The Sage Handbook of Eco-Social Policy and Politics

Karen Bell, Emma Foster, Silpa Satheesh

• Publisher: SAGE Publications Ltd
• Year: 2026
• Print ISBN:
  9781529684247
• Edition: 1
• eBook ISBN:
  9781036239923
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Rural Sociology
• Index: Social Sciences

The Sage Handbook of Eco-Social Policy and Politics offers a bold and timely rethinking of how public policies and political action can address ecological challenges while simultaneously advancing a broad range of social goals—such as equity, wellbeing, inclusion, and democratic participation—through an integrated and transformative approach.

Moving beyond the traditional silos of environmental protection and social welfare, this handbook presents a comprehensive framework for understanding how ecological and social justice are deeply interconnected—and must be tackled together.

At the heart of eco-social thinking is the recognition that sustainability cannot be achieved without justice, nor justice without sustainability. From the uneven impacts of climate change to the structural inequalities embedded in environmental harm, this volume explores how power, politics, and policy shape our responses to ecological crises. It brings together leading scholars and practitioners from around the world to examine the theoretical foundations, political struggles, policy innovations, and transformative movements that define the eco-social landscape.

Structured into five thematic sections, the handbook begins with key theories, informing concepts and histories, then moves through political dynamics, policy design, grassroots activism, and future visions for eco-social transformation. It offers critical insights into how welfare systems, governance structures, and social movements can be reimagined to support both people and the planet.

The Sage Handbook of Eco-Social Policy and Politics is an essential resource for anyone seeking to understand and shape a just and sustainable future.

Section One: Theories, Concepts, and Histories
Section Two: Politics of Eco-Social Crises
Section Three: Eco-Social Policy
Section Four: Eco-Social Movements, Resistance, and Activism
Section Five: Eco-Social Futures and Transformations

 

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Editorial Board
• Notes on Editors and Contributors
• Contributors
• Acknowledgements
• Foreword
• 1 Just Transition as a Contested Ecosocial Strategy
• 2 Socio-Ecological Risks: A Definition, Taxonomy and Operationalization
• 3 Global Eco-Social Policy: The Integration of the Ecological, the Economic and the Social in International Organisations' Policy Proposals
• 4 Contested Places: Navigating the Politics of the X-Minute City
• 5 Eco-Social Policies in the Global South and North: Potential and Challenges for Creating New Eco-Social Contracts
• 6 Bringing the Climate Emergency into the Mainstream of Social Policy: A Cross-Cutting Review of Major Gaps, Opportunities and Needed Action
• 7 Doughnut Economics, Degrowth and Eco-Social Transition
• 8 Eco-Social Welfare Integration in Germany
• 9 Demilitarizing to Decarbonize
• 10 Wetland Management in Bangladesh
• 11 The Eco-Social Politics of Waste in Southeast Asia
• 12 Unlike Father, the Son? Displacement and Intergenerational Mobility Along the Coasts in Kerala
• 13 Land Tenure Policy and Eco-Social Justice in Ethiopia: Revisiting ‘Land to the Tiller’ Motto 50 Years on
• 14 From Environmental Protection to Greenwashing: Framing Sustainable Development in Brazilian Media
• 15 Renewable Energy and Regional Development: Implications for Eco-Social Policy
• 16 Eco-Social Justice and the ‘Everyday’ Neighbourhood Environment
• 17 Tiny Houses: A Housing Solution or a Planning Problem?
• 18 The Dark Side of Urban Liveability: Questioning the Liveable City as a Planning Ideal Type
• 19 Why Renewable Energy Expansion Hasn't Been Fast Enough in South Korea: A Political Economy Perspective
• 20 Failing Better: The Unlikely Eco-Social Welfare State in Germany
• 21 Green Job Guarantees: A Small Puzzle Piece of Environmental Policy or a First Step for a System Change?1
• 22 The Growth Dependence of the Welfare State
• 23 Identity-Rooted Communality as the Underlying Driver for Forest Conservation in Three Territories in Guatemala
• 24 Territory and Nature in Zapatista Discourse: Social Movements, Conflict and the Environment
• 25 The Queer Eco-Social Movement and the Radical Potential of Queer Ecology
• 26 Climate Reparations and the Peace Transition
• 27 Situating Sovereign Debt Within the Climate–Debt Cycle: The Colonial Origins, Financial Hierarchy and Epistemic Roots of Debt in the Global South
• 28 The Eco-Social and Intercultural Pact of the South and Green Transitions in Eastern Europe
• 29 ‘Eat the Rich!’: The Ecological Case for the Redistribution of Income and Wealth
• 30 From Eco-Social Policy to Eco-Socialism in an Era of Ideological Flux
• 31 Reimagining Environmental as Eco-Social Politics and Policy: Towards Eco-Social Alliances ‘from Below’
• 32 The Transformative Potential of Eco-Social Welfare, Navigating Between Pragmatic and Utopian Possibilities in the Welfare–Work–Care Nexus
• 33 Promoting the Ecosocial Transition of Societies: Advancing Political and Structural Action in Social Work
• 34 Ecological Civilization in China: Striving for Unity, Harmony and Reciprocity with Nature
• 35 Cuba's Life Work: ‘Tarea Vida’ and Three Decades of Eco-Social Policy
• 36 Vivir Bien: Effective, Equitable and Decolonial Eco-Social Policy in Bolivia
• 37 Mexican Humanism and the Transformation of the Yucatán Peninsula
• Index