We live in a world of states. But arguably the core (existential) challenge we currently face on earth—the threat of climate change—is one that looks particularly ill-suited for the state system. The problem is clearly a global one; unilateral action is insufficient to address the challenge; and any attempt to agree on a cooperative response is immediately beset by complex logistical, institutional, and ethical challenges. Yet we have seen international agreements on climate change, and states have found ways to promote strong action on climate change (from other states and from the broader international community) in a range of ways. This chapter examines the challenges of addressing climate change in a world of states before exploring the means through which states have attempted to promote (and in some cases undermine) action on climate change, in the process reflecting on the success of these strategies.
Chapter
14. Climate change and foreign policy
Matt Mcdonald
Chapter
12. Encountering the Anthropocene
This chapter examines environmental discourses in light of recognition of humanity’s entry into the Anthropocene, an emerging geological epoch that dramatizes what is at stake in the politics of the Earth. The Anthropocene is the successor to the unusually benign and stable Holocene of the previous 12,000 years, during which human civilization evolved. The human institutions, practices, ideas, and discourses that still dominate the politics of the Earth all took shape under perceived Holocene conditions. The most important quality demanded of the configuration of environmental discourses is now a capacity to generate critical reflection on the trajectory of human societies in the context of an unstable Earth system. This will require meaningful deliberative and democratic engagement across discourses.
Chapter
11. Green Perspectives And International Relations
This chapter explains how environmental issues affect international relations (IR). Despite early Western influences being predominantly national in focus, the prominence of environmental issues surged significantly as intellectual and public concern about global environmental degradation increased. The chapter distinguishes the key philosophical differences between varieties of green thinking, which have more recently shifted to the international sphere. There are several key themes or theories within contemporary green perspectives on international politics and these include: the green international political economy, global environmental justice, the ecocentric world order, and Anthropocene. The chapter then presents the emergence and political components of Robert Goodin's green political theory and the notion of a green international political economy.
Chapter
37. Dipesh Chakrabarty
Eva-Maria Nag
This chapter presents an overview of Dipesh Chakrabarty’s contribution to political thinking that is concerned with the human condition in the age of climate change. The chapter examines Chakrabarty’s argument that human-centred ways of thinking about the world and humanity are no longer appropriate. Moreover, Chakrabarty makes the case for bringing together natural and human history; for humans having become a geological force upon the planet; for capitalism having only a limited role in climate change; and for a new focus on planetary history, not merely human history. This chapter presents, Chakrabarty as a postcolonial historian and political thinker and then examines his conceptualization of the Anthropocene as a new historical and planetary era. This chapter further explores the complex connections between freedom, capitalism, and climate change. Chakrabarty insists the era of climate change needs new political perspectives beyond critiques of capitalism, colonialism, and globalization.
Chapter
38. Donna Haraway
Claire Colebrook
This chapter explores the various disciplinary and political dimensions of Donna Haraway’s work revolving around the negotiation of the interdisciplinary problem of the Anthropocene. It considers Haraway’s works which range between feminist interventions in science studies, animal studies, and environmental criticism. Haraway’s A Cyborg Manifesto (1985) offers a feminist response to broadly Marxist accounts of the relationship between technology and history while also reconfiguring and responding to feminist forms of socialism. After briefly introducing Haraway’s contributions to standpoint theory and posthumanism, this chapter turns to an examination of her critique of science and her alternative way of considering the world in which the boundaries between the human and non-human disappear. Haraway outlines various ways to think about planetary change and develops a conception of the Chthulucene that captures the complexity of the present, including the transformation of nature through human histories.