10 Earth
used to trigger payouts to subsistence farmers in the developing world (e.g.
Johnson 2013; Müller et al. 2017). These types of insurance are being instigated through partnerships between insurers and non-government development organisations or the United Nations. They are frequently tied to
prescriptions for seed source, crop type, and agro-chemical use, and thus
can be formative in the changing nature of places by facilitating integration
within large-scale agricultural systems. On the other hand, micro-insurance
purchase in particular places can be informed by local knowledge and traditions, in which the logics of insurance are changed because of, and in
concert with place specificities (Johnson 2013).
Thinking does not stop with the idea of coming ‘down to earth’ in insurance research, as ideas of place raise a different type of question – not only
what location, but what kind of place or ‘what kind of space’ (Law & Mol
2001, p. 610). Ingold (2008, p. 1798), for example, observes how Kantian
notions of place and space that inform modern scientific thinking locate
people on the outside of earth: ‘They do not… live within the world but upon
its outer surface.’ People are represented as in some sense removed from
what goes on around them, with places understood as backdrops or stages
for human activity. It is possible, within this framing, to map particular
phenomenon as place-based according to longitude and latitude.
In subsequent sections, we reflect on other conceptualizations of place and
space, and how these intersect and inform insurance research and understandings of insurance. In this section, the selected chapters pivot on earthliness constituted through soil, relationality, and locality. In the first chapter,
Lauren Rickards emphasises the power of cultural narratives that constitute
the insurance imaginary in concert with geo-engineering responses to climate change, such as soil carbon sequestration. Drawing upon Latour (2018),
she posits ‘the Terrestrial’ as a relational challenge to Modernist logics of
insurance discourse and practice. Olli Hasu and Kimmo-Turo Lehtonen
also cast a critical eye over the stories told in relation to insurance in their
chapter – in this case how soil is accounted for through index insurance targeted at farmers in the developing world and justified on the basis of climate
risks. They conclude, that despite claims of innovation and significance,
this insurance type remains quite traditional in form and thus, unresponsive to dynamic climate variables. A similar, ‘schismed’ insurance imaginary
(Ewald 1991) inhabits the rollout of index insurance in the Caribbean. In
the final chapter, Kevin Grove illustrates how former plantation states are
encouraged to ‘think like an insurer’ to deliver financial sustainability in the
face of disasters, yet through this logic experience a reinforcement and intensification the racialized governance that undercut post-colonialist gains.
Insurance logics attempt to hold different parts of the world in place as
‘backdrops’ before which insurance performs it’s abstract and universalized
capabilities. However, exploring the expansion of global capital through
insurance in different locations reveals the stark, and at times brutal,
co-constitution of place and insurance.
used to trigger payouts to subsistence farmers in the developing world (e.g.
Johnson 2013; Müller et al. 2017). These types of insurance are being instigated through partnerships between insurers and non-government development organisations or the United Nations. They are frequently tied to
prescriptions for seed source, crop type, and agro-chemical use, and thus
can be formative in the changing nature of places by facilitating integration
within large-scale agricultural systems. On the other hand, micro-insurance
purchase in particular places can be informed by local knowledge and traditions, in which the logics of insurance are changed because of, and in
concert with place specificities (Johnson 2013).
Thinking does not stop with the idea of coming ‘down to earth’ in insurance research, as ideas of place raise a different type of question – not only
what location, but what kind of place or ‘what kind of space’ (Law & Mol
2001, p. 610). Ingold (2008, p. 1798), for example, observes how Kantian
notions of place and space that inform modern scientific thinking locate
people on the outside of earth: ‘They do not… live within the world but upon
its outer surface.’ People are represented as in some sense removed from
what goes on around them, with places understood as backdrops or stages
for human activity. It is possible, within this framing, to map particular
phenomenon as place-based according to longitude and latitude.
In subsequent sections, we reflect on other conceptualizations of place and
space, and how these intersect and inform insurance research and understandings of insurance. In this section, the selected chapters pivot on earthliness constituted through soil, relationality, and locality. In the first chapter,
Lauren Rickards emphasises the power of cultural narratives that constitute
the insurance imaginary in concert with geo-engineering responses to climate change, such as soil carbon sequestration. Drawing upon Latour (2018),
she posits ‘the Terrestrial’ as a relational challenge to Modernist logics of
insurance discourse and practice. Olli Hasu and Kimmo-Turo Lehtonen
also cast a critical eye over the stories told in relation to insurance in their
chapter – in this case how soil is accounted for through index insurance targeted at farmers in the developing world and justified on the basis of climate
risks. They conclude, that despite claims of innovation and significance,
this insurance type remains quite traditional in form and thus, unresponsive to dynamic climate variables. A similar, ‘schismed’ insurance imaginary
(Ewald 1991) inhabits the rollout of index insurance in the Caribbean. In
the final chapter, Kevin Grove illustrates how former plantation states are
encouraged to ‘think like an insurer’ to deliver financial sustainability in the
face of disasters, yet through this logic experience a reinforcement and intensification the racialized governance that undercut post-colonialist gains.
Insurance logics attempt to hold different parts of the world in place as
‘backdrops’ before which insurance performs it’s abstract and universalized
capabilities. However, exploring the expansion of global capital through
insurance in different locations reveals the stark, and at times brutal,
co-constitution of place and insurance.