Climate Necropolitics: Ecological Civilization and the Distributive Geographies of Extractive Violence in the Anthropocene

Meredith J. DeBoom

Annals of the American Association of Geographers, 2020, vol. 111, issue 3, 900-912

Abstract: The declaration of the Anthropocene reflects the magnitude of human-caused planetary violence, but it also risks disguising the inequitable geographies of responsibility and sacrifice that underlie its designation. Similarly, many existing strategies for climate change mitigation, including the development of low-carbon energy, are critical to reducing carbon emissions and yet simultaneously risk deepening extractive violence against marginalized communities. If the uneven distribution of historical and contemporary climate violence is not recognized and redressed, climate change solutions may increase the burdens borne by the very people, places, and environments expected to experience some of the worst effects of climate change itself. To aid in identifying and analyzing the distributive geographies of geo-power capable of facilitating this perverse outcome, this article develops a theoretical framework –climate necropolitics –for revealing the multiscalar processes, practices, discourses, and logics through which Anthropocenic imaginaries can be used to render extractive violence legitimate in the name of climate change response. Drawing on field work using multiple methods, I illustrate the applied value of climate necropolitics through a case study of the Chinese Communist Party's Ecological Civilization. The analysis reveals how the utopian “green” vision of Ecological Civilization, as promoted by both Chinese and Namibian state actors, has been used to legitimate intensified extractive violence against minority communities living near uranium mines in Namibia. I conclude by discussing how geographers can use multiscalar frameworks like climate necropolitics to develop integrated analyses of the uneven distribution of both social and environmental violence in the Anthropocene.

Date: 2020
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DOI: 10.1080/24694452.2020.1843995

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