Despite its diversity of manifestations, we’ve discussed how political ecology relies largely on three pillars: cultural ecology, physical geography and political economy. Cultural ecology is driven, in turn, by the concept of agency, which has captured much of my attention this week as I begin to understand the thought processes and methodologies of political ecologists. Here I would like to focus on forests and the agency of the nation state, as I see individual agency and even private corporate interest subsumed by the strong role of the state in a few of our forest readings.
Prudham (2003) demonstrates how the state drives the advancement of industrial tree improvement in the Pacific Coast region. As worries about timber shortages spread throughout the United States in the early 20th century, the federal government took the first steps in understanding genetics of the Douglas fir, with hopes of improving growth rates and uniformity. In 1913, the U.S. Forest Service appointed a scientist to the region, assigned with the task of researching seed source and geographic variation in Douglas fir populations. Throughout the last 90 years, the government has continued to play a crucial role in the development of a successful timber cultivation industry, shaping the character of both local research and corporate success.
Biological constraints defined this process of industrial tree improvement. Slow capital turnover due to time lags of tree growth, risk of uncontrolled cross-pollination, and obstacles to realizing economies of scale all implied that individual corporations could not undertake the research and development of this industry alone. To confront such intimidating initial fixed costs, silvicultural cooperatives were developed, comprised of private corporations, public and private research institutions, public forest management agencies, and a significant amount of public funding. Although biotechnology may change the nature of this industry in the future, the state still exerts its influence over timber through these cooperatives, and it is this public agency that drives the direction of research and commercial success.
Hecht (1985) gives state agency more explicit recognition in a study of Amazonian forest conversion. The author argues that after the Brazilian military coup of 1964, the new military government not only needed to relieve the economic constraints that had inhibited capital accumulation by the elite class, but also was forced to address social and political unrest in rural areas, due to low agricultural productivity. The government made a conscious decision to use Amazonian land conversion as a tool to resolve both of these conflicts, essentially driving the resulting deforestation and land degradation. State subsidies encouraged land speculation to the extent that the productive value of land faded in comparison with its exchange value, eliminating incentives to maintain land quality.
In a case study review of proximate and underlying drivers of deforestation globally, Geist & Lambin (2002) generate results supporting strong state agency. Of the 152 deforestation case studies considered, institutional factors (national policies on land use and economic development, state subsidies for land-based activities, etc.) drove 78% of tropical deforestation incidents. Moreover, the authors argue that interactions and feedbacks between multiple causal factors of deforestation reveal that state policies are the impetus behind many of their “proximate drivers,” such as agricultural and infrastructure expansion.
In all three of these cases, the nation state has shaped the society-nature relationship with respect to forestry, deforestation and land use. Would there be a successful tree cultivation industry in the Pacific Coast if the federal government hadn’t pioneered provenance research? Would Amazonian deforestation rates be the same if state subsidies hadn’t encouraged land conversion and land speculation? Would global deforestation rates change if state institutions focused on forest conservation?
This common trend makes me question the standard political ecological definition of agency, as it often pertains to individuals or communities, but rarely to state governments (as far as I can tell). From my understanding, state decisions are addressed through the pillar of political economy, as governments react to economic and political pressures in the decision-making process. I wonder if we can also be successful in revealing causal explanations if we begin to view the state as its own powerful agent that is of course connected to external pressure, but often acts unilaterally in defining society-nature outcomes.
Works Cited:
Geist, HJ, and EF Lambin. 2002. Proximate causes and underlying driving forces of tropical deforestation. Bioscience 52 (2):143-150.
Hecht, Susanna B. 1985. Environment, Development and Politics: Capital Accumulation and the Livestock Sector in Eastern Amazonia”, World Development 13(6): 663-84.
Prudham, S. 2003. Taming trees: Capital, science, and nature in Pacific Slope tree improvement. Annals of the Association of American Geographers 93 (3):636-656.
Good discussion Tamma. I am not sure I would give the state itself 'agency'. I might reserve agency for the way in which powerful individuals within the state (e.g. key policy makers) influence human-environment relations. I see the state as more on the political economy side. But its up for discussion!
ReplyDeleteYes, I thought about that and of course understand that the state is driven by those in power politically and that this is often addressed through political economy. Of these three articles, however, only Hecht truly addresses powerful individuals and in Prudham the state is treated as an external actor that for a relatively undiscussed reason decides to get intricately involved with private forestry companies. I suppose my call for agency is more of a call for a closer look at how and why individuals within the state are responsible for human-environment relations.
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