particular places add up to a global transformation affecting planetary processes, or
do actions now have to take place at a different scale, removing control and agency
from local actors, the lifeblood of any movement? With mechanisms structured at
international levels – through various commissions, committees, assessments,
protocols or agreements – how do locally rooted but internationally networked
movements fit in, and what space do they have to make a difference? Some have
argued that the primary role of mobilizations is to protect local perspectives and
priorities in the face of proliferating global initiatives and forms of thinking and
action. As Esteva and Prakash (1997, p47) put it:
[T]he solidarity of coalitions and alliances does not call for ‘thinking globally’.
In fact, what is needed is exactly the opposite: people thinking and acting
locally, while forging solidarity with other local forces that share this
opposition to the ‘global thinking’ and ‘global forces’ threatening local
spaces.
In contrast, others suggest that the local and global can – and must – be meshed
in powerful ways. Is such translocal networking a key to fostering green
transformations that respond both to the particularity of grounded experience and
to the needs for wider, global scale change?
Conclusion
Mobilizations have vital roles to play in the politics of green transformations. These
transformations are certainly multiple, as our analysis of framings, identities, resource
mobilization and networks across the cases suggests. We see mobilizations linked
to a wide range of framings, subjectivities, values and identities. They have engaged
with political processes in different ways, across a spectrum from overt contestation
of structures of power through more subtle negotiations with the state and international agencies, through to withdrawal from dominant regimes to demonstrate
alternative ways of living. These differences depend partly on the issue and place,
but political contexts also matter. As we have seen, political histories, cultures and
styles of decision-making vary between nations, regions and localities, and around
particular ‘sectors’ – from agriculture to climate change, urban design to forestry
– shaping which political strategies and combinations are feasible and desirable. A
diversity of strategies and styles, therefore, will almost inevitably be needed, and
today these can draw on a wide variety of spaces and practices from face-to-face
protest and legal and media action through to more practical, everyday forms of
material life and community organizing.
Across these arguments and examples, we see processes of emergent social
solidarity – forms of ‘green citizenship’ – but around diverse, rather than singular,
notions of ‘green’, ‘social justice’ and ‘transformation’. Just as a conceptual
framework to understand these needs to draw together diverse strands of social
movement theory, so it also requires an integrative perspective on citizenship (Leach
132 Melissa Leach and Ian Scoones
do actions now have to take place at a different scale, removing control and agency
from local actors, the lifeblood of any movement? With mechanisms structured at
international levels – through various commissions, committees, assessments,
protocols or agreements – how do locally rooted but internationally networked
movements fit in, and what space do they have to make a difference? Some have
argued that the primary role of mobilizations is to protect local perspectives and
priorities in the face of proliferating global initiatives and forms of thinking and
action. As Esteva and Prakash (1997, p47) put it:
[T]he solidarity of coalitions and alliances does not call for ‘thinking globally’.
In fact, what is needed is exactly the opposite: people thinking and acting
locally, while forging solidarity with other local forces that share this
opposition to the ‘global thinking’ and ‘global forces’ threatening local
spaces.
In contrast, others suggest that the local and global can – and must – be meshed
in powerful ways. Is such translocal networking a key to fostering green
transformations that respond both to the particularity of grounded experience and
to the needs for wider, global scale change?
Conclusion
Mobilizations have vital roles to play in the politics of green transformations. These
transformations are certainly multiple, as our analysis of framings, identities, resource
mobilization and networks across the cases suggests. We see mobilizations linked
to a wide range of framings, subjectivities, values and identities. They have engaged
with political processes in different ways, across a spectrum from overt contestation
of structures of power through more subtle negotiations with the state and international agencies, through to withdrawal from dominant regimes to demonstrate
alternative ways of living. These differences depend partly on the issue and place,
but political contexts also matter. As we have seen, political histories, cultures and
styles of decision-making vary between nations, regions and localities, and around
particular ‘sectors’ – from agriculture to climate change, urban design to forestry
– shaping which political strategies and combinations are feasible and desirable. A
diversity of strategies and styles, therefore, will almost inevitably be needed, and
today these can draw on a wide variety of spaces and practices from face-to-face
protest and legal and media action through to more practical, everyday forms of
material life and community organizing.
Across these arguments and examples, we see processes of emergent social
solidarity – forms of ‘green citizenship’ – but around diverse, rather than singular,
notions of ‘green’, ‘social justice’ and ‘transformation’. Just as a conceptual
framework to understand these needs to draw together diverse strands of social
movement theory, so it also requires an integrative perspective on citizenship (Leach
132 Melissa Leach and Ian Scoones