January 2016
Call for Proposals
"Society and Natural Resources in an Illiberal World"
The editors of Society & Natural Resources invite paper proposals for participation in an
interdisciplinary social science, theory-building workshop and related special issue on
society–environment interactions in the context of illiberal regimes and conditions.
The scope of the project includes both the developed and developing world; illiberal
democracies, centralized states, theocracies, monarchies, military-ruled states;
indigenous states and territories; unrecognized states and stateless societies; times
and places of war and other forms of protracted conflict; illiberal places within liberal
states; illiberal movements, organizations, and other actors; and more. Theoretical,
empirical, comparative, case study, and practice-based approaches will be considered.
Perspectives from the Global South are especially welcome. Abstract proposals are due
by March 1, 2016; complete draft papers by August 1, 2016. Authors whose proposals
are accepted will be invited to participate in a pair of collaborative, online theorybuilding workshops; completed papers will be considered for inclusion in a special
issue of Society & Natural Resources.
Background
Since their inception, contemporary mainstream environmentalism, environmental policy,
and environmental social science have been developed in close association, extension, and
critique of liberalism, a liberal worldview, and liberal values based largely on classical
Western ideals of the rights of individuals (actual and fictive, corporate); citizenship;
political pluralism; representative democracy; responsive states and institutions, etc.
Many of today’s states are predicated at least nominally on the rule of law and the
establishment of responsive/ representative institutions, including with respect to natural
resources and the environment. Today’s global institutions, including environmental
institutions, are founded to a large degree on liberalism as well: the United Nations, the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Rio Declaration, the recently-endorsed global
Sustainable Development Goals, etc.
Yet Western-style, liberal democracies hardly are universal. Illiberalism is widespread, in
institutional forms ranging from centralized states to illiberal democracies, theocracies,
monarchies; and non-state forms including various 'rights' and millenarian movements,
including within liberal states. In much of the world, liberal states and institutions co-exist
with, and at times are overshadowed by, illiberal counterparts, rivals, and critics. At the
same time, strained by seemingly endless series of actual and perceived social and
-2-
environmental crises, all states face increased calls for environmental intervention, at
times even over the rights of individuals, communities, and dependent territories.
What are the implications of this wide variety of socio-political forms and ideologies for a
social science of the environment that seeks to study the full range of nature–society
interactions and to support the attainment of a more sustainable future across the globe?
Aims
This ad hoc, collaborative, theory-building project aims to advance social scientific
understanding of society–environment relations in illiberal political and institutional
contexts through evidence-informed analysis of questions such as:
•
•
•
•
•
•
What socio-political theories and analytical frameworks help explain the
nature, characteristics, and dynamics of environmental policy and practice
under such conditions? What new concepts and theoretical approaches are
needed for this purpose?
In what ways and conditions do illiberal states, institutions, and other actors
take up problems and issues related to society, natural resources, and the
environment? With what outcomes and effects?
In what ways, and with what effect, do environmental and natural resource
institutions, organizations, managers, and other actors function in illiberal
contexts, at every level?
Are there aspects of society–environment relations which are universal,
extending across and beyond socio-political forms and contexts?
Alternatively, in what ways are such relations deeply embedded in
particularistic political, institutional, and cultural conditions?
What are the possibilities, challenges, and limitations for individual and
collective engagement in natural resource and environmental issues and
problem resolution in illiberal contexts?
What are the most pressing elements of an agenda for future research on
society–environment interactions in an illiberal world?
Proposals
To propose a paper for consideration for these workshops and SNR special issue, send a
200-word abstract and brief CV to <snr@colostate.edu> by March 1, 2016. The editors may
follow up with questions or requests for clarification of proposals.
-3-
Manuscript development
Authors of proposed papers accepted for participation in the theory-building workshop will
be notified by March 15, 2016, with an initial, online workshop taking place soon thereafter.
Complete drafts are due by August 1, 2016, with a second virtual workshop to follow, including
short presentations and discussion of those drafts. Incorporating feedback from workshop
participants and the editors, authors will submit a final version through SNR’s standard,
double-blind, peer review process. Selected accepted papers will appear in the special
issue; others may be published as individual articles in SNR.
Timeline
Paper proposals
Notification
Workshop #1
Complete draft papers
Workshop #2
Final draft papers submitted to SNR for peer review
Information
March 1, 2016
March 15, 2016
late March/ early April
August 1, 2016
late August/ early Sept.
December 31, 2016
For inquiries and further information, please contact Professor David A. Sonnenfeld,
Editor-in-Chief, Society & Natural Resources, at <snr@colostate.edu>.
Related reading
Beeson, Mark. 2010. "The coming of environmental authoritarianism," Environmental Politics
19(2):276-294.
Bernauer, T., et al. 2013. "Is there a democracy-civil society paradox in global environmental
governance?" Global Environmental Politics 13(1): 88-108.
Blühdorn, Ingolfur. 2013. "The governance of unsustainability: ecology and democracy after the
post-democratic turn," Environmental Politics 22(1):16-36.
Böhmelt, Tobias. 2014. "Political opportunity structures in dictatorships? Explaining ENGO
existence in autocratic regimes," Journal of Environment & Development 23 (4): 446-471.
Dobson, Andrew. 2003. Citizenship and the Environment. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
Doyle, Timothy, and Adam Simpson. 2006. "Traversing more than speed bumps: Green politics
under authoritarian regimes in Burma and Iran," Environmental Politics 15(5): 750-767.
Geddes, B. 2003. Paradigms and Sand Castles: Theory Building and Research Design in Comparative
Politics. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
Gilley, B. 2012. "Authoritarian environmentalism and China's response to climate change,"
Environmental Politics 21(2): 284-307.
Hobson, C. 2012. "Addressing climate change and promoting democracy abroad: Compatible
agendas?" Democratization 19: 974-992.
-4-
Shahar, Dan Coby. 2015. "Rejecting eco-authoritarianism, again," Environmental Values 24(3):
345-366.
Shearman, David J. C., and Joseph Wayne Smith. 2007. The Climate Change Challenge and the Failure
of Democracy. Westport, CT: Praeger.
Somers, J. 2007. "Nature reserves and authoritarian rule in Egypt: Embedded autonomy revisited,"
The Journal of Environment and Development 16: 375-397.
Wissenburg, Marcel. 1998. Green Liberalism. London: University College London Press.
Wurster, Stefan. 2013. "Comparing ecological sustainability in autocracies and democracies,"
Contemporary Politics 19(1):76-93.
Zakaria, Fareed. 1997. "The rise of illiberal democracy," Foreign Affairs 76(6):22-43.