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View article: Artificial Intelligence, Platform Capitalist Power, and the Impact of the Crisis of Truth on Ethnography
Artificial Intelligence, Platform Capitalist Power, and the Impact of the Crisis of Truth on Ethnography Open
This article reviews recent debates on the contemporary crisis of truth and the rise of artificial intelligence (AI)-enabled platforms and constructions, including social media, deepfakes, and new algorithmic governance settings. The latte…
View article: Reviews and syntheses: Current perspectives on biosphere research 2024–2025 – eight findings from ecology, sociology, and economics
Reviews and syntheses: Current perspectives on biosphere research 2024–2025 – eight findings from ecology, sociology, and economics Open
This review of recent advances in biosphere research aims to provide information on eight selected themes related to changes in biodiversity, ecosystem functioning, social and economic interactions with ecosystems, and the impacts of clima…
View article: Coexistence beyond disciplinary silos: Five dimensions of analysis for more convivial human-predator interactions
Coexistence beyond disciplinary silos: Five dimensions of analysis for more convivial human-predator interactions Open
Understanding human-predator interactions has been a central goal of conservation for decades, yet many previous efforts have approached this challenge from disciplinary perspectives focused on single case studies. There is a need for more…
View article: Intimidation as epistemological violence against social science conservation research
Intimidation as epistemological violence against social science conservation research Open
We investigated intimidation of conservation social scientists, which is ongoing and aimed at silencing or discrediting research findings. Although social scientists share with conservation biologists the desire to understand and address t…
View article: Upsetting the Double Movement? Elite Schisms and Bolsonaro's Brazil in the Context of Global Authoritarian Capitalism
Upsetting the Double Movement? Elite Schisms and Bolsonaro's Brazil in the Context of Global Authoritarian Capitalism Open
The brazen political antics and mystifying logics accompanying the contemporary rise of authoritarianism have garnered much interest in academic and popular media. A key question is how to make sense of a politics that seems nonsensical? U…
View article: Toward a planetary ethnography?
Toward a planetary ethnography? Open
It is time for anthropology to reclaim truth and speak it to capitalist power more forcefully. The rise of post-truth and the truth of our planetary socioecological predicaments demand this. How to do so is not straightforward. Recalibrati…
View article: Reviews and syntheses: Current perspectives on biosphere research – 2024
Reviews and syntheses: Current perspectives on biosphere research – 2024 Open
This review of recent advances in biosphere research aims to provide information on selected issues related to changes in biodiversity, ecosystem functioning, social and economic interactions with ecosystems, and the impacts of climate cha…
View article: Convivial fences? Property, ‘right to wildlife’ and the need for redistributive justice in South African conservation
Convivial fences? Property, ‘right to wildlife’ and the need for redistributive justice in South African conservation Open
In South Africa, fences are ubiquitous. From urban centers to rural landscapes, myriad fences divide properties, fortify estates, and protect private interests. In biodiversity conservation, likewise, fences are instrumental in legally ass…
View article: Introduction: Fallen from grace? the legacy and state of Southern African conservation
Introduction: Fallen from grace? the legacy and state of Southern African conservation Open
For many decades, southern Africa has been at the forefront of global conservation paradigms and practices, ranging from protected area models and community-based conservation to transfrontier parks and, more recently, the wildlife economy…
View article: Golden Wildebeest Days: Fragmentation and Value in South Africa’s Wildlife Economy After Apartheid
Golden Wildebeest Days: Fragmentation and Value in South Africa’s Wildlife Economy After Apartheid Open
There are renewed global efforts to make wildlife conservation the foundation for broad-based economic development. This article looks at these tendencies in the ‘Kruger to Canyons’ (K2C) biosphere region in South Africa, encompassing the …
View article: The new green apartheid? Race, capital and logics of enclosure in South Africa’s wildlife economy
The new green apartheid? Race, capital and logics of enclosure in South Africa’s wildlife economy Open
In this paper, we explore relations between race, capital and wildlife conservation in the town of Hoedspruit and its surroundings, which has developed into one of the main centres of the lucrative and rapidly growing ‘wildlife economy’ in…
View article: The Convivial Conservation Imperative: Exploring “Biodiversity Impact Chains” to Support Structural Transformation
The Convivial Conservation Imperative: Exploring “Biodiversity Impact Chains” to Support Structural Transformation Open
News on the state of the environment does not seem to be improving. Despite some holding on to “conservation optimism,”1 the general conclusion in the academic and policy literature is that global biodiversity, the global climate and the s…
View article: Fossilized conservation, or the unsustainability of saving nature in South Africa
Fossilized conservation, or the unsustainability of saving nature in South Africa Open
This paper argues that the conservation sector in South Africa is fossilized – unsustainable, outmoded and resistant to change – in two integrated ways. First, it is completely dependent on and steeped in fossil fuels and mineral extractio…
View article: Political ecologies of extinction: from endpoint to inflection-point. Introduction to the Special Section
Political ecologies of extinction: from endpoint to inflection-point. Introduction to the Special Section Open
Amidst the many socio-ecological crises facing the world today, the biodiversity crisis is considered one of the most foundational. According to scientists, we have entered yet another mass extinction event in the history of the planet, th…
View article: The dangerous intensifications of surplus alienation, or why platform capitalism challenges the (more-than-)human
The dangerous intensifications of surplus alienation, or why platform capitalism challenges the (more-than-)human Open
This response gratefully acknowledges and engages with the commentaries on my article ‘The nonhuman turn: Critical reflections on alienation, entanglement and nature under capitalism’. It highlights the importance of further defining key c…
View article: Conserving inequality: How private conservation and property developers ‘fix’ spatial injustice in South Africa
Conserving inequality: How private conservation and property developers ‘fix’ spatial injustice in South Africa Open
In 2016, South Africa launched its National Biodiversity Economy Strategy. This strategy aims to facilitate the development of a ‘wildlife economy’ as a solution to unemployment, loss of biodiversity and rural development. Central to the s…
View article: Between overstocking and extinction: conservation and the intensification of uneven wildlife geographies in Africa
Between overstocking and extinction: conservation and the intensification of uneven wildlife geographies in Africa Open
Conservation news from Africa generally seems to exude crisis. Over the last decade,especially, we have witnessed the increasingly visible decline of charismatic species such as the rhino, elephant, cheetah, lion, giraffe and others, coupl…
View article: Liquid violence : the politics of water responsibilisation and dispossession in South Africa
Liquid violence : the politics of water responsibilisation and dispossession in South Africa Open
CITATION: Marcatelli, M. & Buscher, B. 2019. Liquid violence : the politics of water responsibilisation and dispossession in South Africa. Water Alternatives: An Interdisciplinary Journal on Water Politics and Development, 12(2):760-773.
View article: Conservation and the social sciences: Beyond critique and co‐optation. A case study from orangutan conservation
Conservation and the social sciences: Beyond critique and co‐optation. A case study from orangutan conservation Open
Interactions between conservation and the social sciences are frequently characterized by either critique (of conservation by social scientists) or co‐optation (of social scientific methods and insights by conservationists). This article s…
View article: Planning for Post-Corona: Five proposals to craft a radically more sustainable and equal world
Planning for Post-Corona: Five proposals to craft a radically more sustainable and equal world Open
This brief manifesto signed by 173 Netherlands-based scholars working on issues around development aims to summarize what we know to be critical and successful policy strategies for moving forward during and after the crisis. We propose fi…
View article: Giving Land (Back)? The Meaning of Land in the Indigenous Politics of the South Kalahari Bushmen Land Claim, South Africa
Giving Land (Back)? The Meaning of Land in the Indigenous Politics of the South Kalahari Bushmen Land Claim, South Africa Open
In this article, we analyse the land claim of the South Kalahari Bushmen (≠Khomani) to reflect critically on the South African land restitution process in relation to their contemporary marginalised socio-economic situation. South Kalahari…
View article: From ‘Global’ to ‘Revolutionary’ Development
From ‘Global’ to ‘Revolutionary’ Development Open
This article argues that Horner and Hulme's call for moving towards ‘global development’ to do justice to changing 21 st century development geographies neither contributes to advancing our understanding of contemporary development challen…
View article: Nature Inc.: Environmetal Conservation in the Neoliberal Age
Nature Inc.: Environmetal Conservation in the Neoliberal Age Open
With global wildlife populations and biodiversity riches in peril, it is obvious that innovative methods of addressing our planet’s environmental problems are needed. But is “the market” the answer? Nature™ Inc. brings together cutting-edg…
View article: Towards Convivial Conservation
Towards Convivial Conservation Open
Environmental conservation finds itself in desperate times. Saving nature, to be sure, has never been an easy proposition. But the arrival of the Anthropocene-the alleged new phase of world history in which humans dominate the earth-system…
View article: Natural capital must be defended: green growth as neoliberal biopolitics
Natural capital must be defended: green growth as neoliberal biopolitics Open
This contribution addresses the growing global trend to promote ‘natural capital accounting’ (NCA) in support of environmental conservation. NCA seeks to harness the economic value of conserved nature to incentivize local resource users to…