At a time of increased societal urgency surrounding ecological crises from depleted fisheries (Longo, Clausen, and Clark 2015) to mineral extraction (Bunker and Ciccantell 2005) and potential pathways toward environmental justice (Martinez-Alier et al. 2016; Smith, Plummer, and Hughes 2016), this collection of papers re-examines ecologically unequal exchange (EUE) in historical and comparative perspective. The theory of EUE, grounded in Wallersteinās (1974ā2011) world -systems perspective and the work of Amin (1976), Bunker (1985), and Emmanuel (1972), posits that core or northern consumption and capital accumulation are based on peripheral or southern environmental degradation and extraction. In other words, structures of social and environmental inequality between the Global North and Global South are founded in the extraction of materials from, as well as the displacement of hazardous production processes and wastes to, the Global South (Frey, Gellert, and Dahms 2017; Hornborg and Martinez-Alier 2016; Jorgenson 2016a, 2016b; Jorgenson and Clark 2009a). These unequal relations underscore a large ecological debt owed to the periphery by the core countries; this debt is a key source for many of the previous and current environmental distribution conflicts that have taken place and continue to take place throughout the world-system (Hornborg and Martinez-Alier 2016; Martinez-Alier et al. 2016).
This volume consists of ten chapters based on papers presented at the conference on Ecologically Unequal Exchange: Environmental Injustice in Historical and Comparative Perspective held on the campus of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, on October 15ā16, 2015. The conference is part of an ongoing effort by the Center for the Study of Social Justice, housed in the Department of Sociology at the University of Tennessee, to study issues of social justice broadly defined. Additional papers presented at the conference were published in a special issue of the Journal of World -Systems Research (Frey et al. 2017).
EUE is an important theory for understanding the uneven socionatural contours of global development and it has fostered research demonstrating that the structure of international trade contributes to environmental degradation in the periphery (see, e.g., Clark and Foster 2009; Frey 2015; Jorgenson 2016b; Jorgenson and Clark 2009b). Various scholars have commented on the āunder-utilizationā of EUE (Roberts and Parks 2007:195), but there has been a flurry of renewed interest as witnessed by several recent conferences and the publication of several special journal issues devoted to EUE (Frey et al. 2017; Hornborg and Martinez-Alier 2016; Jorgenson and Clark 2009a) and recent contributions by Foster and Holleman (2014), Hornborg (1998, 2009, 2011, 2015), and Jorgenson (2016a, 2016b). In principle, it should be possible to integrate a range of theorists from the ecological economics of Nicholas Georgescu-Roegen (1971) and Howard T. Odum (1971; see also Foster and Holleman 2014) to the promulgation of a theory of EUE by Stephen G. Bunker (1984, 1985, 2005) and from Wackernagel and Reesās (1996) ecological footprint to the ecosocialism of Foster (2002; see also White, Gareau, and Rudy 2017) and the material flow analysis of Marina Fischer-Kowalski (1998; Fischer-Kowalski and Huttler 1999) into a āsingle theoretical framework clarifying how societal relations of exchange and the material dimensions of production are intertwined,ā as Alf Hornborg (2009:250) argues.
It is not an easy task to formulate such a single framework, however. As summarized by Oalu (2016:448), the theory has been dubbed āvague and roundaboutā (Foster and Holleman 2014:210) and considered at risk of āremaining scholasticā (Hornborg 2011:109ā114). This lack of specificity in the concept or, more ambitiously, the theory of EUE contributes to the perpetuation of ecological modernization theoryās five āinterconnected illusionsā culminating in the idea that āsustainable developmentā is possible and not an oxymoron (Hornborg 2009:256). On the other hand, EUE theory can also be considered as too specific because it relies on a narrow economistic view of the structure of the capitalist world-economy as hierarchical. Or, at least the methods used to analyze it are economistic in their emphasis on trade data.
In this volume, we try to push scholarship on EUE forward as a useful framework for research by paying attention to the theoretical debates, empirical analyses, and implications for praxis. The authors of the chapters contained in this volume do not all agree with one anotherāand neither did all of the participants at the conference that formed the basis for this bookāyet we believe that presenting them together offers the reader the chance to reflect, adjudicate, and evaluate these contributions. We hope this volume expands critical discussion of EUE.
Book Overview
This volume is organized into three distinct sections: theoretical foundations and critical reflections on EUE; empirical research on economic development, mining, deforestation, fisheries, and the like from the perspective of EUE; and current responses to the adverse socioecological consequences associated with EUE. The first section consists of four chapters examining the theoretical foundations of EUE. Chapter 2 is a condensed reprint of the key theoretical arguments of Stephen G. Bunkerās (1985) Underdeveloping the Amazon: Extraction, Unequal Exchange, and the Failure of the Modern State. This work is an often cited classic in the field. Yet many have not taken the time to actually read it. By including it here, we hope to re-kindle attention to the formative contri...