Chapter I

Theoretical Framework on Political Ecology and Social Movements

Political ecology analyses the complexity of social and environmental change as some

thing produced by intersecting and conflicting economic, social, and ecological

processes operating at different scales. I Political ecology as an analytical framework

originated in the 19705 with a paper by Eric Wolf is seen as the earliest work of

political ecology.

The path breaking work of Piers Blaikie powerfully and explicitly merged

environmental studies with political economy. The book focused on the ways in

which the development of capitalism affects the peasants and pastoralists and thereby

the ways in which they use the environment. He argued that capitalism extracted

surpluses from peasants and pastoralists who then, in their need for money, over

utilized their natural resources, "taking out of the soil, pastures and forests what they

cannot afford to put back. This tendency was exacerbated by land-users, displacement

and often confinement into a small land area". In this way, Blaikie attributed

environmental events and environmental status to political economy, understood in

terms of world system theory. They connect local struggles and changes related to

land, labour which are contested are drawn upon the historical background of the

current process, highlight the dynamics related to inequality, and attend to critical

developments in the larger political economies. It also emphasizes the importance of

asymmetries of power, the unequal relations between different actors, in explaining

the interaction of society and environment.

The multidisciplinary, multilevel scope of political ecology has been used as a

rubric to explain environmental degradation or environmental change, and to

understand their significance for different groups within society. Political ecology

approach is an inquiry into the political sources, conditions and ramification of

environmental change while embracing different social and ecological scales, and

I Peter, J Taylor (1999): "Mapping Complex Social-Natural Relationships: Cases from Mexico and Africa" in Living with Nature: Environmental Politics as Cultural Discourse, (Ed) Frank Fischer and Marten, A.Hajer, Oxford University Press, p-l22.

17

relates to inter-related research areas? The other influential book in the growth of

political ecology by Blaikie, Piers and Harold Brookfield argued for the deeper causes

of land degradation was more in the social problem rather in terms of characteristics

of soil, geology and climate and purely physical constraints of natural sciences.

Political ecology is grounded less in a coherent theory and seek to integrate its

analysis and encompasses a wide variety of interpretations drawn from ideological

spectrum from the political right (Neo-classical thought) to the political left (Neo-

Marxism) based on ideas drawn from political economy. Balikie and Brookfield has

suggested that third world political ecology is about the combined "concerns of

ecology and broadly defined political economy". Political ecology argues for

consideration of environmental degradation within its 'historical, political and

economic context' as well as its ecological one.3

The constantly shifting dialectic between society and land based resources

with regular attention to the role of the 'marginalized' peasants and the interaction of

scales - or chains of exploitation that radiate outward from individual resource users

to peasant communities and to regional, national, and global political and economic

relations. It stresses that the most effective way of addressing this problem is not

through a grand theoretical exposition, but rather through a selective engagement with

the political-economy literature as and when it is appropriate. The aim is built on a

multiple interpretation of 'political economy' rather than to assert in a single 'correct' . . 4 InterpretatIOn.

Political ecology explores the complexities by taking into account the

contextual sources of environmental impacts of the state and its policies, inter state

relations and global capitalism. The second approach investigates the local - specific

peasants and other socially disadvantaged groups in struggles to protect the

environmental foundations of their livelihood. It also tries to understand both

historical and contemporary dynamics of struggle. The third approach were political

2 Piers, Blaikie and Harold Brookfield (1987): Land Degradation and Society, London Methun, pp.l-17.

3. See Piers, Blaikie, (1987): The Political Ecology of Soil Erosion in Developing Countries, Longman, London, pp. 7-9.

4 Ibid, pp. 14-28.

18

ramifications of environment change has been guided by what extent are the costs of

environment change are borne by socially disadvantaged groups, and how does this

unequal distribution of costs mediate existing socio-economic inequalities and does

this modify political process.

There were several reasons for the slow development of the field of political

ecologl because of the negative connotations it had on the political left and also due

to the association with the works at that time. Rachel Carson's Silent Spring which

showed the inter-connectedness between seemingly minute levels of pesticides which

could become concentrated in food chains and thus pose a serious environmental

problem.6 But banning for the few toxins, the chemical industry triumphed, seeing an

expansion of the production of chemicals. 7 She influenced many works like Hardin's

'The tragedy of Commons' model has been influenced by William Forster Lloyd

(1794-1852) was made on the two critical assumptions: First common property

. resources are open access and second that such resources held in common leads to

over-exploitation since resources are individualistic and unable to co-operate in favor

of a common interest. The Hardin model concludes that resources must be either

privatized or state controlled by the state to ensure sustainable use. This had

influenced the third world countries and the dominant models of development had far

reaching implications in the management of national parks as they are open to all

without limit the parks themselves are limited in extent and whereas population seems

to grow without limit.8

An extreme ecological stand was taken by the Limits to Growth study

produced by the Club of Rome. It predicted that unless technology changed its current

course, the world was in danger and running out of its resources. This was supported

with Paul Ehrlich (1968)9 predicted that the world faced imminent social and

5 Eckersley (1997): Environmentalism and Political Theory, UCl Press, london, pp.8-1 o. 6 J Bellamy, Foster and Brett Clark (2008): "Rachel Carson's Ecological Critique", Analytical Monthly Review, Vol.5, No.ll, pp.l-5.

7 Andrew, Jamison, (2001): The Making of Green Knowledge, Cambridge University Press, U.K, pp.80-85.

8 Garrett, Hardin, and John Baden (1977): Managing the Commons, (Ed), W.H. Freeman and Company, San Francisco, p-21.

9 P.R Enrlich, and Enrlich (1968): The Population Bomb linking population, New York.

19

environmental catastrophe due to high population growth 10 presumes that resource

scarcities and consequent limits to growth and population pressure is the heart of the

environmental and ecological issue. The widely held notion that the principle cause of

environmental destruction is the alarming growth of population.

It was against this backdrop that the UN decided to hold the famous

conference on the environment at Stockholm in 1972. The economic growth was

considered to have taken place at the expense of ecological integrity and ecological

sustainability was viewed as separate from economic growth. The political debate

during that time was centered as a crisis of participation whereby excluded groups

sought to ensure a more equitable distribution of goods but it tended to reinforce,

rather than challenge the prevailing view of environment as being just another

resource there for human consumption. In recent years, however authoritarian

solutions to the environmental crisis have been abandoned, but there is always an

authoritarian edge somewhere in ecological politics which rests upon scientific-

technical rationality that is science-led solutions within an administrative state armed

with strong regulatory bureaucratic process of political-economic decision making. I I

Hans Magnus Enzensberger an influential and comparatively early critic on

the left raised the central question that why did "environment movements" emerge

only in the 1970s, but the conditions of the working poor deteriorated after the

industrial revolution. The latter were termed as neo-Malthusians because for its

anxiety over the population question like environmental degradation, food insecurity,

famine and land conflicts have looked to population pressures which lead to the

burden on scarce resources. 12 The emergence of cultural ecology or ecological

10 See Michael, Richards (1997): "Common Property Resource Institutions and Forest Management in Latin America", Development and Change, Vo1.28, Blackwell Publishers, p-97. Also see Meadows, D.H, Meadows, D.L and Randers, J (1972): The Limits to Growth: A Report for the Club of Rome's Project for the Predicament of Mankind, London.

II David, Harvey, (1993): "The Nature of Environment-Dialectics of Social and Environmental Change", Socialist Register, p-21.

I~ The arguments of uncontrolled population growth is exclusively from North American sources and the liberation movements in 1950 and 1960s of the third world countries began to become a central problem for imperialist power. On the other hand the rate of increase in population had begun to rise much earlier, in the 1930s and 1940s. See Hans Magnus, Enzensberger (1974): "A critique of political ecology", New Left Review, 84, 3-31. The effects of neo-malthus in India in the work of D'Souza,

20

anthropology as a separate strand in the evolution of third world political ecology in

1960s sought to explain the links between cultural fonn and management practices in

tenns of adaptive behavior within a closed ecosystem. 13

The environment was seen as an additional structural feature of the analysis,

often portrayed as fixed, or subject to major, disruptive change due to capitalist

penetration of peasant societies due to market integration, commercialization, and the

dislocation of customary fonns of resource management-rather than adaptation and

homeostasis-became the cornerstone of a critical alternative to older cultural or

human ecology. The major criticism against cultural ecology, which stressed the self-

regulatory characteristics and stability, and by detennining the boundaries of the

systems and minimizing the defined local populations by social conflict was excluded

and as the territoriality in which they are embedded are politically and economically

constructed. The word "ecology" was used to emphasize the homeostatic and

apolitical nature of human-environmental interaction. This critique also promoted a

growing interest in the connection between politics and environmental change in the

third world as a political process.

In combing political economy with ecology, political ecology tried to rectify

the deficiencies in both frameworks, which resulted in the emergence of political

ecology. The relationship between politics and ecology is not in equal tenns but the

role of politics in shaping ecology in the Third World environmental problems is

much greater today and it is only through political means that a solution will be

devised. 14 Political ecologist seeking to integrate place and non-place-based analysis

Rohan (2003): "Ecological politics in India" (ed) Smitu Kothari, Imtiaz Ahmad, Helmut Reifeld, The Value of Nature, New Delhi Rainbow Publishers, pp.23-38. -

13 In anthropology the ecological issue has stimulated in the field of ecological anthropology, cultural ecology and human ecology around questions about non-western societies live with nature. A significant body of work emerged in the 1950s with cultural ecology; the ecosystems approach (Rappaport) and cultural materialism. The major work of Roy Rappaport's argued that the ritual cycles were used to regulate the growth of pig populations, swidden fallow cycles and the cyclical patterns of war and peace with neighboring Maring groups argued for the close interaction of natural and social systems as a functional whole. David, Harvey, (1993): "The Nature of Environment-Dialectics of Social and Environmental Change", Socialist Register, pp. 1-51.

14 David, Harvey, (1974): "Population, Resources and the Ideology of science", Economic Geography, 50, pp.256-77.

'~b40

21

turned mainly to Neo-Marxism l5 as a way of avoiding a-politicism of cultural

ecologist and Neo-Malthusian work. The neo-Marxism based on dependency theoryl6

of Andre Gunder Frank, focused on the power relations between regions in analyzing

uneven development on a world scale - described as development and

underdevelopment. The dependency theorist like Frank believed that the

underdevelopment of Third World countries was a consequence of unequal exchange

with the developed countries with the west characterized by dual societies divided

between dynamic zones into modem capitalism and backward zones in relation to

feudal isolation. The dependency approach had eclipsed modernization theory and

lacked adequate conceptualization of the class structure and state to accompany its

economic analysis.

Political ecology turned to the "World System theory" of Immanuel

Wallerstein 17 focused on the different stages or levels of national development within

. what appears to be a global political economy. The world-system theorists opposed

the 'dualism' in development studies on the basis that the countries could achieve

modernization of resources could be shifted from the traditional sector of their

economies into the modem sector and opposed the tactics of the communist parties

which favored alliances with the national bourgeoisies of the developing countries

against feudal land owners and multinational corporations. This basic categories of

analysis were core!semi-periphery!, periphery! core! periphery, metropolis or satellite

and its rejection of the development model (the west as ideal type) of modernization

theory. They countered such dualist analysis with 'monist' analysis as a single whole,

which is the capitalist world economy. The general weakness of world system through

its formal stratification criteria of differentiation subsumes specific class differences

into general developmental categories and subordinates notions of class conflict to

15 Biersack, Aletta (2006): "Reimagining Political Ecology: Culture/PowerlHistory Nature" in Aletta Biersack and James B Greeberg (Ed) Reclaiming Political Ecology, Duke University Press, London, p-3.

16 See Thomas, Patterson, (1999): Change and Development in the Twentieth Century, Oxford International publishers, p-124.

17 Ibid., p-132. The World System theory points out that neither the socialist countries nor those of third world constituted distinct by non-capitalist economic relations. The states never exist in isolation, like but rather participate in capitalist world system forged by the expansion of commerce and maintained by an enforced international division of labour shaped economic structures and directed change.

22

mechanisms of international social mobility.18 The World System theory points out

that neither the socialist countries nor those of third world constituted distinct by non-

capitalist economic relations. The states never exist in isolation, like but rather

participate in capitalist world system forged by the expansion of commerce and

maintained by an enforced international division oflabour shaped economic structures

and directed change.

The first generation of political ecology wedded ecology to system theory that

envisioned the world as organized into a single class system, first-world nations

owning the means of production and third world nations supplying the labour and

producing the surplus value tended to think in terms of structures, systems, and

interlocking variables and did not focus on the local-global articulation, the emphasis

of today.19 The Indian Environmentalism of political ecology started with chipko

movement from the 1970s referred as social movement because much of the work

theorizing social movements begins with Marxism, Historical materialism, and

dialectical theory of social and environmental change saw collective mobilization

from the perspective of class based drawing on the classical Marxist, neo-Marxist and

functionalist traditions like the trade union politics, peasant, tribal, and other

movements. 20 The expansion occurred in the 1980s with integrating environment and

political activism for the environment problems of the Third world countries of Asia,

Africa and Latin America.2I

Social Movements

Social movement's studies on the collective action can be defined as a collective

effort of a section of people to pursue certain shared objectives, goals, and values

18 Richard, Muir, (1997): Political Geography: A New Introduction, Macmillan Press, pp. 213-236.

19 Ibid., p- 4.

20 Glyan, Williams, and Emma Mawdsley (2006): "India's Evolving Political Ecologies" in Colonial and Post-Colonial Geographies of India (Ed) by Saraswati Raju, M.Satish Kumar, and Stuart Corbridge, Sage publications, pp. 261-78.

21 Bryant, L Raymond (1992): "Political ecology: An emerging research agenda in third world countries", Journal of Political Geography, VoUl, No.1, p-12.

23

even in the face of opposition and conflict are seen in an isolated form rather than

interconnectedness. Collective conflicts may assume various forms of actions ranging

from organized modes of protest such as dharnas (sit-ins), boycotts, hartals (strikes),

picketing and peaceful slogan shouting protest marches to active and violent outbursts

of people in the non-institutions means of resistance through "revolution" in a social

movement. But many forms of interpersonal, dispersed and unshared conflicts, even

when involving groups do not lead to collective action.22 The major divide which

differentiates mobilizations of different types directed towards change with reference

to a social system is based on the question whether the collective mobilizations is

seeking to bargain for a greater share of the rewards and facilities by the existing

system or alter the system itself.

The social structures are described by more than one variant like caste, class,

religious groups, stratification in terms of education, wealth and so on.23 The

collective actions which are generally manifested more in a society with social

structure defined by hierarchy, harsh social inequality and social injustice. Thus

scholars have drawn on actor-oriented approach which seeks to understand conflicts

as an outcome of the interaction of different actors pursuing often quite distinctive

aims and interests. The potential power of grassroots actors such as poor farmers and

shifting cultivators in environmental conflicts has been emphasized with reference to

everyday resistance as part of an attempt to link political ecology to developments in

social movements theorizing to demonstrate the more complex understanding of

power relations mediate between human-environment interactions. 24

The major works were influenced by everyday resistance with the critique of

structural variant of Marxist theories which widens the spectrum of social movements

opposing hegemony-of productive resources to include culture, ideology and way of

22 Rajendra, Singh, (2001): Social Movements Old and New: A Post-Modernist Critique, Sage publications, New Delhi, pp. 1-42.

23 Partha Nath, Mukerji, (1977): "Social Movements and Social Change: Towards a Conceptual Clarification and Theoretical framework", Sociological Bulletin, p-43.

24 Ramachandra, Guha, (1989): The Unquiet Woods: Ecological Change and Peasant Resistance in the Himalaya, Delhi. Peluso links the historiography of criminality with every day resistance to show how state forest management is contested by Indonesian in Java. Peluso, Nancy Lee (1992): Rich F ores/s, Poor People: Resource Control and Resistance in Java, Berkeley.

24

life. Gramsi made a distinction between three interconnected spheres: civil society,

political society and economic formations. 25 Civil society refers to organizations that

are neither part of the process of material production in the economy nor part of state-

funded organizations that are relatively long-lasting institutions supported and run by

people outside the other two major spheres. Political society (the "state") consists of

the means of violence (such as the police and army) within a given territory, together

with the state-funded bureaucracies, such as the civil service, legal, welfare and

educational institutions. Economic formations refer to the dominant mode of

production in a territory that is built upon the differential ways classes are related to

the ownership of the means of production. The most important factor for social

movements to emerge is to challenge hegemonic ideas in society and to make public

debates that were previously taken for granted?6

Ramachandra Guha must be credited for firmly establishing this field in India

and uses the term social ecology modelled on the discipline of 'ecology' in the natural

science were social ecology systematically includes the human species within this

framework. The Chipko marked the beginning of a public debate on the environment

and emergence of alternative solutions to environment management is placed within

the historical framework of India's colonial legacy. The British are seen as having

undermined pre-colonial community based environmental management systems, and

as having treated nature as a resource to be exploited for the benefit of evolving

colonial economy. Chipko has been widely regarded as the assertion of the rights of

villagers against the urban industrial sector for the right to practice traditional values

in forest use, which represents a fundamental critique of development process.

The Dasholi Gram Swaraja MandaI (DGSM) led by C.P.Bhat27, which was

instrumental in the first protest was formed in 1964 to promote concepts of gramdan

25. See Routledge, Paul (1995): Terrains of Resistance: Nonviolent Social Movements and the Contestation of Place in India, Praeger Publishers, pp.19-38.

26 James, Scott (1985): Weapons of the Weak: Evelyday Forms of Resistance, Yale University press, New Haven, Pp-29-30. Also see See Pellicani, Luciano (1981): Gramsci: An Alternative Communisml Hoover Institute Press, Stanford, California, p-40-59. Henry, Veltmeyer, (1997): "New Social Movements in Latin America", Vo1.24, No.4, The Journal of Peasant Studies, pp .144-145

27 It may be noted that Mr. Chandi Prasad Bhat activism was a low profile and democratic and well known figure in the region. But Sundarlal Bahuguna is more popular among the metropolitan environmentalist.

25

of a non-violent, self reliant village society, based on cottage industries. However

competition from established firms led the forest department to supply raw materials

to industrialists rather than local enterprises. The another strand of chipko represented

by Uttarakhand Sangharsh Vahini (USV) who disassociate themselves from what they

perceive as the conservationist of mainstream and considered uneven development in

Uttarakhand in forests and wider economy. The numerous shades of the movement

brings out critical facets like chipko as a women's movement and the religious

dimensions had received attention due to the support of Vandana Shiva eco-feminist

analyses that Indian attitude to nature differs significantly from the west. She sees the

crisis of the environment which is a manifestation of a process in which the feminine

principle has been subjugated in favour of a male-centered idea of development.28

The chipko movement had its influence in other movements like Appiko

movement in Uttara Kannada district of Karnataka which was against the commercial

demands in the context of ecological stability and survival and the activists believed

that basic products of forests in the Western Ghats are soil, water and pure air. The

protest was led by the rural elite to protect arecanut, a highly commercialised garden crop.29

The popular defence of customary rights against the allotment of village

pastures by the state government to Polyfibre industry which intended to grow

eucalyptus saplings. The peasants of kusnur organized a 'pluck and plant' satyagraha

demonstrations on November 14 1987 in Karnataka. 3o In the Indian environment

debate, major has quickly filled the space vacated by forests dams and mining. The

river valley projects like Silent Valley crusade which was never a people's struggle to

save the valley, because the local people were not convinced by the knowledge of

nature conservation, which they had never experienced. The Silent Valley Hyde!

project was a symbol of the aspirations of the people of Malabar for a long period and

mass organizations and political parties were committed to its implementation long

28 Vandana, Shiva, (1989): Staying Alive: Women, Ecology and Development, London: Zed Books, p-56.

29M, Nadkami (1989): The Political Economy of Forest Policy, Sage publication, Delhi, pp.I-I5.

30 Madhav Gadgil, and Ramachandra Guha (1994): "Ecological Conflicts and the Environmental Movement in India", Development and Change, Vol.25, pp.106-7.

26

before the ecological questions were raised by the scientists. The silent valley is one

of the richest biospheres in the whole world, but the people of Malabar were more

interested in the question of energy, employment and development than the necessity

of protecting the unique biosphere of silent valley.31 The opposition to the project was

led by Kerala Sastra Sahitya Parishad, an organization dedicated to popular science

education. The reasons cited for opposing due to the techno economic appraisal of

energy generating alternatives. In another example, groups affected by large dams

have not always been tribal like the Bedthi project in Uttara Kannada district of

Karnataka, which abandoned due to the protest from the influential commercial

farming whose lands were to be submerged, by the project. The protests against the

koel-karo hydroelectric project in lharkhand have been one of the most sustained

struggles for identity and justice. The project targeted to generate a 710 Mw of

electricity, comprises of two dams, one each on the river koel and its tributary, karo.

According to the official estimates, the project would displace 7063 families from 112

villages in the predominantly adivasi districts of Rachi, Gumla and Singbhuum. The

community estimates suggest that the actual displacement will be of about 20,000

people. The estimate regarding the people affected is always contentious in the

environment movement. In India, the two thirds of nineral resources exist in the three

states of Orissa, lharkhand and Chhattisgarh. The major struggles against the mining

industry, imposed with ruthlessness and insensitivity towards its tribal people and the

environment. The Memorandum of understandings signed by these states to hand over

the country's forests, rivers and wildlife resources and to sacrifice the lives of its local

people to big corporate companies. People's resistance to these projects is suppressed

like the firing in Maikanch, Kalinganagar and the repressive Salwa ludum in

Chattisgarh.

The development of Indian Environmentalism has moved forward even as it

acknowledged Guha's Contribution which tried to build distinct environmentalism

that seeks to redress injustices through state led capitalism but posts moral economy

or Gandhian way of reshaping development projects to the local level. The defense of

31 Monte'D, Danyl (1985): Temples or Tombs?: Industry versus Environment, Centre for Science and Environment, New Delhi, pp. 29-61.

27

common property resources and the restoration of community- based environment

management which gives priority to the subsistence of the poor farmers, forest

gatherers against the extractive state with different ideological groups that co-exist

within the movement.32 The criticism against Guha's work as it embraces ideas of the

'indigenous' and the 'traditional' that are dubious because of its political agenda. In

its more extreme forms, this valorization of tradition can lead to readings of the

environment based upon Hindu metaphors which have uneasy relationships with the

Hindu right.33 For example in the 1990s, many Bhilala adivasis in western Madhya

Pradesh joined the battle for Hindu supremacy, attacking Christian adivasis and later

Muslims.34 The protests against the Tehri Dam were people protests against the

closure of two tunnels and demanded full and final settlements of their claims. Ashok

Singal from the Vishwa Hindu Parishad also joined the fast for preserving the purity

of river Ganga brining the work to standstill for few days. The second criticism is that

by posting the rural poor as its principal subject and their livelihoods as the principal

site of their struggles, has its social and geographical restrictions. By implicitly

locating its concerns with the 'marginal' populations have failed to demonstrate that

middle-class actors forcing their view of the good or simple life. The ecological

traditions of local- self sufficiency offer little in the way of solutions for city dwellers,

rich or poor were political action is unlikely to be found in an idealized, colonial and

rural past.

The environmental activism involves the growing participation of Courts in

environmental matters through Public Interest litigation cases in a process that has

ambivalent consequences for environmental justice and sustainability. The emerging

research against pollution seeks to uncover the complex class dynamics involved.

Amita Baviskar has shown the complex and contradictory linkages that exist between

Delhi's Master plan and the presence of slums, and forms of environmental cleansing

32 Guha, Ramachandra (1988): "Ideological Trends in Indian Environmentalism", Economic and Political Weekly, 23, No.49, Economic and Political Weekly, pp.2578-81.

33 E.E, Mawdsley, (1998): "After Chipko: From Environment to Region in Uttaranchal", Journal of Peasant Studies, 25 (4), pp.36-54. Also See Sharma, (2002): 'Saffronising Greens', Seminar: A Symposium of the Changing Contours of Indian Environmentalism, 51 6:pp.26-30.

34 Amita, Baviskar, (2005): "Adivasi Encounters with Hindu Nationalism in Madhya Pradesh", Economic and Political Weekly, November 26, pp. 5105-5113.

28

through 'city beautification'. The beautification plan speaks to versions of

'authoritarian environmentalism' that appeal to the middle class which is eager to

distance itself from their own environmental footprints and from the poor. 35 The role

of the state in the neo-liberal era is not to deny the major and often threatening role

that the state plays in the lives of the rural poor. However, some early political

ecology analyses were criticized for their 'overly deterministic vision of social

structure and an overemphasis of material struggles. Moore has criticized political

ecology as being insufficiently political in nature because of its structuralist legacy

and too little effort given to 'micro politics' and further the interests and actions of the

actors involved in such conflict like state, elites, peasants or workers which were

portrayed as 'monolithic' as little effort made to study the internal complexity or

differentiated concerns ofthe state or other actors. However State continues to act as a

major player, but we need to look beyond as it is not a single or uniform actor, in

projects of resource extraction from the rural poor. 36

New Social Movements

In the 1980s, European and American societies witnessed the emergence of large-

scale movements around issues which were basically humanist, cultural and non-

materialistic in nature have been referred to as "new social movements.,,37 The Post-

development refers not to the theoretical conviction instead questions 'development'

itself and the critic against post-development have often restricted their analysis to

critique without exploring alternatives. Escobar argues that local concerns and

politics, as articulated by new social movements are portrayed as reflecting the

35 Amita Baviskar, (2003): "Between Violence and Desire: Space, power and Identity in the Making of Metropolitan Delhi", International Social Science Journal, 55, I, pp.89-98. Also See Dembowski, H (1999): "Courts, Civil Society and Public Sphere: Environmental Litigation in Calcutta", Economic and Political Weekly, 34, 1&2, pp. 49-56.

36 Moore, D.S. (1993): "Contesting terrain in Zimbabwe's eastern highlands; Political ecology, ethnography and peasant resources struggles", Economic Geography, Vo1.69, No.4, pp.380-40 I.

37 Social movements may be expressions of cultural struggles over meaning, but the meanings for which they fight are not always clear when we consider the material struggles alongside these cultural contestations. See Anthony, Bebbington, (2007): "Social Movements and the Politicization of Chronic Poverty", Development and Change, Vo1.38, No.5, p- 740.

29

immediate place-based concerns of local communities and able to respond to these

concerns in the future. The site of radical and plural struggle is used to fill the gap

created by the withdrawal of artificially naturalized ideal state, modeled upon the

'developed' west comprised of institutions, processes, practices, languages has

diversified the diverse range of social, cultural, political systems which have failed to

deliver their promises for better societies.38 Escobar argues for a post structural

political ecology because of the retheorizing political economy and environment at

different levels. The traditional Marxist theory of Capitalism relates to the

contradictions between capitalist productive forces and production relations. Whereas

political economy looks at the historical intersection of capital and the state, political

ecology adds nature to the equation and addresses the lack of attention paid to the

natural world by traditional political economy approaches and avoids making

unnecessary assumption about forms of integration or previous ecological

equilibrium, but examines how real political and economic systems interact with

nature through time. At this junction the central question of nature which is

transformed into commodities in terms of Karl Polyani as 'fictitious commodities'

because the land and labour are not produced and reproduced in accordance with

market forces or the law of nature are transformed into pseudo commodities made

available for sale, which is termed as second contradiction of capitalism that has

aggravated to ecological crisis and the social forms of protest. 39

In India under the rubric of new social movements like civil rights, farmers,

and environment movements have been taken up by civil society against the state

which is seen an oppressive and unable to solve the problems of exploitation, poverty,

and uneven development.4o The issue-based politics of movements based on shared

38 McGregor, Andrew (2007): "Development, Foreign Aid and Post-development in Timor-Leste", Third World Quarterly, Vol.28, No.1, pp. 156-7.

39 See Arturo, Escobar, (1996): Constructing Nature: Elements of a post structural political ecology in Liberation Ecologies (Ed) by Richard Peet and Michael Watts, New York, pp.46-85. Also See Greenberg, B. James (2006): The Political Ecology of fisheries in the Upper Gulf of California in Aletta Biersack and James B Greeberg (Ed) Reclaiming Political Ecology, Duke University Press, London, pp.126-27. See Michael, Watts (1993): "Development I: Power, knowledge, discursive practice", Progress in Human Geography, 17,2, p.267.

40 James, Petras, (2000): "The Third Way: Myth and Reality", Monthly Review, Vo1.51, No. 10, March, pp.19-35.

30

identities and common characteristics of not only class, but also gender, race,

ethnicity, religion, and other cultural criteria have developed "new oppositional

counter-discursive forms of consciousness and action ".

These 'new' social movements claimed to be a new way of doing politics

amounting to social change without state power. The social bases of these new social

movements saw the emergence and the strengthening of middle class-led NGOs

which joined with the International Financ-ial Institutions in attacking public welfare

and promoting private ownership in the public policy fonnulation. 41 New Social

movements may be expressions of cultural struggles over meaning, ideas and

practices constitute one of the most important terrains in which social movements

operate and which seek to change is not always clear but complicated alongside with

material struggles.42 The claim to achieve empowerment by NGOs at the grassroots

by using non-party/ 'a-political,43 has lead to de-politicized mobilization towards the

existing class structure and diverting mobilization from each other. This has resulted

in the emergence of varied NGOs like Green peace, Friend of the Earth, the Sierra

Club, Earth First, World Wild Fund for Nature and a whole variety of less formal

organizations and groups. They received substantial funding from International

Financial Institutions despite their occasional bursts against neo-liberalism. These

associations with globally based networks are allied with each other through their

overlapping membership, frequent communication and joint campaigns44 with one

41 James Petras, and Henry Veltmeyer (2007): "The 'Development State' in Latin America: Whose Development, Whose State?" Journal of Peasant Studies, VoI.34, No. 3&4, July-October, p-393.

42 Ibid., p-742.

43 Tom, Brass, (2000): Peasants, Populism and Postmodernism: The Return of the Agrarian Myth, Frank Class, London, p-151.

44 Diani's work, especially his definition of social movements as networks has certainly aided this trend in the sociological literature. Net working goes beyond organizational form; it becomes the mode of organizational function. Decentralization, diversification, and democratization drive networks, as opposed to the centralized and hierarchical practice of past movements and present mainstream organizing. See Diani Mario (1992): 'The Concept of Social Movement', Sociological Review, 40, pp.l-25. Also see Sutton, Philip. W (2004): Nature, Environment and Society, Palgrave McMillan, p-43.

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another and fomi coalitions and seek to establish claims on national and global civil . 45 socIety.

The interface of movements would have to foster complex learning that does

not happen locally. The numerous organizations also raises the questions of

accountability, democracy and representation which is far from clear as they are open

structures which are able to expand without limits, integrating new modes as long as

they are able to communicate within the network of organizations through internet to

its own evolution in shaping the development of privatizing dynamics that remain

unaccountable.46 The focus on the local-global nexus becomes more compelling given

the interconnections between environmental issues and those pertaining to rights. 47

According to Fuentes and Frank these NSMs are popular social movements

and expressions of people's struggles against exploitation and oppression in a

complex dependent society.48 Omvedt in contrast has argued that the shift in the

traditional class-based movements towards those of women, lower castes, indigenous

groups are a process of redefining those spheres of exploitation mainly economic

which has not been addressed by conventional Marxist analysis.49 We have used the

term social movements because the claims of the new social movements may be

contested, but the question ofland continues to be on the agenda in different forms.

The first phase of political ecology focused exclusively on rural areas in

analysis of land degradation in peasant societies. This rural emphasis makes sense but

45 Global civil society as the sphere of ideas, values, institutions, organizations, networks, and individual located between the family, the state and the market and operating beyond the confines of national societies, politics and economies. Jogdand, P.G and S.M. Michael (2003): Globalization and Social Movements: Struggle for a Humane Society, (Ed) Rawat publications, Jaipur.

46 Ramachandra, Guha, and J. Martinez-Alier (1997): Varieties of Environmentalism: Essays North and South, Earth Scan Publications, London, pp. 96-7.

47 Marc, Edelman, (2005): "When Networks Don't Work: The Rise and fall and Rise of Civil Society Initiatives in Central America" in Social Movements: an Anthropological Reader, (Ed) by June Nash, Blackwell Publishing, p-4l.

48 M Fuentes, and AG. Frank (1989): " Ten theses on Social Movements", World Development, Vol.l7 No.2

49 The traditional social movements drawing on the Marxist traditions unlike the trade union politics which is class based, but differing significantly regarding the connection between contradictions, crises and urban social conflicts which led to the rise of protest movements in 1960s and 70s like civil rights, students, feminist, environmental which came to be referred as the new social movements. Gail, Omvedt (1993): Reinventing Revolution: New Social Movements and the Socialist Tradition in India, East Gate Book, London, pp. 127-153.

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gives an incomplete picture, so political ecology has begun room for the 'nuances of

different social actors' livelihood struggles and uses of 'cultural idioms in the changed

context of local politics' and also paying attention to social actors in urban settings50

and their connection with degradation process.51 Political ecology has also centered

on urban issues has shown that "environment movements" is not that they represent

an environmentalism of the poor but emerge through collaborations of the middle-

class actors and audiences.52 The middle class is very fragile and it is har-d to access

accurately the size and significantly of the urban middle class in India is

heterogeneous and encompasses a range of attributes in terms of income and

consumption, education, occupation and property ownership. Different waves of

environmentalism brought in different actors with varying social projects. If the

earlier social movements revolved around social issues of equity and justice the urban

movements have deployed "Environmental law" as a tool for dominating the masses

and controlling their resistance which operates at multiple levels in framing their

demands and engaging in action from International, National and local level context.53

The theoretical coherence remains in question identified under the political

ecology because of its diverse objectives, epistemologies, and method that can be

discussed under various 'subfield' with diverse areas lacking any single coherent

theoretical approach or message. 54 The way social movements today link local

struggles with international networks- for example in the environmental movements

50 G. Myers (1999): "Political ecology and Urbanization: Zanzibar's construction materials industry", Journal of Modern African Studies, 37, I, pp. 83-108. Also see Heynes, Nik, Harold. A. Perkins and Parama Ray (2006): "The political economy in Race and Ethnicity in producing environment inequality in Milwaukee", Urban Affairs Review, VoL42, No.1, pp. 3-25.

51 D. Moore (1993): "Contesting terrain in Zimbabwe's eastern highlands: Political ecology, ethnography and peasant resource struggles", Economic Geography, 69, p-38 I.

52 See Leena, Fernandes, (2006): Liberalization, Democracy and Middle class politics, Oxford University Press, New Delhi, pp.I93-94. Also see Emma Mawdsley's (2004): "India's Middle Class and the Environment", Development and Change, 35 (I), pp.79-I03. Amita, Baviskar, (2005): "Red in Tooth and Claw? Looking for class in struggles over Nature in Social Movements in India, Poverty ", Power and Politics (Ed) by Raka Ray and Mary Fainsod Katzenstein, Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, pp. 161-79.

53 Balakrishnan, Rajagopal, (2004): "Limits of law in Counter-Hegemonic Globalization: The Indian Supreme Court and the Narmada Valley Struggle", Working paper series, Centre for the Study of Law and Governance, lawaharlal Nehru University, pp. 1-5.

54 Peter. A Walker, (2006): "Political Ecology: Where is the policy?", Progress in Human Geography, 30,3, pp.384.

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seems to imply a completely new agenda for research on social movements. The

social movements have perceived the opportunities posed by these global trends and

mobilized resistance against their consequences at the local level exploitation of

natural resources and the reassertion of traditional rights at the community level. The

political ecology as a field that emerged from the critique of the Hardins 'Tragedy of

the Commons' and Ehrlich's 'Population Bomb' still largely dominates policy

discourses because it has not able to provide alternative to the mainstream policies has -

resulted in marginalization of political ecology in the broader public debate. 55

The political ecology of the 2000s has moved forward along with different

fronts like "violent environments" as an arena of contested entitlements in which

conflicts and claims over property, assets, labour and the politics of recognition are

played out. It addresses alternate ways of understanding the relations between

environment and violence as a site-specific phenomenon rooted in environment

histories and social relation, particularly in power relations. 56 Michael Watts in

reference to political ecology has argued that that the subfield should celebrate its

diversity by saying 'Let the flowers of openness and dialogue bloom', which has

blossomed in a wide assortment of colures who wish to engage policy may find useful

to point out when communicating with the 'messy, constrained world outside' .57

The political ecology framework for analysis centered on the idea of a

'politicised environment' is used to understand the politics of environmental change

in the third world. It explores the types of actors that are involved in environmental

conflict like discussion of states, multilateral institutions, businesses, environmental

non-governmental organizations and grassroot actors. This addresses the

comprehensive picture of the motivations, interests and actions of the actors in

55 Michael Watts and Richard Peet (1996): Liberation Ecologies (Ed), Routledge Publications, New York, p.8.

56 Peulso and Watts (2001): "Violent Environments" in N. Peluso and M. Watts (eds) Violent Environments, Ithaca, New York, Cornell university press, pp-3-38. Also see Bohle, Hans-georg and Hartmut Funfgeld (2007): 'The political ecology of Violence in Eastern Sri Lanka", Development and Change, Vo1.38, Number 4, pp.665-87.

57 Michael Watts and Peet, Richard (1996): Liberation Ecologies (Ed), Routledge Publications, New York, p-389.

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manners that is not possible through local studies, but tends to obscure the

complexities and contradictions associated with the actions of all actors. 58

Political ecology inspired perspective has been successfully utilized in

analyses of the historical circumstances leading to local patterns of resource use and

control to understand the contemporary struggles. In order to reveal the changing

social relationships that broadens the corresponding economic and political events on

the regional, national and global scales that affect local systems of production. 59

58 Martinez. Alier (2004): The Environmentalism of the Poor: A Study of Ecological Conflicts and Valuation, Oxford University Press, pp.I-15.

59 Anja, Nygren, (2000): "Development Discourses and Peasant-Forest Relations: Natural resource Utilization as Social Process", Development and Change, Vol.3l, p-14. ,

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