Geography 434: "Politics of the Environment"

Scholarship in geography and related disciplines has demonstrated that nature in general and specific environments in particular are unavoidably political. Environmental management can thus never be a purely scientific or technological challenge; it requires critical analysis of cultural, political, and economic contexts, factors, and effects. For instance, effective environmental management requires consideration of how culture shapes how we perceive and value our environments, who wins and who loses in any particular approach to environmental management, and what the relative advantages and disadvantages of competing institutional approaches to environmental management are.

This course examines the development of environmental governance, with a primary focus on the United States. It explores both how various groups within society conceive of and value the environment, and multiple approaches to environmental governance and protection. It reviews the history of environmental movements and regulation, and contemporary issues and debates in environmental governance, with particular attention to the effects of institutional forms and social movements. In particular, it examines competing arguments for and against governance approaches centered on state action, market mechanisms, and prominent roles for NGOs and social movements.

Students will be evaluated based on: 1) their participation in class discussions, based on critical engagement with material from course readings and lectures; 2) their performance on a midterm and a final examination; 3) an individual research project on a topic relevant to the course, to be designed and carried out under the supervision of the course instructor.