masculinities 
 
2. Masculine Ecologisation: From Industrial/Breadwinner and Ecomodern to Ecological Masculinities 
 
3. Men and Masculinities: A Spectrum of Views
 
4. Connecting Inner and Outer Nature: A Deeper Ecology for the Global North 
 
5. Lessons from Ecological Feminism
 
5. Caring for the 'Glocal' Commons 
 
6. Headwaters: Previous Research on Men, Masculinities and Earth 
 
7. Ecological Masculinities: Giving ADAM-n

Topics: Environment, Climate Change, Feminisms, Feminist Political Ecology, Gender, Masculinity/ies

Year: 2018

Towards New EcoMasculinities, EcoGenders, and EcoSexualities

Citation:

Gaard, Greta. 2014. “Towards New EcoMasculinities, EcoGenders, and EcoSexualities.” In Ecofeminism: Feminist Intersections with Other Animals and the Earth, edited by Carol J. Adams and Lori Gruen, 225–39. New York: Bloomsbury Publishing.

Author: Greta Gaard

Annotation:

Summary:
“Are there masculinities that could be consistent with ecofeminist praxis? From years of organizing through the ‘chain of radical equivalences’ among social movement actors, advocated by Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe (1985) as crucial to the formation of a radically democratic social movement, eco-justice activists and scholars have learned the value of deconstructing the role of the Dominant Master Self, and providing a location for even those constructed as dominant (whether via race, gender, class, sexuality, or nationality) to embrace a radically ecological vision and stand with—rather than on top of—the earth’s oppressed majorities. For any egalitarian socioeconomic and eco-political transformation, such as that advocated by ecofeminism to be possible, both individuals and institutions need to shift away from overvaluing exclusively white, male, and masculinized attributes and behaviors, jobs, environments, economic practices, laws and political practices, in order to recognize and enact eco-political sustainability and ecological genders” (Gaard 2014, 225).

Topics: Feminisms, Ecofeminism, Feminist Political Ecology, Gender, Masculinity/ies, Justice

Year: 2014

Feminist Political Ecology Practices of Worlding: Art, Commoning and the Politics of Hope in the Classroom

Citation:

Harcourt, Wendy. 2019. “Feminist Political Ecology Practices of Worlding: Art, Commoning and the Politics of Hope in the Classroom.” International Journal of the Commons 13 (1): 153–74.

Author: Wendy Harcourt

Abstract:

In the paper I argue that in a world where our lives are intricately interconnected and our environments are rapidly changing, commoning produces ecological imaginaries and understandings of places that could build a sense of global commons based on mutuality, reciprocity, and relationality. In exploring commoning in the international classroom, my paper contributes to ongoing dialogues on community economies and feminist political ecology in the Community Economies Research Network (CERN), and the newly formed EU project Well-being, Ecology, Gender and cOmmunity (WEGO). In the article I first set out how I use commoning in my teaching. In section two I present my methodology, followed by section three where I present the community economies research network. In section four I present a case study of how I employ the community economies iceberg diagram in my teaching process using drawing/ art-making to create an emergent commons-in-practice. In section five I discuss the productivity of bringing community economies and commoning to a broader feminist, ecological justice project followed by a conclusion.

Keywords: commoning, community economies, feminist political ecology, gender, postdevelopment

Topics: Economies, Education, Environment, Feminisms, Feminist Political Ecology, Gender, Justice

Year: 2019

Feminist Political Ecology

Citation:

Elmhirst, Rebecca. 2015. “Feminist Political Ecology.” In The Routledge Handbook of Political Ecology, edited by Tom Perreault, Gavin Bridge, and James McCarthy, 519–30. Abingdon: Routledge.

Author: Rebecca Elmhirst

Abstract:

Feminist political ecology emerged as a subfield of Political Ecology in the 1990s, developing initially from gender and development studies, with which it shares a broad commitment to understanding the dynamics of gender in relation to the natural environment and in the context of natural resource-based livelihoods. As with Political Ecology more generally, Feminist Political Ecology (FPE hereafter) emphasizes politics and power at different scales, but goes further in highlighting gendered power relations, and in making an explicit commitment towards tackling gender disadvantage and inequality. FPE directs attention towards gendered processes within the politics of environmental degradation and conservation, the neoliberalization of nature and ongoing rounds of accumulation, enclosure and dispossession associated with each of these. Work within this field seeks to complicate arenas of assumed common interest, such as “community” and “household”, and to explore the connections between nature, gendered subject formation and the body. Of central interest are the gender dimensions of struggles over nature and the environment, and how might these intersect and be informed by feminist objectives, strategies and practices. Whilst FPE embraces a diversity of approaches and subject matters, there is a shared (if often implicit) commitment to feminist epistemology, methods and values, where dominant, masculinist conceptions and practices of knowledge and authority are recognized and challenged, and where emphasis is given to research and practice that empowers and promotes social and ecological transformation for women and other marginalized groups. (Routledge) 

Topics: Environment, Feminisms, Feminist Political Ecology, Gendered Power Relations, Households

Year: 2015

Introducing New Feminist Political Ecologies

Citation:

Elmhirst, Rebecca. 2011. “Introducing New Feminist Political Ecologies.” Geoforum 42 (2): 129–32. 

Author: Rebecca Elmhirst

Abstract:

Political Ecology is firmly established as an important area of enquiry within Geography that attends to many of the most important questions of our age, including the politics of environmental degradation and conservation, the neoliberalisation of nature and ongoing rounds of accumulation, enclosure and dispossession, focusing on access and control of resources, and environmental struggles around knowledge and power, justice and governance. This short introductory paper considers how feminists working in this field of enquiry consider the gender dimension to such issues, and how political ecologies might intersect with a feminist objectives, strategies and practices: a focus for early iterations of a promising sub-field, labelled Feminist Political Ecology. It considers a number of epistemological, political and practical challenges that together may account for the relatively limited number of works that self-identify as feminist political ecology. Whilst this has made it difficult for Feminist Political Ecology to gain purchase as a sub- field within the political ecology cannon, this introductory piece highlights fruitful new ways that developments in feminist thinking enrich work in this field, evident in a flowering of recent publications.

Keywords: feminist political ecology, political ecology, gender, Subjectivity, scale, embodiment

Topics: Environment, Feminisms, Feminist Political Ecology, Governance, Justice

Year: 2011

Feminist Political Ecologies of the Commons and Commoning

Citation:

Clement, Floriane, Wendy Jane Harcourt, Deepa Joshi, and Chizu Sato. 2019. “Feminist Political Ecologies of the Commons and Commoning.” International Journal of the Commons 13 (1): 1–15.

Authors: Floriane Clement, Wendy Jane Harcourt, Deepa Joshi, Chizu Sato

Keywords: commoning, commons, feminist political ecology, gender, intersectionality, multiscalar, power, subjectivities

Annotation:

Summary:
"It has been almost a decade since Elinor Ostrom won the Nobel Prize in Economics in 2009 and transformed in no small measure, environmental governance studies. On the one hand, her alternative ideas on polycentric governance, collective action and commons management created legitimate space and authority for grassroots structures to self-govern the commons. Less visibly, her work also enabled a storming into masculine spaces of political science and economics (Wall 2014). Viewed through a feminist perspective, these acts were both profoundly political. And yet, although her work ‘challenged many extreme neoliberal concerns by emphasizing cooperative behaviour and the possibility for solutions not involving private property’ (Forsyth and Johnson 2014, 1106)—it did not [re]politicize the field of new institutional economics, i.e. allow a critical analysis of how power operates in commons management (Łapniewska 2016). This special issue offers a set of papers that defend the pertinence and value of integrating power and power relationships in the analysis of the commons, from a feminist perspective" (Clement et al. 2019, 2).

Topics: Economies, Feminist Economics, Environment, Feminisms, Feminist Political Ecology, Gendered Power Relations, Governance

Year: 2019

A Political Ecology of Women, Water and Global Environmental Change

Citation:

Buechler, Stephanie, and Anne-Marie S. Hanson, eds. 2015. A Political Ecology of Women, Water and Global Environmental Change. Abingdon: Routledge.

Authors: Stephanie Buechler, Anne-Marie S. Hanson

Annotation:

Summary: 
This edited volume explores how a feminist political ecology framework can bring fresh insights to the study of rural and urban livelihoods dependent on vulnerable rivers, lakes, watersheds, wetlands and coastal environments. Bringing together political ecologists and feminist scholars from multiple disciplines, the book develops solution-oriented advances to theory, policy and planning to tackle the complexity of these global environmental changes.
 
Using applied research on the contemporary management of groundwater, springs, rivers, lakes, watersheds and coastal wetlands in Central and South Asia, Northern, Central and Southern Africa, and South and North America, the authors draw on a variety of methodological perspectives and new theoretical approaches to demonstrate the importance of considering multiple layers of social difference as produced by and central to the effective governance and local management of water resources.
 
This unique collection employs a unifying feminist political ecology framework that emphasizes the ways that gender interacts with other social and geographical locations of water resource users. In doing so, the book further questions the normative gender discourses that underlie policies and practices surrounding rural and urban water management and climate change, water pollution, large-scale development and dams, water for crop and livestock production and processing, resource knowledge and expertise, and critical livelihood studies.
This book will be of interest to students and scholars of environmental studies, development studies, feminist and environmental geography, anthropology, sociology, environmental philosophy, public policy, planning, media studies, Latin American and other area studies, as well as women’s and gender studies. (Summary from Routledge) 
 
Table of Contents: 
Foreword 
Leila Harris 
 
1. Introduction: Towards a Feminist Political Ecology of Women, Global Change and Vulnerable Waterscapes 
Anne-Marie Hanson and Stephanie Buechler 
 
2. Interrogating Large-scale Development and Inequality in Lesotho: Bridging Feminist Political Ecology, Intersectionality and Environmental Justice Frameworks 
Yvonne Braun 
 
3. The Silent (and Gendered) Violence: Understanding Water Access in Mining Areas 
Kuntala Lahiri-Dutt 
 
4. Urban Water Visibility in Los Angeles: Legibility and Access for All
Kathleen Kambic
 
5. Advances and Setbacks in Women's Participation in Water Management in Brazil 
Andrea Moraes 
 
6. Climate-water Challenges and Gendered Adaptation Strategies in Rayon, a Riparian Community in Sonora, Mexico 
Stephanie Buechler 
 
7. International Partnerships of Women for Sustainable Watershed Governance in Times of Climate Change 
Patricia E. (Ellie) Perkins and Patricia Figuieredo Walker 
 
8. Women's Contributions to Climate Change Adaptation in Egypt's Mubarak Resettlement Scheme through Cactus Cultivation and Adjusted Irrigation 
Dina Najjar 
 
9. Shoes in the Seaweed and Bottles on the Beach: Global Garbage and Women's Oral Histories of Socio-Environmental Change in Coastal Yucatán 
Anne-Marie Hanson 
 
10. Heen Kas' el'ti Zoo: Among the Ragged Lakes - Storytelling and Collaborative Water Research with Carcross/Tagish First Nation (Yukon Territory, Canada) 
Eleanor Hayman with Mark Wedge and Colleen James 
 
11. Pamiri Women and the Melting Glaciers of Tajikistan: A Visual Knowledge Exchange for Improved Environmental Governance 
Citt Williams and Ivan Golovnev 
 
12. Conclusion: Advancing Multi-Disciplinary Scholarship on Gender, Water and Environmental Change through Feminist Political Ecology 
Stephanie Buechler, Anne-Marie Hanson, Diana Liverman and Miriam Gay-Antaki

Topics: Agriculture, Development, Environment, Climate Change, Feminisms, Feminist Political Ecology, Governance, Infrastructure, Water & Sanitation, Livelihoods

Year: 2015

Economy for the Earth: The Labour Theory of Value without the Subject/Object Distinction.

Citation:

Brennan, Teresa. 1997. “Economy for the Earth: The Labour Theory of Value without the Subject/Object Distinction.” Ecological Economics 20 (2): 175–85. 

Author: Teresa Brennan

Abstract:

This is a theoretical paper which applies feminist and ecological feminist critiques of the subject/object distinction in philosophy to Marx's labour theory of value. It argues that much of the use of Marx's political economy has been undermined by the centrality of the subject/object distinction in his theory. His deployment of this distinction led him to an exclusive emphasis on subjective human labour-power as the key factor in profit. The main part of the paper reworks Marx's value-theory without the subject/object distinction. Used this way, the paper argues, Marx's value theory becomes a theory of time and speed, in which nature overall is the source of value, and the time of natural reproduction is disregarded in the interests of profit. The paper contends that this reworking of the labour theory of value extends its explanatory force.

Topics: Economies, Feminisms, Feminist Political Ecology, Feminist Political Economy, Political Economies

Year: 1997

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