Geography 439: "Property and the Global Environment"

Property relations are among the most powerful and pervasive institutions in human societies. Fundamental rules governing and legitimating who can do what, and where, they shape and reveal interactions between human societies and physical environments, a concern at the heart of geography. Our own property relations are often all but invisible to us precisely because they are so deeply woven into our perceptions, consciousness, social structures, and everyday experiences of the world. It is thus easy to overlook the fact that we live within highly specific and contingent property arrangements and that changing circumstances are prompting important changes in contemporary property relations.

This course explores these issues with a particular focus on their implications for environmental politics and regulation. We will address questions such as: Is the privatization and commodification of nature a recipe for ecological disaster, or the most effective means of preservation? Can we own the weather? What were the historical-geographical circumstances surrounding the development of major modern property forms, and are those forms adequate to the environmental problems we now confront? Are there property relationships outside of the law? How do property relations and conflicts change in response to changing human control over nature, and how can different kinds of property arrangements lead to, or help to solve, environmental and social problems? Readings will review debates over common property; the benefits and dangers of privatization of environmental goods; distinctions between formal and informal property rights; the development of zoning and other regulation of private property; and contemporary debates over intellectual property rights in nature, and relationships among trade, property rights, and environmental quality

The course will be of interest to students interested in environmental policy, land use planning and management, law, the areas of nature-society relations and historical geography, and environmental history. Students will gain a sophisticated understanding of the central underpinnings of much property and environmental regulation, and familiarity with many cutting-edge debates in these domains, both domestically and internationally. Evaluation methods will include examinations and an independent research paper and presentation by each student. The course will be offered every other year, with enrollment capped at 30 students.

Professor: Dr. James McCarthy