Reflection On Green Theory By Robyn Eckersley
Environmental problems are very important for modern world. Technological development, such as new factories, automotive industry, weapons testing, etc. had bad impact on the environment. Nowadays ecological crisis is getting more and more important for states. It is not surprising, that this issue influenced International Relations as well. In this reading reflection I want to talk about the chapter by Robyn Eckersley about Green Theory.
As we read in the text, in past years IR as a discipline was more focused on relationships between states, issues such as security and conflicts. But from the 1970s, as environmental problems got more notable, there was a need for states to cooperate together and think about these issues. So the new sub-field of IR formed. As we know there are several common resources, such as oceans, seas, rivers and atmosphere. Cooperation started working on managing those resources and IR scientists begin to focus on Green Theory. Focusing on the new theory gave us that some of basic global politics discourses and concepts were reviewed. Traditional understandings of international justice, security, etc. were challenged totally new discourses, such as: “ecological security, sustainable development and environmental justice.”
The emergence of green theory is well-described in this chapter. The author emphasizes that degradation of our environment was a complex process. In the later half of the twentieth century this process was widespread all over the world. It was connected with industrial revolution and European global expansion. In my opinion, economic boom was the irreversible process after World War II. At this time, world economics was growing rapidly, new technologies were invented and the most important thing: world population grew significantly. It is logical that this process would have a big influence on environment, because new technologies and bigger population needed more and more energy. There were two options: 1) to use existing resources, or 2) find alternate way to generate energy. The result was that “the overall global environmental assessment for the twenty-first century remains bleak. ’’ The most interesting part for me in this reading material was the part, in which the author talks about Rationalist accounts and green alternatives.
It is fascinating, how neorealism and neoliberalism is connecting with environmental issues and Green Theory. Neoliberals were working on regimes with international environmental problems. The main goal of these works was to predict if states were ready to cooperate together for solving these issues and finding the ways for “improving effectiveness of such regimes. ” Otherwise, structural realists were rejecting the “low-politics” of environment. Green IR theory and the global political economy challenged these rationalist approaches on four levels.
Firstly, IR theorists took Robert Cox’s observation. The latter thought that every theory has its own goal and is intended for someone. So, green critics exposed the issuing environmental assumptions and ethical values which were implicit in neorealist and neoliberal studies, in order to analyze normative purposes. From Hobbesian universe, neorealists say that state system has an anarchic structure and competitive relations between states is unpreventable and the cooperation where states do not have similar interests and goals, would be foolhardy. Green IR theorists also examined the antagonistic understanding of international security “that has dominated realist theories of all persuasions, ” instead working on better environment to integrate human-beings with nature.
On the second level IR theorists invigorated the critique of rationalist approaches which was begun by critical theorists and constructivists. After that on the third level theorists directed their attention to the social sphere. Social agents and other structures were obstructing the intervention of ecologically well-developed regimes. They emphasized that for example global trading regime is likely to dominate other environmental regimes. On the final level, theorists underlined how important “deterritorialized governance” non-state forms are. Such as environmental NGOs and other private governance practices of financial and industrial sphere (insurance industry). The most interesting and important level of challenging rationalist approaches for me seems the last, fourth level. In my opinion, this level is something like all-embracing. As I mentioned above, on this level scholars stressed the importance of non-state forms, NGOs and private governance practices. On this level, new, more layered and complex picture is visible. It emphasizes the importance of environmental governance. This governance, by itself, admits totally new pattern which, in some cases, ignores the classic hierarchical forms of control which used to be common for nation states.
I totally agree the authors that non-state forms are important in environmental studies. To add weight on my arguments and opinion, I want to mention the work of Elinor Ostrom. As a political economist, her ideas will help to understand connections between good environment governance and natural resources. In our reading material there was mentioned a text “tragedy of commons, ” the text about the destruction of resources. Ostrom challenges assumptions, emphasized in this work. I agree with her and think that managing common resources collectively is the best way to avoid tragedy of commons. For example controlling resources collectively by local communities will give less pollution and less waste of natural resources in long-term. I think that connecting governance with social and ecological consequences, in local and global level, will give us a good result.
In conclusion, I want to outline the main points of Green Theory importance. It is not the news that modern world is in front of difficult environmental issues. Single states are unable to solve this problem. They need cooperation, to gather their resources, economical or intellectual, and begin working on it. Because everybody has to live on the same planet, in the same world. We should use our general resources productively. The most difficult is to organize cooperation between states. I think that appearing environmental issues in IR is the best solution from this situation. IR, with help of different interstate and international organizations, will be able to regulate using natural resources, air and water pollution and some other main sources which plays the main role in degradation of nature.
