“Human Dimensions of Oceans: From a Sociological Perspective” blog series is live on FATHOM.

VIEW

CRITICAL ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE BLOG BY OCEAN NEXUS

Categories

Topics

Authors

Are Tuna Fish?

There is a lot to be gained by paying attention to the ways in which we classify the world around us, scientifically or otherwise. For not only does classification influence the ways we think about nature and our place in it, but, I will argue, classification also has an immense influence on the ways human beings physically interact with nature.

More Than Mermaids: Reclaiming the Lost Feminist Voice in the Sociology of Oceans

The increased visibility of women in and around the ocean reflects women’s central role in producing knowledge about the ocean and developing equitable approaches to engaging with and protecting the ocean. Despite this visibility, though, inequality and discrimination still persist, suppressing female voices and upholding toxic tropes of women as silent, passive, or invisible. 

Degrowth, Environmental Sociology, and the Blue Economy

As expansionary growth becomes less and less feasible across finite and stressed ocean ecologies, we will likely see more and more rhetoric aimed at conceptualizing marine spaces as “new frontiers” for forms of development that appear exceptionally modern and less materially intensive. These include sectors often imagined as “non-real” or “non-material,” which typically involve financial schemes and real estate speculation. These approaches will offer ‘win-win’ framing, where economic accumulation can occur without harming—even benefiting—complex ecosystems. 

Lessons from La Lucha (The Worker’s Struggle): Organized Labor and the Industries of the Sea

All too often workers are seen as collateral damage in conservation and economic-based management decisions and irrelevant in the production of environmental knowledge used to inform those policy decisions. Perhaps that’s inevitable. But I would argue that workers are an essential aspect of the human dimensions of a fishery, or any maritime-based economy, and need to be systematically incorporated into policy-making—a process made possible by strengthening labor unions.

The Same Issue as the Sokol Hoax

The first thing is to remember to always take the dual nature of science – its explanatory power as well as its very human foundations – into account. Science will always reflect the social conditions of production, from the agendas of its owners to the time and place it was created to the technologies and strategies then available for researchers to much else. We should therefore be weary of ideas that accept our own time, place, economies, and culture as “natural,” for these conditions change.

Listen to the Science

If science speaks for itself, then powerful forces will invariably try to justify inequality and injustice on scientific grounds. Rather, it is important to understand that science is done by people living in societies. As environmental sociologists have long argued, we must therefore understand society if we are to understand science.

Aquaculture and Political Economy: Food System as Social Structure

While technological innovation is paramount, environmental sociological scholarship on marine food systems and development usually stresses that hunger and unsustainable environmental impacts are political problems exacerbated by rigid and complex social structures. The capacity of aquaculture to ameliorate problems therefore requires careful consideration. What lessons does environmental sociology offer to understand aquaculture’s potential to address these issues, in sustainable fashion? 

Ocean Justice in the Urban Context: The Case of New York Harbor

Ultimately, ocean justice is not only about understanding the disproportionate exposure to environmental harms by marginalized communities but also about acknowledging the unique ways in which these very social groups integrate ocean conservation, science and policy-making in the urban setting.

Carp in Space. Carp in Time.

In this blog post I will trace the development of the “Asian” carp invasion. The obvious reason for this is to discuss how these carp crossed biogeographic regions to become an “invasive species” in North America from, well, Asia, one that has had an enormous influence on environmental politics in the American Midwest. Though there is a subtler, yet perhaps more important, reason why the Asian carp invasion is worth investigating. This invasive species event highlights the need for a larger spatial and temporal view of the often surprising, unintentional ways in which human beings are crisscrossing and altering nature (as well as the indelible ways nature is altering us). 

Introducing Environmental Sociology and Its Importance for Ocean Science

Introducing the first installment of "Human Dimensions of Oceans: From a Sociological Perspective." While each blog post in this series will have a different emphasis, a running thread will be the idea that advancing equitable outcomes means, in part, learning how to balance a deep respect for scientific knowledge with an understanding that natural science is a fallible enterprise generated through historically specific conditions of production.

Categories

Themes

Topics

Authors