Ecological law is a legal paradigm that is emerging in response to the current ecological crisis. This thesis explores the main challenges and opportunities in existing laws, particularly in the context of mining, for a shift to this new paradigm. A synthesis of the main critiques, scientific and economic concepts, legal scholarship and proposals that contribute to the theory of ecological law is presented, along with a discussion of the relationship and potential synergies of ecological law with Indigenous legal traditions and with Green Legal Theory. An analytical tool to help improve the understanding of what a shift to ecological law would entail–a lens of ecological law–is proposed, building on ecological law scholarship. The lens of ecological law consists of three principles of ecological law: ecocentrism, ecological primacy and ecological justice. This lens is applied to three different legal approaches to mining in order to reflect on the implications for a shift to ecological law in this sector: El Salvador’s ban on metal mining; mineral extraction proposed in Ontario’s Ring of Fire; and mining in the context of the rights of Mother Earth and vivir bien recognized in Bolivian law. Conclusions on the obstacles and opportunities for a shift to ecological law in mining, and recommendations on the ecological law re-formation of mining and on further research are offered in closing. Ecological law promises to be an important part of building an ecologically just society.

La crise de la dette externe latino-américaine des années 1980 a consacré le passage du modèle d’industrialisation par substitution des importations à un modèle de développement fondé sur la libéralisation de l’économie. La transition est provoquée par les politiques d’ajustement et de stabilisation macro-économique du FMI. Ces mesures vont être poursuivies, consolidées et approfondies par la Banque Mondiale et la coopération internationale au développement, à travers des réformes structurelles qui vont provoquer des bouleversements au sein des Etats et des sociétés. Cela a généré un malaise social qui s’est traduit par des mobilisations dans presque tous les pays de la région. Ces mobilisations sociales contre l’ajustement et la réforme structurelle néolibérale ont donné lieu à de nouveaux discours politiques. Parmi eux, le Buen Vivir qui a été incorporé aux Constitutions bolivienne et équatorienne en 2008. Le Buen Vivir rassemble et synthétise les revendications pour un modèle de développement solidaire, écologique et dans lequel les droits fondamentaux des êtres humains, parmi lesquels le droit à la différence radicale, sont respectés. Le discours du Buen Vivir récupère les critiques formulées par le post-développement et la décroissance en les intégrant en une nouvelle dimension qui donne une nouvelle place à l’altérité en économie. / The crisis of the Latin American external debt of the eighties meant the change of the model of industrialization by substitution of imports towards a model of sustained development in the liberalization of the economy. The transition was triggered by IMF macroeconomic adjustment and stabilization policies. These measures were continued, consolidated and deepened by the World Bank and International Development Cooperation, through structural reforms that brought about changes in the State and society. This generated social unrest that was expressed in mobilizations, claims and rejections in almost all countries in the region. These social mobilizations against neoliberal structural adjustment and reform gave rise to new political discourses. One of them is the Good Living (Buen Vivir), that was incorporated into the Political Constitution of Ecuador and Bolivia in 2008. Buen Vivir collects the demands for a model of friendly, supportive development, friendly to nature and in which the fundamental rights of human beings, including the right to radical difference, are respected. The discourse of Good Living reflects the criticisms of development made by post-development and decline, and integrates them into a new dimension, which refers to otherness in the economy.

Depuis une vingtaine d'années, la plupart des villes européennes font face à un phénomène inédit et imprévu, la diminution de la consommation des différents réseaux techniques urbains, et en particulier des réseaux d'eau. Ce phénomène s'explique par des raisons diverses allant des améliorations techniques de l'électro-ménager à la désindustrialisation en passant par les changements de comportement des usagers ou le développement de politiques visant la sobriété et un usage modéré des ressources naturelles. Il s'agit cependant d'un symptôme plus que d'un processus en soi. Cette baisse de la consommation est en effet le révélateur de l'épuisement progressif du modèle traditionnel de gestion des (grands) réseaux qui a prévalu jusqu'ici et qui a reposé principalement sur une augmentation de la demande et une extension continue du réseau selon la logique du « toujours plus et toujours plus loin ». Cette érosion du modèle traditionnel confronte les opérateurs de grands réseaux à une forme nouvelle de vulnérabilité, que nous appelons la vulnérabilité infrastructurelle, et dont les effets touchent l'ensemble des composantes du réseau, de l'usager au tuyau en passant par l'opérateur. Notre travail pose pour hypothèse forte que ce changement de contexte et de régime de consommation n'est pas une simple parenthèse, mais correspond à l'émergence d'un nouveau mode de gestion du réseau. Il peut être lu comme une bifurcation infrastructurelle, à savoir une transformation radicale et pérenne des modalités de gestion du réseau pour les adapter à ce régime décroissant (de demande).Face à ce défi nouveau, les opérateurs de réseaux techniques urbains ont dû s'adapter, pour faire évoluer leur modèle économique et leur assise territoriale. Afin d'en saisir les ressorts, nous avons opté pour une immersion de plusieurs mois au sein des équipes de deux entreprises locales (publique et semi-publique) confrontées à ces questions de baisse de consommation avec plus ou moins d'intensité, un opérateur multi-services à l'Est de l'Allemagne (les Städtische Werke de Magdeburg) et un opérateur d'eau et d'assainissement dans le Sud de l'Espagne (la EMASESA à Séville).Notre approche, mêlant Science and Technologies Studies, écologie politique urbaine et études sur la décroissance urbaine, nous permet de montrer que le modèle émergent est encore à la recherche de stabilité mais que des lignes de force communes sont observables dans les différents cas étudiés. Les stratégies d'adaptation mises en place par les opérateurs ne reposent pas seulement sur des ajustements techniques ou des augmentations tarifaires visant à compenser les pertes liées aux volumes non consommés. Le changement de modèle de gestion s'articule ainsi non seulement autour de transformations techniques fortes (downsizing, resizing, recentralisation), mais aussi de transformations organisationnelles et de changements importants des rapports entre opérateur et usager. Les opérateurs ont ainsi modifié leur rôle pour devenir davantage que des pourvoyeurs de fluide : leur modèle économique a ainsi accompagné un déplacement des lieux de production de la valeur pour les opérateurs, désormais plus tournés vers les services et l'aval de la filière. Ce changement de modèle économique a également une dimension spatiale puisque l'on observe également une transformation des échelles de gestion des opérateurs. La recherche de nouvelles économies d'échelle donne lieu à une extension des aires géographiques gérées par ces opérateurs locaux et à de potentiels conflits avec les acteurs des territoires progressivement intégrés. Une nouvelle géographie des réseaux techniques urbains semble ainsi émerger, faite de nouvelles formes de redistribution et de nouvelles sources de conflictualités. Ces différentes évolutions permettent de compléter des travaux théoriques sur la firme locale d'infrastructures et les modèles d'évolution des réseaux en y intégrant la dimension d'un régime décroissant de la demande / Over the last twenty years, most European cities have had to face a new and unforeseen phenomenon, a reduction in the consumption levels of urban technical networks (and in particular water systems). The reasons for this phenomenon are numerous, from technical improvements of domestic appliances and deindustrialisation to changes in behaviours of users and the development of policies promoting sobriety and moderation in the use of natural resources. This is however a symptom of a larger process rather than a process per se. Indeed, declining consumption levels reveal the slow decay of the traditional model of management of urban networks, which has long relied on increasing demand associated with perpetual extension of the network. The erosion of this model is forcing network operators to confront a new form of vulnerability, which I term infrastructural vulnerability, the effects of which touch all components of a network, from users to pipes through operators and regulators. The thesis argues that this changing consumption regime is no single interlude, but rather constitutes the emergence of a new mode of network management. As such, it can be interpreted as an infrastructural bifurcation, i.e. a radical and durable transformation of network management as a means of adaptation to this regime of shrinking demand. To deal with this challenge, urban technical network operators have had to adapt and decided to transform both their business model and their territorial base. In order to grasp the rationales of these changes, I opted for a methodology involving being embedded for several months within two local firms facing this issue of diminished consumption with differing levels of intensity. The first is a multi-utility in the eastern part of Germany (Städtische Werke of Magdeburg), while the second is a water and sanitation operator in the south of Spain (EMASESA in Sevilla).My approach combines contributions from Science and Technology Studies (STS), urban political ecology and work on urban shrinkage to reveal that an emerging model of network management is yet to be fully stabilised, but that common adaptation strategies can be observed in both the cases. These strategies are not limited to technical adjustments or tariff increases to compensate the losses due to non-consumed volumes. The transformation in management model relies not only on major technical changes (such as downsizing, resizing or recentralisation of the network), but also on organisational shifts and new relations and arrangements between users and operators. Network operators have thus modified their role to become more than only suppliers of fluids. Their new business model has consequently reoriented production of value towards the development of services for users and the downstream part of the sector. This shift has a spatial dimension, as operators are also experiencing a form of rescaling of their management. The search for new economies of scale to preserve the stability of their socio-technical systems pushes them to extend their functional territories. This leads to potential conflicts with the local actors of the absorbed territories, but also to new forms of territorial solidarity and spatial redistribution. Systemic transformation thus sketches out a new geography of urban technical networks which advances work on local infrastructure firms and on network evolution by integrating the neglected configuration of a shrinking demand regime

Face aux enjeux socioéconomiques, démocratiques, et environnementaux, la croissance économique comme fin en soi, ou comme condition nécessaire au « développement », est de nouveau remise en cause. Depuis le début du XXIème siècle, suscitant un intérêt grandissant et de vifs échanges, la Décroissance se fraie une place dans le débat. Après avoir resitué son émergence dans la perspective historique de la controverse qui s'est développée, au cours de la deuxième moitié du XXe siècle, autour de la croissance et du modèle de développement des pays industrialisés, nous suggérons une synthèse des principales idées et des propositions concrètes actuellement portées par ses partisans. Celles-ci soulèvent un certain nombre de questions complexes, pour lesquelles nous proposons d'apporter quelques éclairages à travers un exercice de modélisation prospective. Nous réalisons pour cela une série d'entretiens, qui visent à recueillir différentes visions détaillées et quantifiées de ce que pourraient être, selon les participants, des scénarios de Décroissance, ou - plus largement- des scénarios de transitions souhaitables et soutenables, notamment en termes d'évolution des institutions, des modes de vie et de consommation, pour la France. En parallèle de ces entretiens, nous développons un modèle spécifique de simulation dynamique de l'économie française, construit autour de l'analyse entrées-sorties, sur la base de données publiques, et incorporant un haut niveau de détail. A l'aide de cet outil macroéconomique, nous proposons alors d'explorer, sur un horizon à long terme (2060) les implications possibles de différents scénarios, dont ceux élaborés à partir des entretiens. Nous nous intéressons par exemple aux conséquences possibles en termes d'emploi, de finances publiques, de consommation d'énergie, d'émissions de polluants atmosphériques, et de production de déchets. Les résultats des simulations soulignent l'importance des choix institutionnels, des facteurs culturels, comportementaux, et « non-techniques », et le potentiel de certaines propositions des mouvements de la Décroissance. Ils invitent ainsi à ouvrir le débat autour de la construction collective d'un nouveau projet de société. Dans cette perspective, notre approche offre un support simple et efficace pour la compréhension commune et la délibération collective. / The development paths followed by industrial societies in the last decades have led them in front of complex socioeconomic, democratic and environmental crises, which question the relevance of economic growth, either as a goal in itself, or as a way to achieve “development”. With the emergence of the degrowth movement at the beginning of the 21st century, the call for transitions towards sustainable “post-growth societies” is now consolidating into a multifaceted political project. For the “wealthiest” countries, where the ecological footprint per capita is greater than the global sustainable level, this project may be envisioned as a voluntary, socially sustainable, equitable and smooth downscaling of production and consumption, and thus throughput, to an environmentally sustainable level. Such a project raises numerous questions, for instance: what concrete proposals could initiate such a transition? What could such paths induce in terms of employment, public debt, energy consumption, waste, or greenhouse gas emission mitigation? What structural or institutional obstacles must be overcome and how? Etc. In this research, we offer to discuss such questions with the help of prospective modeling. Our approach involves a series of interviews, conducted, among others, with actors within the Degrowth movement. These are aimed at collecting detailed and quantified visions or narratives about what Degrowth scenarios or – more broadly speaking– scenarios of transition towards sustainable and desirable societies could look like, for France, in the mind of participants, especially in terms of institutions, lifestyles and consumption patterns. In parallel, we have designed and developed a specific dynamic simulation model of the French monetary economy, featuring a high level of detail and disaggregation, based on input-output analysis, and built using public data. Using this macroeconomic tool, we investigate, over the long term (2060), the possible outcomes of different scenarios, including those inferred from the interviews, in terms of employment, public debt, energy consumption, waste and atmospheric emissions. We discuss the potential strengths and weaknesses of the different visions they reflect. Our results highlight in particular the importance of cultural, social, behavioral and “non-technical” factors, stress the potential of various degrowth proposals, and recall the critical need for the collective elaboration of a societal project. In this perspective, our modeling approach provides a simple, yet powerful tool for common understanding and collective deliberation.

Farmer suicide is at crisis levels in the United States and India. This crisis is both a problem of experiential knowledge within infrastructure as well as a problem of discourse power. I argue that the logical abstraction required to conceptualize and evaluate farmer suicide cannot be separated from the overall experience of farmer suicide. Rather than existing as distinctly separate phenomena, these elements are co-constitutive. Despite the Centers' for Disease Control identification and designation of farmer suicide as complex, statistically relevant, and elevated, nearly all the policy efforts addressing farmer suicide focus on narrow economic impact and narrow economic relief. While these economic vectors are important, the problem is multifaceted and requires a broadening of policy discourse to include additional factors (e.g. philosophical, existential, psychological, etc.). Using Hannah Arendt's work on politics and the human condition, I connect the conditionality of homo faber (human fabricator/maker), animal laborans (laboring animal), and vita activa (active life) with farmer struggle and suicide. Through the work of Georges Canguilhem and Achille Mbembe, I critique and analyze the predominant discourse and framing of suicide as a disease. Last, but not least, I propose decolonial theory and degrowth theory as viable critical pathways to shift the scale of farming infrastructure towards a more equitable and just future.

Au cours des années 2000, deux mobilisations parallèles ont contribué à renouveler le paysage de l’écologie politique : la décroissance en France, et les Transition Towns au Royaume-Uni. Nous proposons une approche comparative internationale de ces deux mouvements, d’abord distincts, mais qui se sont progressivement imbriqués à mesure qu’ils s’internationalisaient. Nous nous intéresserons particulièrement à la dimension catastrophiste de ces deux mouvements, entendue comme un mode de pensée politique fondé sur l’anticipation de ruptures écologiques majeures (pic pétrolier, mais aussi réchauffement climatique ou effondrement écosystémique) qui mettraient fin à la version moderne du projet démocratique. Loin de n’être qu’une posture intellectuelle, le catastrophisme s’incarne dans ces mouvements en des pratiques délibératives expérimentales qui invitent à questionner la temporalité continuiste dans laquelle se conçoit généralement la théorie démocratique.L’étude de ces deux mobilisations vise à nourrir une réflexion d’ordre plus théorique sur les outils dont dispose la science politique pour penser l’insertion des communautés politiques dans leur environnement. En nous appuyant sur les travaux pionniers de la green political theory, nous montrerons qu’une théorie politique environnementale pourrait contribuer à interroger la théorie démocratique en invitant à la réinsérer dans un contexte de déstabilisation écologique globale. / During the 2000’s decade, two social movements, the décroissance movement in France and Transition Towns in the United- Kingdom, have contributed, both in parallel, to a renewal of the green political landscape. This thesis is an international comparative analysis of these two movements, which were first distinct, then progressively overlapped as they evolved to become international. This research will focus in particular on the catastrophist dimension of these two movements, understood as a form of political thought based on the anticipation of major ecological shifts (peak oil, climatechange, ecosystems collapse, etc.) that would put an end to the modern version of the democratic project. Far from being an intellectual framework only, catastrophism also gives rise to experimental deliberative practices that put into question the hypothesis of continuity that generally pervades theories of democracy.The analysis of these two movements aims at proposing new material to provide for a theoretical reflection on the intellectual tools that political science uses to investigate the ecological embeddedness of political communities. Dwelling on the pioneer work of green political theory, we will suggest that a théorie politique environnementale could contribute to reconsider theories of democracy, with an invitation for them to fit within the framework of the global ecological disruption.

Genom att kritiskt granska de två Malmöstadsdelarna Augustenborg och Sege Park, som har utgett sig för och planeras att bli förebilder för hållbar stadsutveckling, studeras inslag av en nerväxt-inspirerad utveckling bort från ekonomisk tillväxt. Detta görs genom en fallstudie där områdenas strategiska hållbarhetsarbete studeras genom att observera inslag av två utvalda begrepp, kollaborativekonomi (KE) och lokal självförsörjning (LSF). Dessa begrepp kommer från framtidsscenarier i rapporten Framtider bortom BNP-tillväxt av Hagbert et al.( 2018) i forskningsprogrammet Bortom BNP-tillväxt: Scenarier för hållbart samhällsbyggande som är formulerade att uppnå ett hållbart tillstånd inom Donut-ekonomin (Raworth 2012) i Sverige 2050. Det empiriska materialet utgörs av fem semistrukturerade kvalitativa informantintervjuer, offentligt tillgängliga dokument från Malmö Stad som hållbarhetsstrategi och planprogram för Sege Park samt en antologi över Augustenborgs utveckling. Den analytiska metoden består av en systematiserande kvalitativ textanalys som utformats med utgångspunkt i uppsatsens teoretiska diskussion och ramverk. Tidigare forskning tar upp olika förhållningssätt till operationaliseringen av nerväxtlogiker på stadsdelsnivå. Den teoretiska diskussionen går igenom olika perspektiv kring nerväxtlogiker, relationen mellan tillväxt och stadsutveckling samt det rådande stadsplaneringsparadigmets relation till hållbar stadsutveckling. Det teoretiska ramverket presenterar de två begreppen kollaborativ ekonomi och lokal självförsörjning som används för att utröna inslag av en utveckling bort från ekonomisk tillväxt. Studiens empiriska framställning visar att många inslag av kollaborativ ekonomi och lokal självförsörjning är närvarande, men överlappar med rådande tillväxtbaserade stadsplaneringsparadigm och det är tveksamt i vilken utsträckning dessa inslag faktiskt bidrar till minskade resursflöden och en utveckling bort från ekonomisk tillväxt. Studiens diskussion tar upp svårigheterna med att tillämpa en stadsplanering inspirerad av nerväxtlogiker inom rådande lagstiftning, som hindrar en utveckling bort från tillväxt. Ansatsen att använda framtidsscenarier för studier av en samtida verklighet kan ifrågasättas och har genererat en viss svårighet bland annat i relation till skillnaden som uppstår mellan framtidsscenariernas radikalitet och dagens socio-ekonomiska komplexa situation. / Through a critical examination of two neighbourhoods of Malmö, Augustenborg and Sege Park degrowth-inspired elements of a development away from economic growth are being studied. These specific neighbourhoods are selected since they have served and are being planned to serve as models of sustainable urban neighbourhoods. The neighbourhoods are being studied through a case study of strategic sustainable measures through the observation of two selected concepts, Collaborative Economy (KE) and Local Self-sufficiency (LSF). These concepts originate from the future scenarios in the report Futures Beyond GDP Growth (Hagbert et al., 2018) in the research program Beyond GDP Growth: Scenarios for sustainable building and planning formulated to reach a sustainable condition within the Doughnut-economy (Raworth, 2012) in Sweden 2050. The empirical material are five semi-structured qualitative informant interviews, publicly accessible documents from Malmö municipality as sustainability strategy, district planning program as well as an anthology of the neighbourhood Augustengorg’s development history. The analytical method is a systemising qualitative text analysis designed from the study’s theoretical discussion and framework. Earlier research addresses different approaches to operationalisation of degrowth on a neighbourhood level.The theoretical discussion examines different perspectives concerning degrowth, the relation between economic growth and urban development as well as the relation of the prevailing growth based urban planning paradigm to sustainable urban development. The theoretical framework discusses the two concepts Collaborative Economy and Local Self-sufficiency which are being used to examine the presence of a development away from economic growth. The empirical representation shows that several elements of Collaborative Economy and Local Self-sufficiency are present, but coexists with the contemporary prevailing growth based urban planning paradigm, and it is uncertain to which extent these elements actually contribute to diminish the flows of resources and contribute to a development away from economic growth. The discussion examines the difficulties applying urban planning inspired by the logic of degrowth within prevailing legislation preventing a development away from economic growth. The attempt to use scenarios of an alternative future for studies of a contemporary reality can be questioned. It has generated a certain amount of difficulty in relation to the apparent difference between the radicality in the scenarios and the complexity of the socio-economical situation of today.

[pt] Em 2021, o Dia da Sobrecarga da Terra ocorreu em 29 de julho e, desde então, a população passou a estar em débito com o planeta, já que aquilo que é consumido, não corresponde ao que ele é capaz de produzir no período de 12 meses. Trata-se de uma relação desarmônica que corrobora com o estado de emergência climática atual, onde a busca por recursos naturais mostra-se cada vez mais predatória. Neste estudo observamos, a partir de revisão bibliográfica, que alguns grupos sociais suportam os efeitos da emergência do clima de maneira desigual, e nos propusemos a observar o tema a partir da ótica da justiça climática. Foi o Acordo de Paris o responsável por introduzir, em 2015, este conceito nas discussões sobre o meio ambiente e o clima, ainda que sem determinar seu significado. O presente trabalho discute esses aspectos a partir da visão do Sul-Global e lê o Decrescimento como possível opositor ao Antropoceno. Concluímos que uma construção epistemológica unificada do termo justiça climática pode não ser tão factível quanto uma perspectiva que abrange múltiplas possibilidades. / [en] In 2021, Earth Overshoot Day took place on July 29 and, since then, the population has been in debt to the planet, as what is consumed does not correspond to what it is capable of producing in the period of 12 months. It is a disharmonious relationship that corroborates the current state of climate emergency, where the search for natural resources is increasingly predatory. In this study, we observed, based on a literature review, that some social groups bear the effects of the climate emergency in an unequal way, and we proposed to observe this from the perspective of climate justice. The Paris Agreement was responsible for introducing this concept in discussions on the environment and climate in 2015, although without determining its meaning. The present work discusses these aspects from the perspective of the Global South and reads Degrowth as a possible opposition to the Anthropocene. We conclude that a unified epistemological construction of the term climate justice may not be as feasible as a perspective that encompasses multiple possibilities.

The concepts of degrowth and green growth are central in the scientific discussion on resources, climate change and sustainability. This thesis investigates to what degree the concepts are present in the Swedish government’s climate policy. The two climate policy action plans that have hitherto been presented by the government was analysed through a quantitative text analysis method and the findings where then compared with each other. The analysis suggests, unsurprisingly, that green growth is the dominant perspective in both action plans although there exist clear differences in emphasis of the perspectives.  The current right-wing government stresses that economic growth should be considered a prerequisite for the transition to sustainable development whilst the former left-wing government tries to merge the concepts of degrowth and green growth although with an emphasis on the later.  The findings show that different perspectives on economic growth are present in Swedish climate policy and that the concepts of degrowth and green growth are useful tools to analyse and comprehend these perspectives. The findings raise questions whether opinions on economic growth, as expressed in the government’s action plans, are a result not only from party ideology but also from power struggles within respective government coalition.

Detta arbete består av ett antal verk skapade med olika återbrukade teknologier och de kompositionsmetoder som uppstår till följd av deras begränsningar, samt en text som behandlar verken utifrån några definitioner av mediearkeologisk konstnärlig praktik som föreslagits av medieteoretikern Jussi Parikka. Verken – Orphan Works, Magelungsverket och Temporal Canons: No. 1 - 3 – utgör den konstnärliga delen av arbetet. Texten tar även upp tankar om bl.a. mitt eget användande av teknik och betydelsen det haft för mitt skapande, att finna det suggestiva genom att utforska det materiella i skapandet, sociala och ekologiska aspekter av automatisering och moderna musikteknologier, olika nivåer av återbruk i konstnärligt syfte, alternativa historier och imaginära medier, konstverks livslängd under snabb teknikutveckling samt ljudåtergivning i relation till dessa.