Paper Presented at the Challenging Orthodoxies: Critical Governance Studies
Conference, Warwick Business School, December 13 th -14 th 2010.
Dr. Sophie Wynne-Jones
Lecturer in Human Geography
Institute of Geography and Earth Sciences
Aberystwyth University
Ceredigion
SY23 3DB
01970-622595 sxw@aber.ac.uk
Abstract
This paper critically engages with the application of neoliberal governance strategies to the sphere of environmental management, in the form of newly initiated payment schemes for ecosystem services in Wales. Following widely held sensibilities advocating the application of market-mechanisms, the scheme in question here reframes the environment as a source of saleable goods and services, rather than something which needs to be regulated through legislation. Tracing the impetus behind this shift, it is notable that whilst neoliberal directives are clearly present within the discourses of government and policy advisors, there has been little coverage of the reaction to such policy programmes from the publics whom they are
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intended to involve. In particular, the attitudes of rural land-managers are identified as a key area for investigation, in order to attain a fuller perspective on the advancement of market-led governance schemes. Moreover, it is argued that analysis which is solely focused upon official policy and ‘elite’ knowledges, can suggest a top-down reading of hegemony, sidelining the social and subjective processes involved in the negotiation of political-economic programmes. Consequently, this paper details more grounded reflections on the impetus for market-led strategies of governance, by unpacking the way in which land-managers have made-sense of, and subsequently engaged or resisted these processes of neoliberalisation. Specifically, the paper applies methodologies drawn from post-structural feminists Wendy Larner and J.K.
Gibson-Graham, in order to locate the negotiation of neoliberal formations with individuals’ processes of self-reflection, identification, and emotion. As such, providing an important avenue for more in-depth understandings of why neoliberal strategies have continued to endure.
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1. Introduction
“What we call land is an element of nature inexplicably interwoven with man’s institutions. To isolate it and form a market out of it was perhaps the weirdest of all undertakings of our ancestors ...The economic function is but one of many vital functions of land.” (Polanyi 1944 p178)
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Over the course of the last thirty years the increasing dominance of neoliberalism has become a central concern for critical scholars, and even in our current time of crises it is apparent that these modes of rule have not yet lost their purchase. The continued evaluation of such political-economic processes, and their associated maintenance of hegemony, is therefore seen as an urgent priority - perhaps now more than ever. In this paper I will focus upon the deployment of neoliberal governance for the purposes of environmental management, as an important avenue through which neoliberal strategy is continuing to be rolled-out. Critically, it is argued that the neoliberalisation of nature represents not only a further colonisation of previous externalities
(McCarthy and Prudham 2004), but can also be seen as a critical juncture in the continued advance of neoliberalism, given the potentially fundamental contradictions which are seen to arise from such processes of commodification (O'Connor 1998). As such, whilst we are clearly faced with an increasing imperative to address mounting ecological crises, we also have to grapple with the charge that ecological problems are unavoidably connected to the political-economic system. Here, the apparent acceptability, and indeed necessity of deploying neoliberal mechanisms for environmental management is seen as a key paradox to be unpacked as part of a wider project of critical engagement with neoliberal hegemony.
Working within this framing, this paper focuses upon the issue of payments for the delivery of ecosystem services as a component of recent agri-environment policy reform in Wales (WAG 2009, a). Following wider patterns for the implementation of market mechanisms in the governance of ecosystem function (Robertson 2004 ;
Bakker 2007; Bumpus and Liverman 2008; Schreuder 2009), the scheme in question reframes the environment as a source of saleable goods and services, rather than
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something which needs to be regulated through legislation. As such, through this process of policy reform, the Welsh Assembly Government has acted to commodify ecosystem processes that were previously seen as external to business.
Exploring the impetus behind this change, it is notable that payments for ecosystem services have become an increasing figure within western environmental discourse
(Costanza and et.al. 1997; Heal 2000; Daily and Ellison 2002; Swingland 2003;
Whitten, Salzman et al. 2003). This has led to increasing pressures on an international level to implement market mechanisms in the management of environmental resources. Here, the conclusions of a recent report, led by the United Nations
Environment Programme i
, into ‘The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity’
(TEEB 2010), offer a useful example of the discourses now employed to argue for a widespread mainstreaming of the economics of nature. Specifically, they outline that:
“ The invisibility of many of nature’s services to the economy results in widespread neglect of natural capital, leading to decisions that degrade ecosystems and biodiversity…[consequently] decision makers…should take steps to assess and communicate the role of biodiversity and ecosystem services in economic activity...
”
(ibid, p25).
“Economic incentives including market prices, taxes, subsidies and other signals play a major role in influencing the use of natural capital.” (ibid p27)
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Within Wales, the Assembly Government has taken up this challenge with the development of the new agri-environment scheme; as shown in the following outtakes from their 2008 consultation and 2009 press releases:
“for the current [schemes] the economic model is seen as being the appropriate one to take in developing land management schemes since it emphasises the relationship between land management and the production of outputs…” (WAG 2008).
“The purpose of [this] agri-environment scheme [is] to enable WAG to buy environmental goods and services from farmers that are not supplied through normal market mechanisms. WAG is therefore the customer and the farmer is the supplier.”
(WAG 2009, b, p11).
“We have deliberately used the term ‘supply contract’ to describe the agreement that
WAG and farmers will sign under [the new scheme]… WAG is therefore the customer and the farmer is the supplier. The contract that will be put in place for [the new scheme] will reflect this relationship.” (WAG 2009, a)
Given these aspirations, it is argued that the advance of neoliberal ideals can be clearly identified as an outcome of the Welsh Assembly Government’s ambition to restructure their rural payment schemes ii
. Nevertheless, it is equally acknowledged that the State is only one site and instrument through which neoliberal discourse is developed and deployed. As Larner and le Heron (Larner and Le Heron 2002b) have argued, there are multiple dimensions and processes through which neoliberalism(s) are constituted, which are in need of attention. In order to conduct a fuller analysis, it
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is therefore argued that we need to explore a wider network of mechanisms and procedures, built around collective norms of behaviour and identity, which are mediated through individuals (Cloke and Goodwin 1992 p325). Equally, it is argued that analysis which is solely focused upon official policy and ‘elite’ knowledges, can suggest a top-down reading of hegemony, sidelining the social and subjective processes of negotiation involved. Following Larner (2000 p4), it is argued that:
“analyses that characterise neoliberalism as a policy response to the exigencies of the global economy…run the risk of under-estimating the significance of contemporary transformations in governance. Neoliberalism is both a political discourse about the nature of rule and a set of practises that facilitate the governing of individuals…”
Consequently, we need to ask more precisely how hegemony becomes manifest, in order to explore the mechanics and sometimes fraught negotiation of such practises of governance. Following this impetus, this paper attends to the experiences of land managers who have been involved in the development of new conservation strategies, in Wales, which have recently culminated in the proposals for the new agrienvironment scheme. The details of these case studies are outlined in section 3. Here it is argued that land-managers prefer market-style modes of governance as a seemingly common-sense persuasion, hence evidencing a ‘bottom-up’ push for the development of neoliberal policy programmes.
In order to gain more critical insights into these assessments, the paper then applies the methodologies of post-structural feminists Wendy Larner (2000) and J.K. Gibson-
Graham (2006). That is, to develop a more in-depth analysis of how such sensibilities
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have become sedimented, by focusing upon the way in which hegemony is achieved through the negotiation of internalised desires and sensibilities, rather than assuming the unquestionable logic of the economic bottom line as a primary rationale. This approach is outlined in section 2, before being applied in section 4 following the introduction of the case studies in section 3. In the analysis of section 4, I discuss how neoliberal subjectivities are formulated within land managers’ current conduct, and processes of self-assessment and representation; as well as outlining how the emergence of a new payment scheme for ecosystem services could further enhance this shift.
In summary, it is argued that in order to understand the presumed suitability of market solutions to the emerging challenges of environmental governance, the formation of hegemony needs to be traced through to individuals, and their more deep-seated negotiations of neoliberalism. That is, to unpick the ways in which neoliberal policy formations are co-constituted with and through particular understandings of the self, which are then mobilised and (re)enacted through the apparatus of governance.
2. Theorising Neoliberal Subjectivity
In this section I will outline the theory behind the analytical approach employed in the paper. Specifically, this paper draws upon the work Wendy Larner (Larner 2000;
Larner and Le Heron 2002a; Larner and Le Heron 2002b; Larner 2003; 2007) and
J.K. Gibson-Graham (Gibson-Graham 2006; Gibson-Graham 2008), as a means to unpack the way in which different people make-sense of, engage, and / or resist, neoliberal ways of knowing and doing. Putting this mode of analysis in a wider
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context, it can be seen as a distinctly feminist and post-structural approach to the analysis of neoliberalism. That is, one which grounds the negotiation of neoliberal formations with individuals, and the processes of self-reflection, identification and emotion, through which they enact or refute neoliberal ways of being. Given this focus, such analyses are seen to provide an important means of exploring how neoliberalism becomes manifest through both ‘rational’ economic assessments, as well as more subconscious, intuitive, or reactive, emotional responses. As such, an understanding of the more unconscious, deep-seated, and potentially irrational embraces of neoliberal policy is taken forward as a key insight of this paper, in order to provide a means of explaining the lack of more visible contestation to neoliberal hegemony in ecosystem management.
However, before we begin to outline the particulars of this approach it is important to reflect further upon why such analysis is necessary. That is, to outline why a shift to neoliberal modes of governance could be seen as problematic. Here, a number of concerns can be raised. In the first instance, one is alerted to the long tradition of critical scholarship that has identified the problematics of uneven development associated with neoliberal capitalism (eg. Smith 1984; Harvey 1996). This is particularly applicable in the analysis of agricultural and wider rural development patterns, which have been formative in the need for new governance mechanisms
(Bonanno, Busch et al. 1994; Buttel 2005; Potter and Tilzey 2007). Specifically, it is argued that rural Wales has suffered from serious economic marginalisation, associated with a struggling agricultural sector that is unable to compete on the global market (Midmore and Hughes 1996; Midmore and Moore-Colyer 2005). Moreover, it is noted that similar processes of rural marginalisation and decline have resulted in
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outright resistance to the advance of neoliberal policy programmes from a number of communities outside of Wales (Bové and Dufour 2001; Guzmán and Martinez-Alier
2005; McCarthy 2005; Shiva 2008), promoting the question of why resistance is not more popularly articulated in this context. Critically, it is argued that in place of a rejection of neoliberalism, the move towards paying for ecosystem services within
Wales can be understood as a means to rejuvenate the struggling agricultural sector through increasing neoliberalisation, as much as it is a strategy to address ecological decline. This provokes the question of how a wider application of neoliberal development models improve the prospects of farmers already struggling as a consequence of such competitive and polarising influences, as well as reinforcing concerns over such uncritical acquiescence.
Beyond this key paradox, the enthusiastic embrace of payments for ecosystem services is also brought into question by following the insights of critical scholarship on the neoliberalisation of nature (McCarthy and Prudham 2004; Heynan, McCarthy et al. 2007). Specifically, it is argued that strategies such as the development of payments for ecosystem services serve to further extend the logics of commodification and capitalisation, in order to exploit previously untapped resources, as a means to maintain the potential for capital accumulation. Here, work such as
Robertson (2006a; 2007b) and Bakker (2002; 2005) are exemplary in their demonstration of the difficulties associated with the operationalisation of such markets, by evidencing the various ways in which nature is resistant to the application of economic measure and processes of exchange. Equally, it is argued that the extension of neoliberal rule to previously un-enclosed aspects of the environment has been as fraught with conflict as earlier rounds of enclosure (De Angelis 2001;
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Heynan, McCarthy et al. 2007; Mansfield 2007). Moreover, the neoliberalisation of nature is argued as a wider continuation of crisis remediation, with ecological degradation presented as the second contradiction of capitalism (O'Connor 1998;
Foster 2002). In these terms, the extension of neoliberal governance is not seen as a benign strategy to internalise and apply ‘proper’ value to natures’ goods and services, but a means of maintaining the overall legitimacy of a fundamentally crisis prone system.
Given such vehement critiques, the continued dominance of neoliberalism has become a central conundrum for scholars wishing to unpack contemporary governance models. Exuding a frustration that is common in such enquiries, Peck and
Tickell (2002 p381) have argued that neoliberalism is “as compelling as it is intangible”
, whilst Beck (2000 211) goes as far as to describe it as “ an ideological thought virus” . Grasping at this compulsion, critical scholars have aimed to map the construction of an apparently extant hegemony. There-in tackling the awkward paradox that neoliberalism is seemingly all powerful and everywhere, and yet a large proportion of society either doesn’t realise this, or just accepts it unquestioningly – despite the many clear difficulties that have arisen in conjunction with neoliberal governance reforms.
It is here-in, that the work of Wendy Larner and J.K. Gibson-Graham is similarly aimed; but before we can appreciate the impetus of their post-structural approaches, it is necessary to outline how their work departs from more structuralist, Neo-Marxist, accounts of hegemony. The work of David Harvey is often considered to be exemplary here, with his account of the rise of neoliberalism from the theorising of
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Hayek and Friedman (Hayek 1960; Friedman 1962 ), through to the political manifestations of the Reagan and Thatcher governments. Following Antonio
Gramsci’s notion of hegemony (1971) his account sets out to reveal how the
‘common-sensical’ nature of neoliberalism was created and maintained by particular individuals and institutions to serve their own political-economic ambitions, and gain wider public support, without the need for aggressive coercive measures. Diane
Rochelau (2007 p222) describes this as the Trojan horse approach, in which neoliberalism has not breached the city gates, but entered the imagination and restructured our sense of our selves - thus, directing the practise of willing subjects.
In particular, Harvey (2005) suggests that neoliberal policies have been accepted by a wider populous due to their association of neoliberalism with ‘freedom for the individual’. His invocation of hegemony, therefore, suggests that the acceptance of particular political-economic positions can be achieved through a process of careful negotiation. Not by trying to enforce obviously objectionable policies, but by placing an emphasis upon the way in which they can be beneficial, to draw attention away from more problematic aspects. As such, the achievement of hegemony through consent rather than coercion offers an important avenue for the analysis of ‘irrational’ advancements of neoliberal policy programmes.
It is here that Wendy Larner (2000) interjects a more post-structural reading.
Specifically, whilst she concurs with the Gramscian notion of hegemony, as a culturing of ‘norms’, she suggests that some Neo Marxian readings – such as the work of Jessop (1990) and Hall (eg. Hall 1985 ; Hall 1988) - can be critiqued for their theoretical incoherence and over reliance upon an abstracted force of capitalism (see
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also Bonefield 1993; Murdoch 1995; Barnett 2005). In particular, she has aired concerns that scholars are too ready to recognise neoliberalism, rather than taking the complexity of contemporary governance as a starting point. Specifically, she has argued that:
“If we do indeed live in an era in which neoliberalism has been normalised, we need to take seriously the complexity of real examples…The task of neoliberals has been to present their unwieldy and contradictory political assemblage as a coherent geographical and institutional formation with necessary outcomes. Are we… also unintentionally contributing to these ambitions…”
(Larner 2007 p220).
Consequently, her work has argued for a more nuanced understanding of neoliberaltype governance formations and goes as far as to ascribe the label of ‘afterneoliberalism’ to some emerging strategies (Larner, le Heron et al. 2007). Equally, these arguments are echoed by post-structural feminists Gibson-Graham (1996, p ix) who suggest that we need to depict social existence at loose ends with itself, rather than reproducing everything as part of the same monolithic complex (ie. neoliberalism). In these terms, economic practises are considered to comprise a rich diversity, which we are otherwise in danger of loosing if we ascribe everything as neoliberal.
Given these tensions, Larner has sought to explain hegemony through a more grounded and subject-centred reading. Specifically, she has applied the concept of
‘governmentality’, from the work of Nikolas Rose (1999) and Foucault (1991), who have developed governmentality as a means of explaining how the problematic of
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government in liberal democracies can be addressed. That is, as a means to control
‘the conduct of conduct’, whilst appearing not to intervene; resolving the puzzle of action versus in-action, which the State is confounded by in a political regime that prioritises the autonomy of the individual (Murdoch and Ward 1997). As such, the neoliberal emphasis upon liberty is ‘paradoxically’ maintained in conjunction with continued State authority.
Specifically, this mode of analysis provides a means of grounding otherwise abstracted notions of hegemony, due to a focus upon the way in which governable subjects are created. Here, this is achieved through the formation and deployment of specific forms of knowledge and expertise, as a means to facilitate the governance of the self. Within neoliberal governance regimes it is argued that the State deploys a series of in-direct mechanisms to manage society in a manner that enables the maintained presumption of liberty as a key ideological goal of neoliberalism (ibid, p
311). Distilling the modes of subjectivity produced here-in, Liz Bondi (following
Wendy Larner, 2000) has argued that:
“as a form of governmentality, neoliberalism works by installing a concept of the human subject as an autonomous, individualised, self-directing, decision-making agent at the heart of policy-making” (Bondi 2005 p106).
Here, individuals’ understandings of themselves and their desires to be independent, entrepreneurial, and successful, are embedded in the operation of wider modes of neoliberal government, which are reliant upon the compliance engendered through these forms of subjectivity. Contrasting this with Neo-Marxist approaches, it is argued
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that governmentality enables an epistemological shift that deflects explanatory purchase away from the structures of neoliberal rule, towards a focus upon the rationalities and technologies of knowledge that make these ‘structures’ thinkable and manageable in the first place (Lockie and Higgins 2007). As such, the importance of understanding the modes of subjectivity that facilitate governance, through particular ways of thinking about ones’ self, are clearly asserted.
For example, Larner (2000, p11) argues that the restructuring of welfare programmes, in order to reduce citizen dependency upon a Keynesian State and move towards a more neoliberal mode of governance, has been predicated upon a shift in the conceptualisation of the self. Specifically, she states that:
“Neoliberal strategies of rule...encourage people to see themselves as individualised and active subjects responsible for their own well-being. This conception...can also be linked to a particular politics of the self in which we are all encouraged to ‘work on ourselves’...”
This is supported by the work of Miller and Rose (2008) who have charted the changing constructions of citizenship, and associated mentalities, during the initial rise of neoliberal governance in the mid 1980’s (see also Dean 1995). Specifically, they claim that this shift in governance led to a move away from collective solidarities and social responsibilities; and in their place a new set of political discourses, associated with a neoliberal model of citizenry, have emerged:
“the language of freedom, autonomy and choice increasingly came to regulate arguments over the legitimate means and ends of political power...the political subject
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was to be an individual whose citizenship was manifested through the free exercise of personal choice...” (Miller and Rose 2008, p48).
Moreover, they detail the way in which this form of subjectivity has been nurtured through the rationalities of enterprise, personal autonomy and self fulfilment:
“the worker was no longer construed as a social creature seeking satisfaction of his or her need for security, solidarity or welfare, but as an individual actively seeking to shape and manage [their] own life in order to maximise its returns in terms of success and achievement.”
(ibid p49).
Here, Harvey’s (2005) claim that acquiescence has been achieved through neoliberalism’s associations with freedom is clearly echoed, and further buoyed by a raft of similarly desirable characteristics which are equally entwined with the operation of neoliberal governance. However, in order to access such subject-centred readings, the necessity of careful empirical analysis is emphasised as a means to achieve more grounded accounts of how neoliberal hegemony is actually worked out, and avoid hasty conclusions. This reinforces the suggestion that neoliberalism is not simply achieved through top-down impositions by the State, but is actively engineered by the desires and actions of individual people beyond the State. In these terms, neoliberalism is a construct of State-form and policy, as well as the everyday understandings and subject positions of individual people.
Moreover, contra to criticisms such as Barnett’s (2005), this approach is not seen to describe the way in which individuals’ are ‘got at’ by an abstract force. Rather, by
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asserting the ongoing processes of individuals’ identity formation, and continuous renegotiation, the fate of ‘neoliberalism’ is left open. As such, Larner’s method provides a means through which to explain the advancement of neoliberalism(s), as well as asserting their complex, hybrid, and ultimately contingent nature. Moreover,
Miller and Rose (1990 p10-11) argue that governmentality is predicated upon an inherently unstable conception of government, in need of constant work to legitimise and stabilise its operation. As such, any mode of political rule (including neoliberalism) cannot exist in a monolithic and unchanging form. Here-in, the fraught negotiation and malleability of neoliberalism, as manifest in different policy programmes, demonstrates both the ongoing endurance of neoliberal strategies, but also the potential openings for more-than neoliberal ways of organising.
Supporting the impetus of this work, Gibson-Graham (2006) argue that our politicaleconomic identities are dependent upon continuous processes of construction, and practical negotiation. Specifically, they draw upon feminist theory to remind us that our assumed roles and identities are always dependant upon iteration and performance
(Butler 1990). As a consequence, they suggest that the re-imagination of identity and subjectivity can be used as a means of challenging the entrenched ‘truth’ of peoples’ economic identities. In their words
“the achievements of second wave feminism provide…the impetus for theorising a new global form of economic politics…Its focus upon the subject prompts us to think about new ways of cultivating economic subjects with different desires and capacities and greater openness to change and uncertainty”
(Gibson-Graham 2006 pxxiv).
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To clarify, this is not to dismiss the importance of economic process, or the subjectivities affected there-in, but to assert their contingency and ultimately, their state of infinitude. That is, to refuse the notion of the economy as a singular selfevident totality, that is unquestioningly capitalistic, and to rethink it, not in terms of abstracted theorisations but through the manifestations that come of the self, and our awareness of ourselves. Consequently, they argue that the power of economic structures is always dependant upon the cumulative iterations of individual actors, and the potential for economic alternatives iii
is equally tied to our everyday actions and attitudes. As such, they re-ground political-economic analysis with the individual, asserting the necessity of attending to individuals’ daily practise and processes of self identification, as the means through which economic discourse is formed and negotiated:
“to cultivate new attitudes and practises of thinking is to cultivate a new relation to the world and it’s always hidden possibilities…”
(ibid, pxxix).
Moreover, in this re-construction of the self they follow Connolly’s (2002 p107) argument that
“sensibility… is composed through the cultural layering of affect into the materiality of thought… To work on an established sensibility by tactical means, then, is to nudge the composition of some layers in relation to others.”
In other words, they see affect and emotion as an essential component of the way that we form understanding, and ultimately sediment particular attitudes and positions. As such, unpicking economic practise is not simply a case of following actions and behaviour, but unravelling the attitudes, motivational drivers, and processes of self-assessment bound-up with the performance of economic practises.
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In sum, the combination of Larner’s approach with that of Gibson-Graham, detailed here, is suggested to provide a mode of analysis which can open-up, or re-humanise, an otherwise abstract political-economy. Specifically, the discussion here has suggested a need to reconsider our often taken-for-granted roles and constructions of ourselves; unpacking the presumed responsibilities and qualities that we as individuals display, and remaining sensitive to the continuous performance of these subject positions. From this theoretical basis I will now approach the particulars of my case-studies.
3. Ecosystem Services as the application of Market Governance.
In this section I will set-out the details of my case studies, which have taken the form of two conservation projects iv aimed to pilot new approaches to environmental management. Specifically, these projects have attempted to depart from the perception of conservation as ‘income-foregone’, and move towards the construction of environmental ‘goods and services’ as something which farmers can produce for positive returns. Here I will discuss the way in which ecosystem services have been presented by the project teams as a more desirable and effective form of governance, in terms of a preference associated with market-style payments. I will also outline some of the practical actions undertaken through the projects to advance these mechanisms, including reference to their involvement with policy development.
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3.1 The Pumlumon Project
The first project under consideration, the Pumlumon Project, has been run by the
Wildlife Trust Wales in the Northern region of the Cambrian Mountains, on the border between Powys and Ceredigion in Mid-Wales. The Wildlife Trust is a charitable conservation organisation which is not directly associated with the Welsh
Assembly Government (WAG), but is heavily involved with policy advocacy. The
Pumlumon Project has been in existence in various forms since 2005, and crystallised around 2008, with an ambition to
“enhance the natural capital of the Pumlumon area so that it can support new and viable ecosystem services … [which] will provide the local community with a sustainable economic future” (MWT, 2007b).
In order to do this, the project team have advocated the introduction of new forms of payment for ‘farming’ ecosystem services in place of the existing agri-environment schemes which framed the receipt of monies as compensatory payments, for the
‘income foregone’ by undertaking conservation. Critically, the need to move away from the associations of compensatory conservation payments was evident as a central directive of the Pumlumon Project, with ecosystem goods cast as business opportunities rather than as requirements in another ‘income support style’ rural payment scheme. It was also suggested that conservation works should be tendered to farmers in order to connect the payment to the job, and so provide greater incentives to take environmental works seriously (interview notes with MWT 20/9/07 &
10/1/08). These understandings were outlined to me as the findings of interviews that
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the project team had undertaken with farmers within the proposed project area, as a means to develop workable strategies with those land managers (MWT 2008).
Their economic priorities were further demonstrated by comments in the Farm Plan
Pilot Project Document (MWT 2008 p9) regarding the need to have replacement schemes once existing agri-environments arrangements were completed, as a means of branding the ‘added value’ of a high quality farm environment. Specifically, the
Wildlife Trust argue:
“there is a need for a new scheme, to help farmers compete against low-value foreign imports..[which are] dictating and controlling the traditional farm product markets within the UK”
(MWT 2008 p9). Notably, this is also discussed in conjunction with new marketing strategies, which the team were trying to develop, further demonstrating a belief in the effectiveness of market mechanisms as an underlying figure of the Wildlife Trust’s overall strategy with the
Pumlumon Project.
To quote from a project summary document (Faulkner no date p30):
“The future lies in developing added value and improved marketing...the challenge must be to devise and bring to market a variety of imaginative enterprises...”
Moreover, when questioned about this increasingly ‘free-market’ mentality, the Pumlumon Project
Team suggested that any other methods were becoming increasingly implausible and that there was a clear need to shift conservation in this direction (interview notes
MWT 10/1/08).
In order to affect such changes, the project team have been heavily involved in government lobbying and advocacy, which I will outline below, but have equally
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attempted to pilot such approaches using charitable and private sector funding, in order to explore the viability of such proposals. Here they have begun to explore the delivery of ecosystem services through conservation work on their own sites, as well as discussing the potential for such works with farmers across the Pumlumon area
(MWT 2008). Notably, the team have also been involved in discussions private-sector partners, including power-generating companies, including Eon, who manage the hydro-power sourced from the Nant-y-Moch and Rhiedol reservoirs, along with various wind-farm operators in the area – as a means to obtain funding to experiment with the delivery of ecosystem services across a wider area.
Here, work being done around the Llyn Vyrnwy catchment, in Mid-Wales, was highlighted as important points of reference and inspiration v . Specifically, the water companies who source water from these catchments are involved in financing habitat works to improve water quality and regulate run-off rates. As such, they are paying for habitat works as hydrological management tools, or as a form of ecosystem service. This is markedly different from previous arrangements where companies have financed conservation work to meet statutory conservation targets, or to bolster their environmental credentials. Rather, this work can be seen to pave the way for payments which are directly focussed upon the production of new commodities.
This includes goods which already have an established price, such as water, but also new commidities such as carbon. Here, the Pumlumon team have outlined the possibilities of carbon sequestration as another potentially commodifiable service, produced through the restoration habitats in the uplands. Specifically, the potential for pricing carbon was discussed in relation to the UN Conference of Parties Climate
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Change negotiations talks and associated carbon-trading agreements to ‘manage’ carbon emissions (see eg. Schreuder 2009; UN-REDD no date). In these terms, it was argued that a ‘shadow price’ had been set, and in principle carbon has a recognisable economic value (interview notes CCW Climate Change Officer 22/4/08). However, this is not yet being used as a means of pricing habitat works quantitatively, but is clearly adding to the qualitative worth of emerging projects (interview notes CCW
Climate Change Officer 22/4/08; interview notes MWT 10/1/08; Morris 2007).
Beyond these private partnerships, it was evident that a primary objective of the project was to facilitate community as well as environmental regeneration. For example, they argue that:
“This is a grassroots project that will be delivered by local landowners and communities…enhancing the natural capital of the project area to allow production of traditional farm produce coupled with the new ecosystem services that will provide the local community with a sustainable economic future…The intent of the project is to empower the local community to find and develop novel environmental management schemes and niche opportunities for another income stream, thus boosting economic strength within the community.” (MWT 2008, p5-6).
As such, a large part of the project’s remit has been advocacy work aimed at WAG’s agri-environment reforms, in order to create wider funding opportunities for an approach centred upon the farming community. Consequently, they have made a substantive effort to lobby Ministers involved in the policy reform process, as well as show-casing the project at national farming events and policy seminars. Ultimately,
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the project has been subject to a number of stops and starts. However, the following out-takes from WAG’s consultation document demonstrating some important resonances between national policy reform and the aspirations of the Wildlife Trust with The Pumlumon Project.
“More than ever before the Welsh countryside is under pressure to contribute to society’s needs…we need our land to deliver many functions for us…[with] opportunities for Welsh farmers to position themselves as producers of high quality, environmentally friendly products… through conserving soil carbon…and the development of the ecosystems approaches”
(WAG 2008 p2).
In conclusion, it is argued that the understandings advanced by the Pumlumon Project team demonstrate an important indicator of the more ‘grounded knowledges’ that have been effective in the recent policy developments. As such, the shift towards market-style payments is considered to be the result of a more wide-spread shift in sensibility, beyond the realms of government ministers and policy advisors.
3.2 The Cambrian Mountain Initiative
The second project under consideration here, the Cambrian Mountains Initiative
(CMI) demonstrates many crossovers and parallels with the intentions already set out for the Pumlumon Project, but extends to an even wider area, and has involved a different set of agencies. To clarify, the CMI began life as local authority bid for
Lottery funding to boost development in the area (Land-Use-Consultants 2008). This was then later re-initiated by the Countryside Council for Wales in partnership with
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WAG and other Assembly supported bodies, including the Environment Agency and
Forestry Commission. Despite a number of political tensions between the two projects vi
, they have grown into very similar initiatives, with the following summary demonstrating the CMI’s focus upon the rejuvenation of farming in the area in conjunction with ecosystem service development:
“The overall objective of the Cambrian Mountain Initiative is to ensure the sustainability of rural communities in the Cambrian Mountains – the heartland of rural Wales. We aim to achieve this through an integrated programme of action – developing the value of the Cambrian Mountains brand, connecting local producers to the consumer marketplace, promoting the visibility of the Cambrian Mountains as a tourist destination, caring for the natural and built environments, and helping develop markets for the provision of ecosystem services. Together, these activities will help support the social and cultural vibrancy of the area and help retain young people in local communities.”
(CMI 2009 p1)
Elsewhere it is argued that:
“The very foundations [of the Cambrians]- its agriculture and the cultural life that runs with the season- are being threatened as the markets for the produce of the mountains shrink as a result of global influence”.
(Williams and Davies 2007 p5)
Here the perceived threat to the area is clearly articulated, with the CMI framed as means of responding to such pressures. These concerns are also detailed in the
‘Cherished Heartland’ report (Midmore and Moore-Colyer 2005), and have similarly
24

been highlighted by the 2020 task group that reported to WAG on the prospective future for Welsh agriculture (CMI 2009 p1). In response, the development of payments for ecosystem service delivery is considered to provide an important potential future for the area, and a means to revive the agricultural sector.
Specifically, the Land Use Consultants report states that:
“there are significant opportunities…to realign agricultural payments to reward the specific range of benefits or services that farming provides…bringing farming centre stage…helping to revive the fortunes of the rural economy.”
(Land-Use-Consultants
2008 p5).
“it is vital to secure the environmental capital of the Cambrian Mountain’s as the basis of success for the wider business community.”
(ibid p15).
Moreover, they outline “carbon as a new currency” (Land-Use-Consultants 2008 p20) as one core themes of the project, going on to detail the following proposals:
“Developing new markets for land management in partnership with landowners, which deliver services in flood control, water storage and purification, carbon storage and sequestration and the delivery of biodiversity targets and objectives. This will include securing payments for the environmental services that the Cambrian
Mountains can offer.”
In order to advance this agenda, the project team have developed an ‘Ecosystem
Services Group’ who have been charged with deciding upon the way in which the
25

CMI could be used to trial new agri-environment schemes. Specifically, the project was discussed as:
“a test bed for working out some of the ideas that may come out of the [policy] review... integrated rural development, making the connections between land management – for ecosystem services...the underpinning life support systems - and farmers managing those things and incentivising those things through agrienvironment schemes...” (CCW Agri-environment Policy Officer, June 2008).
Here, it is notable that whilst the Pumlumon Project team were in the position of lobbying from an ‘outsider’ position, the CMI staff are much more closely associated with WAG, and hence have had a more central role in the development of the new
Glastir policy. For example, it was noted that:
“the team at the Assembly are working closely on the Cambrians and it is a cross fertilisation of ideas – using the Cambrians as a test-bed, at least at this stage, at the paper stage…considering how we can achieve the climate change goals that we want with our land use & enhancing the sustainability of the people actually living there”
(CCW Climate Change Officer 22/4/08).
Never-the-less, it is argued that the Cambrian Mountain Initiative demonstrates an important site of grounded engagement with the imperative for neoliberal models of environmental governance vii
. As with the Pumlumon Project, it is therefore presented as evidence of wider awareness, and negotiations with the idea of payments for ecosystem services, beyond those of policy teams and state officials.
26

In summary, the discussions here have shown how these projects have been involved in a wider move towards the commodification of habitats into saleable ecosystem goods and services. This is in response to a perceived need to take nature conservation forward from a legacy of difficulties associated with its presentation as an unproductive form of land use. As such, the need to commodify the environment into goods and services is a move that has clearly been enacted in response to positive associations with production to serve ‘the market’. Moreover, there is a sense that other modes of regulation are becoming increasingly unviable, with market governance assuming a dominant position in popular consciousness. The next section will reflect upon the logics behind such perceptions at the level of the individual project officers and land managers involved in these case studies.
4. Negotiating Neoliberalism
At the outset, it is important to acknowledge the primary change effected by the projects, and subsequent policy reform, in the reframing of the environment as valuable goods and services. However, within this shift the implicit understanding of land managers as businessmen is also noted as a central tenant upon which the success of the projects has also hinged. As such, conservationists have moved beyond the otherwise stead-fast cultural construction of farmers as food producers, towards new associations with the production of novel ecosystem goods and services. Here, the long held assumption that Welsh farmers’ will not engage with nature conservation, as a result of cultural distaste with untamed landscapes (see Taylor 2005), is placed in
27

question. Rather, the findings of this research suggest that farmers are adaptable in what they will produce, as long as it does not threaten their business. This is exemplified by the following comment, made in a press-release, by one project officer describing the necessity of compromise in the development of otherwise contentious conservation works:
“formers are businessmen and we accept that they will not want to do anything that will damage their businesses...”
(Forgrave 2008).
Equally, it was claimed that
“land owners and farming interests have latched onto the economic benefits – managing and farming carbon - they may not be entirely comfortable with the notion, but they have understood that there is potentially an economic benefit...”
(CCW Land Use Policy Officer, 29/5/08).
Here, it is clear that whilst the longstanding problem of motivating farmers to engage with conservation work has not entirely been resolved, reframing otherwise unpalatable works within a beneficial economic arrangement is clearly seen to improve the situation. Overall, it is suggested that as long as farmers are paid, they will produce whatever is required. This, on the face of it, appears simply to be adhering to good business sense, and following the rationale of the economic bottomline. However, whilst this is undoubtedly formative in decision making processes, it is important to acknowledge the influence of wider emotional affecters. For instance, one farmer argued that their role as producers had more deep seated attachments:
28

“
Farmers want to feel wanted, to serve a purpose for their country. It pisses us off that we [the UK] have to import food, producing food is our [farmers’] role....
If energy production is a way of fulfilling that role [of being useful producers] I think farmers will be happy to grow such crops...”
(March 2008).
As such, the role of a useful producer is seen as an important construction of the self, to which confidence and self-worth are attached. In these terms, it is suggested that farmers are not just affected by the logical assessment of whether they can access enough money to maintain their business, by whatever means, but are also motivated by emotional factors. Specifically, the ability to run a successful business is considered to be a source of pride, and an important factor in the wider esteem of individuals.
For example, it was noted in interviews that if the farmers who were engaged in conservation projects were also well respected amongst their local communities, for being successful businessmen, they were likely to have a significant influence upon the wider perception of conservation (interview notes with CCW conservation officer,
8/9/07). This is because conservation work and organic farming have often been portrayed as ‘soft options’ for farmers who could not make a profit otherwise
(interview notes MWT 20/9/07). As such, the need to break with such associations can be identified as an important component of the projects, and the wider policy shift. Critically, the language employed in previous payment mechanisms, of incomeforegone, is clearly seen to represent conservation as an opportunity lost and a payment only sought by those who are struggling to succeed with conventional forms of business.
29

Given these associations, it is argued that conservation work has been framed in an inherently detrimental way by farmers, but equally by conservationists who have criticised previous payment models for their lack of accountability. Specifically, it has been suggested that compensatory-style payments can act as a form of unqualified subsidisation for farmers, echoing wider critiques of unjustified government protectionism for the farming sector both within Wales and across Europe (Potter and
Burney 2002 ; Potter and Lobley 2004). As such, the farmer in receipt of old-style conservation payments has been constructed not only as unsuccessful, but also irresponsible and over-reliant upon the financial support of the State. In particular, the legacy of subsidies that have been available to farmers up until now were argued to foster a culture of ‘welfare’ which is used in a derisory sense to describe the lack of innovation, risk-taking, and entrepreneurialism within the farming sector (interview notes with MWT 10/1/08 and CCW Agri-Environment Officer May 2008).
For instance, previous subsidy schemes were described as follows:
“[the scheme] has no requirements for outputs, it is simply to keep farmers in the uplands but without delivering benefits... it was part of a crusade to keep farmers in the uplands... of course farmers love it because they don’t have to demonstrate any outputs...” NGO Policy Advocate 21/5/08).
At the same time, previous methods of regulation were critiqued for being too controlling and inflexible, which was then seen to encourage resentment and some degree of resistance amongst farmers:
30

“There are clear pressures from Europe in relation to the standard being achieved by
[the agri-environment schemes] – they clearly do not want any resources being wasted and [the schemes] are now subject to rigorous auditing... there is a clear sense that public money has to be closely policed – but this means increased bureaucracy for farmers who are being checked from every angle...There is also a sense from farmers that the controls on the way they have to practise farming are being tightened in legislative terms and that payments for good-practise are subsequently being reduced. This is seen as particularly unfair when they are – on the one hand being told that British farming must be increasingly be compatible with world-trade, but then legislative standards are being imposed which makes their farming practise more difficult, and ensuring that the playing field is not even.”
(CCW Agri-Environment Officer May 2008).
What is important to take from the framing of the new payment relationships, then, is the emphasis upon responsibility, responsiveness, and independence that paying for environment goods provides. Elsewhere, this model has been explored by the UK’s
Land Use Policy Group as an important avenue for future schemes operating across the UK. Specifically it is argued that:
“PBR [payment by return] would create strong incentives to produce high-quality environmental goods and to develop innovative approaches to environmental management...By allowing farmers more flexibility to achieve the desired goals PBR schemes would help offset criticism that the current agri-environment approach is too
31

prescriptive, not adaptable to local conditions and is ineffective because of this.“
(Schwarz, Moxey et al. 2008 p 33).
Here-in there is an implicit assumption that market-governance is a fairer system.
Equally, reframing requirements so that farmers can act independently to deliver goods to the State as a consumer, rather than legislator, is taken to nurture a more positive attitude. The sensibilities assumed here include the promotion of entrepreneurialism and freedom, along with a heightened valuation of work done for the production of saleable goods. In these terms, a clear resonance with the insights of
Larner (2000) and Miller and Rose (2008) is demonstrated, in terms of the logics evident in the shift towards neoliberal governance programmes.
Moreover, by applying their insights to the governance changes under consideration here, it is suggested that the issuance of payments for ecosystem services not only builds upon pre-existing attitudes towards the entrepreneurial subject, but also aims to extend them further. Specifically, it is suggested that whilst the changes noted by
Miller and Rose (2008), in terms of citizenship and worker identities, have been widely acknowledged in other sectors of economic activity, some of the more marginal areas of farming have avoided the fuller immersion in these ‘new’ modes of conduct. This is potentially as a consequence of their geographical isolation, the maintained practise of tradition husbandry techniques, and a continued dependence upon State subsidies in Wales; all of which would serve to isolate them from the wider shifts occurring in the agricultural sector. However, by introducing new modes of governance, which reframe payments as directed rather than compensatory, it is
32

suggested that there could be an enhancement of the subjectivities associated with wider neoliberal reforms.
Overall, the adoption of market-mechanisms here can be understood as a two-way process. On the one hand, the new policy programme is being designed to work towards a model of payment for quantifiable goods and services, in response to the positive emotional associations already embedded within land managers towards these archetypally neoliberal characteristics and modes of behaviour. However, it is also arguable that policy is being designed by the State to encourage farmers who have not been successful in ‘conventional’ agricultural terms, to become more entrepreneurial in their attitudes towards their work, and that the success of these measures will be dependant upon farmers mobilising such desirable traits. As such, fostering a further advancement of neoliberal subjectivities viii
.
In order to further unpack the reasoning behind these developments, it is important to attend to the perceived desirability of archetypal neoliberal characteristics. Critically it is argued that such preferences can be understood not only in terms of logical deductions regarding an individuals’ ability to turn a profit, but also as a consequence of emotional attachments which factor in individuals’ perceptions of themselves and others. Specifically, it is noted that whilst the emotions and self-perceptions presented in the discussion here can be seen to concur with economic rationales, it is also evident from the literature that emotional factors can equally contradict economic logics, and the assumption of rational actors. This builds upon the work of Gibson-
Graham (2006), as well as the work of geographers such as Nigel Thrift (2000 ;
33

2004b) and Nancy Ettlinger (2004), and even economists (see Soros 1998; Wall 2005;
Soderbaum 2008).
In particular, these ideas can be seen to resonate with Gibson-Graham’s (2006) discussion of identifiers such as self-worth, as pivotal aspects in the cultivation of economic subjectivity. Critically, it is suggested that attachments of self-worth to particular forms of economic identity can then block other forms of engagement. For example, this is the case with the redundant electricity workers in Gibson-Graham’s
(2006) work, who struggle to see the worth in non-capitalistic activities as a means to tackle the decline of their wider communities, which have been devastated by mass redundancies and subsequent chronic unemployment. Seeking to challenge the downward spiral of a singular reliance upon capitalistic employment, Gibson-Graham demonstrate how individuals become entrenched within particular modes of economic subjectivity, which restrict their ability to imagine how they could perform within other modes of production and exchange.
Equally, as outlined with the land managers in this case, it is argued that the identification of self-worth with particular economic forms can work towards their cultural normalisation. In both cases, an important conclusion to draw is the way in which such processes of normalisation lead to the internalisation of particular economic practises and logics, to the point that they then become unquestionable. In other words, their sensibility is taken for granted, rather than being consciously reassessed in each instance of negotiation. At worst, the impossibility of any other imaginations leads to the defeatist rhetoric that there is no alternative.
34

In this case, it is argued that a lack of imagination has been witnessed with both conservationists and farmers appearing to be trapped within a singular mindset of market-governance as the only sensible option. Reflecting upon the particulars of the new policy programme, this is made more remarkable as the changes proposed, thus far ix
, are only set to reframe the payment mechanisms, rather than dramatically alter the payments in terms of either the amounts paid, or who is paying who. In other words, whilst the project teams have experimented with new public-private partnerships, the payment schemes as they currently stand are still administered and financed by the State. As such, the principle change is the reframing of the relationship between the State and individual land managers. Here the development of ecosystem services as a primarily discursive shift becomes apparent. In these terms, the importance of individuals’ imagination is reasserted, demonstrating the influence of discursive construction as a means of defining the parameters of the possible.
Equally, by reiterating the insights of Gibson-Graham, we are reminded that our understandings of the world are formulated in conjunction with our selfconceptualisations.
5. Conclusions
In summary, this paper has outlined the importance of compliant subjectivities in the deployment of new governance mechanisms. As such, arguing that it doesn’t make sense to simply think of neoliberalism ‘getting at’ individuals, as something that is pre-formed elsewhere and then delivered unchanged. This is because it is dependant upon, and potentially even unmade, by the wider publics involved in governance
35

procedures. In these terms, neoliberal governance has been discussed as a discursive formation, produced through individual negotiations and the repetition of ‘everyday’ understandings, both within and beyond the State.
Moreover, it has been argued that the active uptake of neoliberal approaches is often apparent as a matter of individual choice, resulting for deep-seated emotional connections. This leads us to important junctures, in terms of questioning the types of governance people actually want. In these terms, ‘neoliberalism’ is neither completely forced upon people, nor simply an achievement of insidious ideology. Consequently, it is necessary for critical scholars to attend to the ways in which these forms of governance are perceived to meet peoples’ needs and suit their perceptions of their lives and selves, in order to advance a more careful assessment of their strengths and weaknesses.
Never-the-less, the seemingly unquestioned acceptance of neoliberal strategies has been identified as a key problematic, with a post-structural feminist approach outlined as important avenue for dismantling neoliberal hegemony. This has been discussed here as a means to unsettle the assumptions surrounding our otherwise unquestioned preferences, and deference to the rationalities of market governance. In conclusion, the imperative to place these sensibilities in question has been outlined as an important priority in the face of further colonisations of the biosphere by a politicaleconomic system that has been repeated proven to be incompatible with the logics of ecology.
36

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15/12/10. ii It is not the intent of this paper to detail the extent to which Glastir represents a form of neoliberalisation as a policy formation, or the role and priorities of the State there-in, as this is covered elsewhere (Wynne-Jones, in review). Although, it should be noted that despite the distinctly neoliberal imperatives articulated by the State and policy staff, the actualities of the governance mechanisms being developed demonstrate more than just neoliberal drivers, leading to a hybridised form of governance. iii It should be noted here that Gibson-Graham’s work provides a wealth of discussion of such alternatives and the way in which non-capitalistic relations and processes of exchange are a fundamental component of contemporary economies which are otherwise assumed as singularly capitalistic. See in particular Gibson-Graham 2006, Chapter 3. iv Whilst the paper here focuses upon two projects in detail, it also draws upon research conducted for my PhD which involved ethnographic engagement with five projects spread across Wales, along with wider research into the discourses prevalent within the conservation sector. v For further details, see http://www.blanketbogswales.org/ ; last accessed 4/1/11. vi These are detailed in Wynne-Jones (2010), and are not considered to be central to the argument of this paper. viii See also Lockie and Higgins (2007) for a discussion of comparative reforms in Australia. ix The new policy is not set to be in operation until 2013, and the information presented here is based upon research conducted during the initial stages of policy development, with a particular focus upon the pilot projects noted.
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