John-Andrew McNeish

Axel Borchgrevink

Owen Logan

In the global North the commoditization of creativity and knowledge under the banner of a creative economy is being posed as the post-industrial answer to dependency on labour and natural resources. Not only does it promise a more stable and sustainable future, but an economy focused on intellectual property is more environmentally friendly, so it is suggested. Contested Powers argues that the fixes being offered by this model are bluffs; development as witnessed in Latin American energy politics and governance remains hindered by a global division of labour and nature that puts the capacity for technological advancement in private hands. The authors call for a multi-layered understanding of sovereignty, arguing that it holds the key to undermining rigid accounts of the relationship between carbon and democracy, energy and development, and energy and political expression. Furthermore, a critical focus on energy politics is crucial to wider debates on development and sustainability. Contested Powers is essential reading for those wondering how energy resources are converted into political power and why we still value the energy we take from our surroundings more than the means of its extraction.

The Politics of Energy and Development in Latin America

Contested Powers

Robyn Eversole

Alberto D. Cimadamore

This book brings together two of today's leading concerns in development policy - the urgent need to prioritize poverty reduction and the particular circumstances of indigenous peoples in both developing and industrialized countries. The contributors analyse patterns of indigenous disadvantage worldwide, the centrality of the right to self-determination, and indigenous people's own diverse perspectives on development. Several fundamental and difficult questions are explored, including the right balance to be struck between autonomy and participation, and the tension between a new wave of assimilationism in the guise of 'pro-poor' and 'inclusionary' development policies and the fact that such policies may in fact provide new spaces for indigenous peoples to advance their demands. In this regard, one overall conclusion that emerges is that both differences and commonalities must be recognised in any realistic study of indigenous poverty.

An International Perspective

Indigenous Peoples and Poverty

Judith Shapiro

Our Extractive Age: Expressions of Violence and Resistance emphasizes how the spectrum of violence associated with natural resource extraction permeates contemporary collective life. Chronicling the increasing rates of brutal suppression of local environmental and labor activists in rural and urban sites of extraction, this volume also foregrounds related violence in areas we might not expect, such as infrastructural developments, protected areas for nature conservation, and even geoengineering in the name of carbon mitigation. Contributors argue that extractive violence is not an accident or side effect, but rather a core logic of the 21st Century planetary experience. Acknowledgement is made not only of the visible violence involved in the securitization of extractive enclaves, but also of the symbolic and structural violence that the governance, economics, and governmentality of extraction have produced. Extractive violence is shown not only to be a spectacular event, but an extended dynamic that can be silent, invisible, and gradual. The volume also recognizes that much of the new violence of extraction has become cloaked in the discourse of "green development," "green building," and efforts to mitigate the planetary environmental crisis through totalizing technologies. Ironically, green technologies and other contemporary efforts to tackle environmental ills often themselves depend on the continuance of social exploitation and the contaminating practices of non-renewable extraction. But as this volume shows, resistance is also as multi-scalar and heterogeneous as the violence it inspires. The book is essential reading for activists and for students and scholars of environmental politics, natural resource management, political ecology, sustainable development, and globalization.

Expressions of Violence and Resistance

Our Extractive Age

John-Andrew McNeish

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