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Books > Earth & environment > The environment > Social impact of environmental issues > General
Intermittent Rivers and Ephemeral Streams: Ecology and Management takes an internationally broad approach, seeking to compare and contrast findings across multiple continents, climates, flow regimes, and land uses to provide a complete and integrated perspective on the ecology of these ecosystems. Coupled with this, users will find a discussion of management approaches applicable in different regions that are illustrated with relevant case studies. In a readable and technically accurate style, the book utilizes logically framed chapters authored by experts in the field, allowing managers and policymakers to readily grasp ecological concepts and their application to specific situations.
A risk conundrum can be viewed as a risk that poses major issues in assessment, and whose management is not easily engaged. Such perplexing problems can either paralyze or badly delay risk analysis and directions for progression. Rather than simply focusing on the progress in risk analysis that has already been made, it is crucial to consider what has been learnt about these seemingly unmanageable problems and how best to move forward. Risk Conundrums seeks to answer this question by bringing together a range of key thinkers in the field to explore key issues such as risk communication, uncertainty, social trust, indicators and metrics, and risk management, drawing upon case study examples including natural disasters, terrorism, and energy transitions. The initial chapters address risk conundrums, their properties, and the challenges they pose. The book then turns to a greater emphasis on systemic and regional risk conundrums. Finally, it considers how risk management can be changed to address these unsolvable conundrums. Alternative pathways are defined and scrutinized and predictions for future developments set out. This book will be of great interest to students and scholars of risk governance, environmental policy, and sustainable development.
A risk conundrum can be viewed as a risk that poses major issues in assessment, and whose management is not easily engaged. Such perplexing problems can either paralyze or badly delay risk analysis and directions for progression. Rather than simply focusing on the progress in risk analysis that has already been made, it is crucial to consider what has been learnt about these seemingly unmanageable problems and how best to move forward. Risk Conundrums seeks to answer this question by bringing together a range of key thinkers in the field to explore key issues such as risk communication, uncertainty, social trust, indicators and metrics, and risk management, drawing upon case study examples including natural disasters, terrorism, and energy transitions. The initial chapters address risk conundrums, their properties, and the challenges they pose. The book then turns to a greater emphasis on systemic and regional risk conundrums. Finally, it considers how risk management can be changed to address these unsolvable conundrums. Alternative pathways are defined and scrutinized and predictions for future developments set out. This book will be of great interest to students and scholars of risk governance, environmental policy, and sustainable development.
FULLY UPDATED FOR 2019 We cannot live without water. But with 7.5 billion people competing for this single unevenly-distributed resource, the planet is drying up. In When the Rivers Run Dry, Fred Pearce explores the growing world water crisis, from Kent to Kenya. His powerful reportage takes us to places where waterways are turning to sand before they reach the ocean; where fields are parched and crops no longer grow; where once fertile ground has turned to desert; where wars are fought over access to water and cultures are dying out. But he offers us hope for the future - if we can radically revolutionise the way we treat water, and take personal responsibility for the water we use. This landmark work, from a respected and accomplished scientist, will transform the way we view the water in our reservoirs and rivers, and change the way we treat the water in our taps.
Flocks of birds, schools of fish and swarms of locusts display amazing forms of collective motion, while huge numbers of glow worms can emit light signals with almost unbelievable synchronization. These and many other collective phenomena in animal societies take place according to laws very similar to those governing the collective behavior in the inanimate nature, such as the magnetization of iron and the light radiation of lasers. During recent years, this has led to the study of swarm behavior as a challenging new field of science, in which ideas from the physical world are applied in order to understand the formation and structure of animal swarms. From these studies, it has become clear that such collective behavior of animals emerges in a self-organized way, without any need of overall coordination. In this book, we present different swarm phenomena of the animal world and compare them to their counterparts in physics, in a conceptual and non-technical way, addressed to a general readership.
Is it possible for individuals to tackle waste by recycling, reusing and reducing alone? This provocative book critically analyses the widespread assumption that individuals and households have created our global waste crisis. Sociologist and waste expert Myra J. Hird reveals neoliberal capitalism's fallacy of infinite growth as the real culprit, and demonstrates how industry and local governments work in tandem to deflect our attention away from the real causes of our global waste problem. Hird offers crucial insights into the relations between waste and wider societal issues including ongoing (settler) colonialism, poverty, racism and sexism, and showcases how sociology may provide solutions through a 'pubic imagination' of waste.
Extractive Relations explores the nature of industrial power and its role in shaping what we understand to be the global mining sector. The authors examine issues at the forefront of contemporary debates: corporate obligations in safeguarding the rights of people displaced by mining, the recognition of community rights and interests in supporting or opposing mining developments, the handling of non-judicial grievances and workability of corporate remedy systems, and the logic of community relations departments in navigating these issues inside and outside of the typical modern mining establishment.The authors develop a unique theoretical approach that highlights the different types and uses of power in these settings. This perspective is supported by the authors' own sustained engagement with the mining sector over many years, drawing on cases from over twenty countries. The analysis of these issues from both 'inside' and 'outside' the sector is a key point of differentiation. For readers seeking to understand how mining companies interpret and interact with the communities and interests around their operations, this book provides invaluable insight and analysis.
" These essays] are of high academic quality and present often penetrating ethnographic and historical insight into the negotiation of (im)purity in a variety of cultural contexts. They offer a stimulating and engaging read." . Aidan Davison, University of Tasmania Re-examining Mary Douglas' work on pollution and concepts of purity, this volume explores modern expressions of these themes in urban areas, examining the intersections of material and cultural pollution. It presents ethnographic case studies from a range of cities affected by globalization processes such as neoliberal urban policies, privatization of urban space, continued migration and spatialized ethnic tension. What has changed since the appearance of Purity and Danger? How have anthropological views on pollution changed accordingly? This volume focuses on cultural meanings and values that are attached to conceptions of 'clean' and 'dirty', purity and impurity, healthy and unhealthy environments, and addresses the implications of pollution with regard to discrimination, class, urban poverty, social hierarchies and ethnic segregation in cities. Eveline Durr is Professor at the Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology, Ludwig- Maximilians-University, Munich. She has conducted fieldwork in Mexico, the USA and Germany, and also in New Zealand while she was Associate Professor at the Auckland University of Technology. Her research focuses on urban anthropology, cultural identities and representations. Rivke Jaffe is Lecturer at the Institute of Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology, Leiden University. She previously held teaching and research positions at the University of the West Indies and the KITLV. She has conducted fieldwork in Jamaica, Curacao and Suriname on topics ranging from the urban environment to the political economy of multiculturalism to alternative governance structures."
This book explores the link between individual lives and significant environmental issues affecting millions of people around the world. Zolnikov offers a novel perspective on the environment and human health through autoethnographic stories. Each chapter includes an overview of an environmental risk factor or issue, such as air quality, accompanied by a reflective personal story. Her experiences were gathered around the world and revolve around immersion into local cultures. Learning about environmental health through this qualitative approach will enable readers to understand how issues in the environment are currently affecting people on an individual basis.
Global climate change is undeniable. Over the next few decades, as sea levels rise, storms intensify, and drought and desertification run rampant, hundreds of millions of civilians will abandon their homes, cities, and even entire countries. What will happen to these massive numbers of environmental refugees? Where will they go, what rights will they have, and who will take care of them? Over 200 million people in Asian countries live on land that will be affected by rising seas. Picture Pakistan, India, and China-all nuclear powers-skirmishing at their borders over access to shared rivers and farmable land with former coastal areas now submerged. Imagine tens of thousands of Pacific and Indian Ocean islanders cast adrift by waves that have drowned their nations, and more than 100,000 Caribbean islanders forced to leave submerged towns. Consider the complete abandonment of Miami Beach and other coastal communities up and down the Americas. At the same time, hundreds of millions will be desperate for water and a secure life in drought-ravaged Africa and the Middle East. Rising Tides sounds an urgent wakeup call to the growing crisis of climate refugees, and offers an essential, continent-by-continent look at these dangers. The crisis is everywhere and it is imminent. Detailing a number of solutions, John R. Wennersten and Denise Robbins argue that no nation can tackle this universal problem alone. The crisis of climate refugees requires global, concerted solutions beyond the strategic, fiscal, and legal capability of a single country or agency.
The Coeur d'Alenes, a twenty-five by ten mile portion of the Idaho Panhandle, is home to one of the most productive mining districts in world history. Historically the globe's richest silver district and also one of the nation's biggest lead and zinc producers, the Coeur d'Alenes' legacy also includes environmental pollution on an epic scale. For decades local waters were fouled with tailings from the mining district's more than one hundred mines and mills and the air surrounding Kellogg, Idaho was laced with lead and other toxic heavy metals issuing from the Bunker Hill Company's smelter. The same industrial processes that damaged the environment and harmed human health, however, also provided economic sustenance to thousands of local residents and a string of proud, working-class communities. Living with Lead endeavors to untangle the costs and benefits of a century of mining, milling, and smelting in a small western city and the region that surrounds it.
Climate change is increasing the severity of disasters and adverse weather conditions worldwide, with particularly devastating effects on developing countries and on individuals with lower resources. Climate change is likely to impact mental health and psychosocial well-being via multiple pathways, leading to new challenges. Direct effects such as gradual environmental changes, higher temperatures, and natural disasters, are likely to lead to more indirect consequences such as social and economic stressors, population displacement, and conflict. Climate change, largely the product of industrialized nations, is projected to magnify existing inequalities and to impact the most vulnerable, including those with low resources, individuals living in developing countries and specific populations such as women, children and those with pre-existing disabilities. This book outlines areas of impact on human well being, consider specific populations, and shed light on mitigating the impact of climate change. Recommendations discuss ways of strengthening community resilience, building on local capacities, responding to humanitarian crises, as well as conducting research and evaluation projects in diverse settings.
'Human Geography' examines the major trends, debates, research and conceptual evolution of human geography during the twentieth century. Considering each of the subject's primary subfields in turn, it addresses developments in both continental European and Anglo-American geography, providing a cutting-edge evaluation of each. Written clearly and accessibly by leading researchers, the book combines historical astuteness with personal insights and draws on a range of theoretical positions. A central theme of the book is the relative decline of the traditional subdisciplines towards the end of the twentieth century, and the continuing movement towards interdisciplinarity in which the various strands of human geography are seen as inextricably linked. This stimulating and exciting new book provides a unique insight into the study of geography during the twentieth century, and is essential reading for anyone studying the history and philosophy of the subject.
The feeling of optimism that followed the COP 21 Paris Conference on Climate Change requires concrete action and steadfast commitment to a process that raises a number of crucial challenges: technological, political, social, and economic. As climate change worsens, new robust leadership is imperative. The EU, US and China Tackling Climate Change examines why a close collaboration between the EU and China may result in the necessary impetus to solidify a vision and a roadmap for our common future in the Anthropocene. Kalantzakos introduces a novel perspective and narrative on climate action leadership through an analysis of international relations. She argues that a close EU-China collaboration, which does not carry the baggage of an imbedded competition for supremacy, may best help the global community move towards a low carbon future and navigate the new challenges of the Anthropocene. Overall, Kalantzakos demonstrates how Europe and China, already strategic partners, can exercise global leadership in an area of crucial common interest through their web of relations, substantial development aid, and the use of soft power tools throughout the developing world. This book will be of great interest to students and scholars of environmental politics, international relations, climate change and energy law and policy.
Swamps and marshes once covered vast stretches of the North American landscape. The destruction of these habitats, long seen as wastelands that harbored deadly disease, accelerated in the twentieth century. Today, the majority of the original wetlands in the US have vanished, transformed into farm fields or buried under city streets. In The Marsh Builders, Sharon Levy delves into the intertwined histories of wetlands loss and water pollution. The book's springboard is the tale of a years-long citizen uprising in Humboldt County, California, which led to the creation of one of the first U.S. wetlands designed to treat city sewage. The book explores the global roots of this local story: the cholera epidemics that plagued nineteenth-century Europe; the researchers who invented modern sewage treatment after bumbling across the insight that microbes break down pollutants in water; the discovery that wetlands act as efficient filters for the pollutants unleashed by modern humanity. More than forty years after the passage of the Clean Water Act launched a nation-wide effort to rescue lakes, rivers and estuaries fouled with human and industrial waste, the need for revived wetlands is more urgent than ever. Waters from Lake Erie and Chesapeake Bay to China's Lake Taihu are tainted with an overload of nutrients carried in runoff from farms and cities, creating underwater dead zones and triggering algal blooms that release toxins into drinking water sources used by millions of people. As the planet warms, scientists are beginning to design wetlands that can shield coastal cities from rising seas. Revived wetlands hold great promise for healing the world's waters.
Extractive Relations explores the nature of industrial power and its role in shaping what we understand to be the global mining sector. The authors examine issues at the forefront of contemporary debates: corporate obligations in safeguarding the rights of people displaced by mining, the recognition of community rights and interests in supporting or opposing mining developments, the handling of non-judicial grievances and workability of corporate remedy systems, and the logic of community relations departments in navigating these issues inside and outside of the typical modern mining establishment.The authors develop a unique theoretical approach that highlights the different types and uses of power in these settings. This perspective is supported by the authors' own sustained engagement with the mining sector over many years, drawing on cases from over twenty countries. The analysis of these issues from both 'inside' and 'outside' the sector is a key point of differentiation. For readers seeking to understand how mining companies interpret and interact with the communities and interests around their operations, this book provides invaluable insight and analysis.
Millipedes are common components of the leaf-litter fauna of most terrestrial environments. The Biology of Millipedes is the first single-volume review of this important group and covers their ecology, behaviour, physiology, and evolution.
This edited volume explores how a feminist political ecology framework can bring fresh insights to the study of rural and urban livelihoods dependent on vulnerable rivers, lakes, watersheds, wetlands and coastal environments. Bringing together political ecologists and feminist scholars from multiple disciplines, the book develops solution-oriented advances to theory, policy and planning to tackle the complexity of these global environmental changes. Using applied research on the contemporary management of groundwater, springs, rivers, lakes, watersheds and coastal wetlands in Central and South Asia, Northern, Central and Southern Africa, and South and North America, the authors draw on a variety of methodological perspectives and new theoretical approaches to demonstrate the importance of considering multiple layers of social difference as produced by and central to the effective governance and local management of water resources. This unique collection employs a unifying feminist political ecology framework that emphasizes the ways that gender interacts with other social and geographical locations of water resource users. In doing so, the book further questions the normative gender discourses that underlie policies and practices surrounding rural and urban water management and climate change, water pollution, large-scale development and dams, water for crop and livestock production and processing, resource knowledge and expertise, and critical livelihood studies. This book will be of interest to students and scholars of environmental studies, development studies, feminist and environmental geography, anthropology, sociology, environmental philosophy, public policy, planning, media studies, Latin American and other area studies, as well as women's and gender studies.
Environmental issues appear deceptively simple: science tells us what the problems are and how to solve them, and, for Christians, the Bible motivates us to care for creation. And yet, both in society in general as well as in the Christian church in particular, we cannot seem to agree on what to do regarding environmental issues. In The Nature of Environmental Stewardship, climate scientist Johnny Wei-Bing Lin argues that determining the content of environmental stewardship, far from being a straightforward exercise, is a difficult and complex endeavour. He sets forth a general taxonomy, drawing from worldviews, ethical theories, science epistemology, sciencepolicy studies, politics, and economics, that can help us better understand what excellent creation care consists of and how to bridge the differences people have regarding environmental issues.
"This remarkable anthology of 13 essays is a cross-cultural study on ecological anthropology, which examines the cultural construction of nature, human evaluation of environmental risks, and human action to mitigate such risks. The anthology persuasively critiques the privileging of Western rationality over culture-specific perspectives of environmental change... It] stands alone for the geographical sweep of its contributions - from Europe, Asia, and Africa - and its disciplinary eclecticism, which draws deeply on anthropology, geography, psychology, ethnography, ethnology, and sociology... Essential." . Choice Today human ecology has split into many different sub-disciplines such as historical ecology, political ecology or the New Ecological Anthropology. The latter in particular has criticised the predominance of the Western view on different ecosystems, arguing that culture-specific world views and human-environment interactions have been largely neglected. However, these different perspectives only tackle specific facets of a local and global hyper-complex reality. In bringing together a variety of views and theoretical approaches, these especially commissioned essays prove that an interdisciplinary collaboration and understanding of the extreme complexity of the human-environment interface(s) is possible. Michael J. Casimir is Professor of Cultural Anthropology at the University of Cologne. He has conducted prolonged fieldwork on the ecology, economy, environmental management and nutritional and socialisation patterns among pastoral nomads in west Afghanistan and Kashmir. Together with Aparna Rao he was chairperson of the Commission on Nomadic Peoples of the International Union of Ethnological and Anthropological Sciences (1995-1998), and was until 2004 one of the editors of Nomadic Peoples (Berghahn), the official journal of the Commission. His major publications include Flocks and Food. A Biocultural Approach to the Study of Pastoral Foodways (1991); Mobility and Territoriality (ed. 1992); Nomadism in South Asia (ed. 2003).
Bioregionalism is an exciting new vision for (re)making a more satisfying, ecological, sustainable society rooted in community and a celebratory culture of place. By providing tools to understand the land we live on and the sources of its natural regeneration, the more than 40 contributors to Home open up new possibilities for the creation of cultures in keeping with the requirements of the natural world. Home contains essays, poems, songs, and beautiful illustrations.
In this thoroughly revised and updated second edition of the highly successful "Ecological Ethics," Patrick Curry shows that a new and truly ecological ethic is both possible and urgently needed. With this distinctive proposition in mind, Curry introduces and discusses all the major concepts needed to understand the full range of ecological ethics. He discusses light green or anthropocentric ethics with the examples of stewardship, lifeboat ethics, and social ecology; the mid-green or intermediate ethics of animal liberation/rights; and dark or deep green ecocentric ethics. Particular attention is given to the Land Ethic, the Gaia Hypothesis and Deep Ecology and its offshoots: Deep Green Theory, Left Biocentrism and the Earth Manifesto. Ecofeminism is also considered and attention is paid to the close relationship between ecocentrism and virtue ethics. Other chapters discuss green ethics as post-secular, moral pluralism and pragmatism, green citizenship, and human population in the light of ecological ethics. In this new edition, all these have been updated and joined by discussions of climate change, sustainable economies, education, and food from an ecocentric perspective. This comprehensive and wide-ranging textbook offers a radical but critical introduction to the subject which puts ecocentrism and the critique of anthropocentrism back at the top of the ethical, intellectual and political agenda. It will be of great interest to students and activists, and to a wider public.
Environmental Anthropology studies historic and present human-environment interactions. This volume illustrates the ways in which today's environmental anthropologists are constructing new paradigms for understanding the multiplicity of players, pressures, and ecologies in every environment, and the value of cultural knowledge of landscapes. This Handbook provides a comprehensive survey of contemporary topics in environmental anthropology and thorough discussions on the current state and prospective future of the field in seven key sections. As the contributions to this Handbook demonstrate, the subfield of environmental anthropology is responding to cultural adaptations and responses to environmental changes in multiple and complex ways. As a discipline concerned primarily with human-environment interaction, environmental anthropologists recognize that we are now working within a pressure cooker of rapid environmental damage that is forcing behavioural and often cultural changes around the world. As we see in the breadth of topics presented in this volume, these environmental challenges have inspired renewed foci on traditional topics such as food procurement, ethnobiology, and spiritual ecology; and a broad new range of subjects, such as resilience, nonhuman rights, architectural anthropology, industrialism, and education. This volume enables scholars and students quick access to both established and trending environmental anthropological explorations into theory, methodology and practice.
With rapid commercialization, a booming urban economy, and the
relaxation of state migration policies, over 100 million peasants,
known as China's "floating population," have streamed into large
cities seeking employment and a better life. This massive flow of
rural migrants directly challenges Chinese socialist modes of state
control. |
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