April 23, 2020

The struggle of Indigenous communities against Christian missionaries in Brazilian Amazon

by Felipe Milanez Amid the Coronavirus pandemic, the attempts at “extracting souls” by fundamentalists Christian missionaries in the Brazilian Amazon continue unabated, fueling the risk of genocide for self-isolated Indigenous communities. This is an in-depth account of the threats to the Indigenous peoples of the Javari Valley and of the legal case that ensued. 
February 26, 2018

More Shamans, less intolerance! An Indigenous Manifesto at Berlin Film Festival

by Felipe Milanez The premier of the movie Ex-Shaman by Luiz Bolognesi at the 68th Berlin International Film Festival becomes the occasion for spreading a manifesto by Indigenous People of Brazil denouncing racism, violence and the loss of traditional knowledge: Shamans must exist and be respected, before it is too late, the world is devoid of spirituality and the Skies fall upon our heads The magic of the forest came to the winter of Berlin, bringing stories of violence and genocide, of evangelical proselytism, intolerance […]
April 27, 2017

“Namami Brahmaputra”: Worshipping a river, ignoring its materialities

By Mitul Baruah* The Brahmaputra river in Northeast India means many different things to the diverse communities in the region – their lifeline, recurrent and destructive flooding and erosion – but by most it is not considered holy. Mitul Baruah reflects on the anti-politics of recent attempts to Hinduize the river, which divorce it from its specific historical-material context.
February 7, 2017

Beyond the limits of nature: a social-ecological view of growth and degrowth

By Eleanor Finley* In this second article of the series “Ecology after capitalism“, Finley revisits the concept of growth from the libertarian socialist perspective of social ecology. She draws on Bookchin’s work to interrogate the limits of a degrowth conception of ‘growth’ and argues that we might find more opportunities for social and political transformation in social ecology’s analysis of post-scarcity and growth as ecological development. 
April 5, 2016

An Undisciplined Rationality

By Çağdaş Dedeoğlu* We must interfere in the dominant rationality in an undisciplined way in order to shape the future independently from today’s dominant power configurations. Political ecology can serve as a key hub to do this.
December 3, 2015

Homo-Religiosus and the Banalization of the Ecological Crisis

By Çağdaş Dedeoğlu* Throughout history, hegemonic power has appeared as the king, the caliphate, the shepherd of the earth, the head of the state, etc – all of which have re-produced the masculine hierarchy-based understanding of nature. This is why political ecology, as a tool to investigate the links between political decisions and ecological outcomes, can and must also investigate the historicity of those links.