生态政治学:西方学界对环境问题的再认识

Political ecology: Rethinking the environmental issues in western academia

随着全球性的生态危机日益突出,20世纪末生态政治学成为西方学界的研究热点,为认识人与自然关系、分析环境问题提供了新思路。相反,国内对生态政治学关注不够,缺乏对西方生态政治学综合性的系统梳理,对开展相关研究也就带来了障碍。有鉴于此,文中从研究脉络、理论基础、研究主题等方面梳理了西方生态政治研究的主要内容,并提出可能进一步展开的研究议题。研究发现:激进发展地理学和文化生态学为生态政治学提供了发展动力;理论基础包括'公地悲剧'、批判性的环境史研究、马克思主义政治经济学、道德经济与日常抵制、女性主义发展研究、管制与主体创造;研究主题包括退化与边缘化、保护与控制、环境冲突与排斥、环境主体和身份、政治客体和行动者。此外,从切入视角来看,生态政治学把环境问题放在更加广泛的政治、经济脉络中考察,将地方环境问题的分析逻辑置于不同尺度的关系网络之中,强调地方性知识、区域和全球变化的环境成本与不同主体之间权力博弈对社会与环境变迁的影响。

With the global ecological crisis becoming increasingly prominent,political ecology has become a research hotspot in western academia at the end of the 20 th century,which provides new thinking for understanding the relationship between human and nature and analyzing environmental problems.On the contrary,Chinese scholars pay less attention to political ecology,which brings difficulties to the development of related research.Therefore,this paper summaries the main content of Western political ecology research from its origin,theoretical basis and research themes,and finally tries to propose research agenda that would expand this field further.It is found that radical development geography and cultural ecology provide driving force for the development political ecology.The theoretical basis includes'the tragedy of the commons',critical environmental history,Marxist political economy,moral economy and everyday resistance,feminist development studies,governmentality and the creation of subjects.There are five themes,including degradation and marginalization,conservation and control,environmental conflicts and exclusions,environmental subjects and identities,political objects and actors.From research perspective,the political ecology emphasizes that environmental issues should be studied in a broader political and economic background and relational network of different spatial-temporal scales,which also stresses that the local knowledge,the costs of environmental change from regional to global,and the power game among different subjects play the important roles in social and environmental change.