Medeltemperaturen på jorden har höjts med 1 grad sedan förindustriell tid. Effekterna av denna temperaturhöjning visar sig i form av förhöjda havsnivåer, smältande havsis i Arktis och extrema väderförhållanden. Inom internationell politik är det numera erkänt att migration är och förblir den i särklass största effekten av klimatförändringarna.  Termen ’klimatflyktingar’ används som gemensam benämning för människor som tvingas fly sina hem på grund av klimatförändringar. Studien ämnar undersöka hur klimatflyktingar gestaltas i svenska dagstidningar efter klimatmötet i Paris 2015. Studien syftar vidare till att belysa vilka maktförhållanden som existerar i kontexten kring denna term. En kvalitativ innehållsanalys används för att analysera artiklar från ett antal utvalda svenska dagstidningar. Ett teoretiskt ramverk bestående av gestaltningsteori och politisk ekologi hjälper till att tolka de sju teman som analysen resulterat i.  Resultatet visar att klimatflyktingar avhumaniseras och förstås som en negativ effekt av klimatförändringarna. De som rymmer under termen vill dock inte associeras med den. I Sverige finns en tydlig tendens till förnekelse inför de problem som världen idag står inför till följd av den globala uppvärmningen. Samtidigt råder en stark tilltro till ekologisk modernisering. Röster inom internationell politik vill erkänna klimatflyktingar i internationell lag. Inget större agerande görs dock för att hjälpa människor som dagligen förlorar sina hem till kusterosion, förstörda jordbruksmarker eller översvämningar. / The mean global temperatures have been rising with one degree since pre-industrial time. Effects is shown in the world today in terms of sea level rising, loss of sea ice in Artic and extreme weather conditions. International politics now states that migration is the single biggest effect caused by climate change.  The term ‘climate refugees’ is used as a definition of humans forced to flee their homes due to climate change. The purpose of the thesis is to show how the Swedish daily newspapers frame climate refugees after the climate conference in Paris in 2015. The purpose is more over to highlight existing power relations in this context. A qualitative content analysis is used on articles chosen from a number of Swedish daily papers. Political ecology and framing theory construct a theoretical framework, which helps to understand the themes which occurred in the analysis. The result shows a dehumanization of climate refugees. Climate refugees is highlighted as a negative effect of climate change. However, the term is rejected by people associated with it. In Sweden, there is a sense of denial to the problems caused around the world due to climate change. Faith is placed into ecological modernization. Voices in international politics states the urge to acknowledge the definition of ‘climate refugees’ in to international law. Not much help is offered to people who have lost their home to coastal erosion, flooding or destroyed lands.

<p>In the village'of Citing in the northern highlands of Tanzania, the factors: social stratification, land tenure, production strategies, investment patterns and the economic uncertainties of society are studied and their relationship to land degradation is examined. The main assumption of the study is that the causes of land degradation are so complex that a methodology that emphasises contextualisation has to be used. A methodological framework that considers inter-linkages between all these factors is developed and tested. The result of the test shows that contextualisation gives a more in-depth and complex explanation than conventional, positivist research. The study gives a detailed account of the relationship that various wealth groups have to land and land degradation in the village. It is found that all wealth groups are destructive to the land but in varying ways. The rich farmers are over-cultivating land marginal to agriculture, the middle peasants have too many cattle in the village while the poor peasants are so marginalised socially that they hardly influence land management. Those identified as having economic as well as social incentives to maintain soil fertility are the middle peasants, while the rich farmers are shown to be consciously soil-mining the former grazing areas.</p>

<p>Globalization and international competition put pressure on local communities to adjust to international standards of price and quality in production. Tirupur in India produces clothes for exports to the first world market. Because of the process of dyeing and bleaching of fabrics the river Noyyal that flows through the town and the surrounding ground water have become polluted. At the local level actors, like the state, business, NGOs and grassroots take action in different ways depending on their interests. The aim with this thesis is both to analyze the situation at the local level from the views and actions of different actors and how the local situation is influenced by globalization. Qualitative interviews have been made with representatives from these actors in Tirupur and its surroundings. This material has then been analyzed from the theory of Third World political ecology and globalization. The conclusions drawn from this study are that the situation in Tirupur cannot exclusively be explained at just one level. Local, national and global politics affect Tirupur. A politicized environment characterizes the local situation where actions against the pollution are not taken for the benefit of the powerful. People also lack empowerment to take action because of dependency on the industry. At the national level centralization is a problem in India because it results in difficulties for the civil society and people to reach elected representatives and influence from the local community. Another problem is the policy maker’s lack of understanding of the local situation. At last globalization limits the way to handle the pollution because of the global competition and the retreat of the state. But it also gives possibilities for the civil society to grow stronger internationally, perhaps with the possibility to create a change.</p>

In the village'of Citing in the northern highlands of Tanzania, the factors: social stratification, land tenure, production strategies, investment patterns and the economic uncertainties of society are studied and their relationship to land degradation is examined. The main assumption of the study is that the causes of land degradation are so complex that a methodology that emphasises contextualisation has to be used. A methodological framework that considers inter-linkages between all these factors is developed and tested. The result of the test shows that contextualisation gives a more in-depth and complex explanation than conventional, positivist research. The study gives a detailed account of the relationship that various wealth groups have to land and land degradation in the village. It is found that all wealth groups are destructive to the land but in varying ways. The rich farmers are over-cultivating land marginal to agriculture, the middle peasants have too many cattle in the village while the poor peasants are so marginalised socially that they hardly influence land management. Those identified as having economic as well as social incentives to maintain soil fertility are the middle peasants, while the rich farmers are shown to be consciously soil-mining the former grazing areas.

This Minor Field Study was carried out during November and December in 2011 in the Mount Elgon District in Western Kenya. The objective was to examine nine small-scale farming household´s land use and socioeconomic situation when they have joined a non-governmental organization (NGO) project, which specifically targets small-scale farming households to improve land use system and socioeconomic situation by the extension of soil and water conservation measures. The survey has worked along three integral examinations methods which are mapping and processing data using GIS, semi structured interviews and literature studies.   This study has adopted a theoretical approach referred to as political ecology, in which landesque capital is a central concept. The result shows that all farmers, except one, have issues with land degradation. However, the extent of the problem and also implemented sustainable soil and water conservation measures were diverse among the farmers. The main causes of this can both be linked to how the farmers themselves utilized their farmland and how impacts from the climate change have modified the terms of the farmers working conditions. These factors have consequently resulted in impacts on the informants’ socioeconomic conditions. Furthermore it was also registered that social and economic elements, in some cases, were the causes of how the farmers manage their farmland. The farmer who had no significant problem with soil erosion had invested in trees and opportunities to irrigate the farmland. In addition, it was also recorded that certain farmers had invested in particular soil and water conservation measures without any significant result. This was probably due to the time span these land measures cover before they start to generate revenue.  The outcome of this study has traced how global, national and local elements exist in a context when it comes to the conditions of the farmers´ land use and their socioeconomic situation. The farmers atMt.Elgon are thereby a component of a wider context when they are both contributory to their socioeconomic situation, mainly due to their land management, and also exposed to core-periphery relationships on which the farmers themselves have no influence.

Currently, there is widespread debate regarding the overall status of the world's fisheries, with some researchers projecting their total collapse in only a few decades, and others concluding the situation is not quite as bleak. Additional debates include what strategies should be used to manage fisheries at various scales, and further research is needed to determine which strategies are most appropriate for use in particular situations and locales, as context is critical. Recently, prominent common pool resources scholars have expressed the need for ethnographic approaches to studying resource management institutions in order to move beyond the current focus of simply identifying the factors and conditions that lead to the self-organization of resource users and long-term sustainability of management institutions. These authors describe the need for examining the larger context in which management institutions exist and taking various historical, political, and sociocultural factors into account when examining common pool resources. This dissertation is a response to that request. This research is the result of over 20 months of ethnographic research in St. Croix, United States Virgin Islands (USVI). Drawing on research in political ecology and building on anthropological critiques of common pool resource institutions, I describe the historical, social, and political factors that influence how fisheries management occurs at the federal and territorial levels, and how commercial fishers, managers, and other stakeholders experience and participate in multi-scale management processes. Ethnographic data suggest that there are a variety of historical, social, and political factors that influence how commercial fishers, managers, and other stakeholders perceive the federal fisheries management process, the extent of their participation in that process, as well as interactions within and between stakeholder groups. Additionally, the mismatch that exists between the centralized management structure of the US federal system and the small-scale, multi-method nature of St. Croix's fishery creates a complex management environment in which few stakeholders participate.

In this Master's of Public Issues Anthropology thesis I examine the perceptions of health and healthcare services within a small rural subsistence farming community in South-Western Paraguay from a political ecology of health perspective. Qualitative research data was collected from May to September of 2010 in Lindo Manantial, a subsistence farming village, and Piribebuy, the closest town to Lindo Manantial and the location of the nearest health centre, the Piribebuy Centro de Salud. The primary goals of this research project were to gain an ethnographic understanding of current local health perspectives and concerns, as well as the local frameworks for health provision in Piribebuy. I argue that the introduction of culturally competent healthcare services could greatly improve individual and community health statuses and outcomes in Lindo Manantial and other similar rural subsistence farming communities in Paraguay. / Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC)

This paper offers a critical framework for understanding how liberal democracies will be tested and constrained by the twin energy crises of climate change and energy scarcity. The analysis is developed in three distinct phases: the first phase pursues a critical understanding of the contemporary liberal democratic state as it relates to the fossil fuel dependent capitalist economy. I argue that the state’s dependence on economic growth prevents it from confronting the structural nature of the twin energy crises. In phase two I shift focus, engaging with the historically significant relationship between liberal democracy and market-capitalism. This argument is developed by exploring (1) the historical connection between democracy, liberalism and capitalism; (2) the permanent and dynamic tension that arises from these mutually dependent, yet conflicting ideologies and (3) the crucial role fossil energy has played, and continues to play, in masking and displacing the sources and the consequences of this tension. Finally, in phase three, I explore the divergent interests of the liberal and democratic traditions, suggesting this generates points of tension within liberal democracy that may be exacerbated as the twin crises worsens. I conclude by arguing that it is only through understanding how the twin energy crises will test and constrain liberal democracy that we will be able to defend, strengthen and deepen its core values.

Values have been identified as important factors that guide decision-making and influence preferences in water governance. Comparing the values reflected in water governance decisions with the values held by stakeholders and the general public may inform the debate on the political legitimacy of water governance. The research presented in this PhD thesis draws on multiple research traditions on values, ranging from ecological economics and political ecology to social and environmental psychology, to investigate the value base of water governance in the Upper Paraguay River Basin, in the state of Mato Grosso, Brazil. It first introduces a novel conceptual framework that integrates these various research traditions and suggests that water governance is closely related to the fundamental values, governance-related values, and assigned values of stakeholders and actors in water governance more generally. These different types of values vary in their level of abstractness, as well as in their ‘locus’, i.e. where the valuing person locates them, and are hypothesised to be closely interrelated in a hierarchical structure, with fundamental values being the most abstract type of values. Water governance, in turn, is defined as the synthesis of water policy (the ‘content’ of decisionmaking), water politics (the ‘power play’ between actors) and water polity (the institutional framework). The thesis then proceeds to apply this novel conceptual framework in a case study on stakeholders’ values in the Upper Paraguay River Basin, and investigates the relationship of their values with their preferences regarding the construction of the Paraguay-Paraná Waterway through the Pantanal wetland, in the south of Mato Grosso. This water infrastructure project has a long history of conflict attached to it, as it might impact the hydrology and ecology of the Pantanal, the world’s largest tropical freshwater wetland and UNESCO biosphere reserve, while at the same time benefitting Mato Grosso’s rapidly growing agribusiness sector by lowering the cost of soybean exports. Based on 24 semi-structured interviews with relevant stakeholders, it was found that supporters and opponents possess different, clashing ‘value landscapes’ (i.e. groups of related values), which may explain the protracted nature of the conflict around the construction of the waterway, while at the same time highlighting political legitimacy deficits of the project. This research was followed up by a quantitative study with members of the general public (n=1067), which sought to measure and test the assumption that we can empirically identify such clashing value landscapes, and their relationship with preferences for or against the Paraguay-Paraná Waterway. Using structural equation modelling (SEM), statistically significant links between people’s values and their preferences in water governance could indeed be found, as well as between different types of values, which formed two contrasting value landscapes. This suggests that water governance conflicts may in part be explained by the presence of different value landscapes among involved actors, which may include even the most abstract level of fundamental values. The research presented in this thesis thus contributes to interdisciplinary debates on the role of values for water governance from multiple conceptual, as well as methodological perspectives. Additionally, through its application to a concrete case study, it highlights the policy relevance of such research, as addressing conflicts in water governance and examining alternative policy options may require a more explicit consideration of the values of the actors involved.

Cette thèse analyse les fondements et l'évolution de l'économie et de la gestion de l'eau au Liban dans ses cadres juridiques, institutionnels et politiques. L'étude s'appuie sur une méthodologie mixte, à la fois qualitative, à travers des études de terrains et celle de la littérature existante, et quantitative, en utilisant des outils d'analyse économétrique. Nous avons pris comme grille de lecture les liens entre les modes de production et d'usage de l'eau, la nature de la propriété foncière et sa structure dans une démarche d'économie politique. L'étude se compose de cinq chapitres. Notre premier chapitre, élaboré à partir d'une lecture critique de la littérature économique qui traite de la valeur de la ressource et de sa rareté, remet en cause la notion de crise de l'eau. Il propose une critique des paradigmes globalisés, notamment la gestion par bassin et la bonne gouvernance, qui sont à la base de la notion de Gestion Intégrée des Ressources en Eau (GIRE) d'inspiration libérale. En dépassant ces théories à l'aide d'une approche historico-matérialiste, ce chapitre construit notre grille de lecture d'un "paysage de l'eau" en mobilisant la théorie de Wittfogel des sociétés hydrauliques et la théorie des "moments" développée par David Harvey. Le deuxième chapitre suit chronologiquement et sur un temps long l'évolution juridico-institutionnelle de la gestion de la ressource depuis l'Empire ottoman et le mandat français sur le Liban jusqu'à la construction nationale entre l'indépendance et la guerre civile libanaise. Notre analyse reconstitue les fondements historiques de la relation du pouvoir aux régimes fonciers durant ces périodes. Nous développons en particulier les éléments qui sont à la source de la formulation de la vision de la mission hydraulique libanaise afin de présenter une interprétation de la relation de l'Etat à l'eau et le discours dominant de la gestion de la ressource. Le troisième chapitre expose les caractéristiques socio-spatiales du service d'eau potable et d'assainissement dans la phase de reconstruction. Il analyse la nature de la fragmentation institutionnelle des autorités publiques ainsi que la politique de l'eau engendrée par l'ajustement structurel et par les paradigmes néolibéraux, notamment, l'adoption des principes de la GIRE par le gouvernement libanais et la préparation du terrain pour des contrats de Partenariat Public-Privé. Le quatrième chapitre propose un modèle formalisé d'économie publique qui nous informe par ses résultats économétriques sur les critères d'allocation des projets de l'eau durant les deux dernières décennies. Les résultats économétriques de ce modèle vont confirmer notre hypothèse de base en montrant que seule la distance politique apparaît comme facteur décisionnel dans l'allocation des fonds aux régions, sans prise en compte de leurs caractéristiques socio-économiques et environnementales. Le cinquième chapitre étudie la question de l'irrigation et sa place dans les politiques agricoles du pays. Dans le fil de notre analyse sur la relation du pouvoir à l'eau, nous revenons sur les privilèges des grands propriétaires terriens dans l'accès aux subventions pour une production intensive en eau à destination des pays du Golfe. Ce chapitre pose la relation de l'eau au système alimentaire du pays en exposant le commerce et l'empreinte en eau virtuelle du pays. Finalement, nous utilisons un modèle de gravité commercial pour analyser la place de l'eau dans le processus de libéralisation du marché agro-alimentaire du pays. En conclusion, notre lecture de l'évolution du processus socio-naturel du paysage de l'eau confirme que les modes de production, d'usage et d'appropriation de la ressource hydrique au Liban sont le produit d'une relation étroite entre la propriété foncière et le pouvoir, héritée de l'histoire politique du pays et maintenue par son système confessionnel. / This thesis analyses the foundations and the evolution of the water economy and management in Lebanon by emphasizing the legal, institutional and political frameworks. The study uses a mixed approach combining a qualitative methodology, through surveys, interviews and documentation and a quantitative approach using econometric modeling. By composing our conceptual framework, we seek to define the political economy of the resource in Lebanon and the ties linking water use to land tenure structures. The study is composed of five chapters. Our first chapter reviews the economic literature dealing with the water value and scarcity and addresses a criticism concerning globalized paradigms, mainly, river basin management, good governance and the Integrated Water Resource Management (IWRM). Going beyond those theories and using a historic-materialist approach, we propose our analytical framework of a "waterscape" combining the hydraulic societies theory developed by Karl Wittfogel and the "moments" approach of David Harvey. Our second chapter explores, by adopting a chronological approach over a long period, the evolution of the legal and the institutional structures of water management in Lebanon. This chapter covers four centuries of the Levant territories under the Ottoman Empire, followed by the French mandate over Lebanon and, finally, the national construction phase between the independence and country's civil war. Our analysis seeks to understand the historical foundations of the relationship between land tenure regimes and social power during those periods. We also develop in this chapter the pilars that drove the Lebanese hydraulic mission in order to present an interpretation of the dominant discourse in the water management. Our third chapter reviews the socio-spatial characteristics of the water and wastewater infrastructures during the reconstruction period. We extend our analysis to depict the institutional fragmentation characterizing the water public authorities in Lebanon. We emphasize on the water policies undertaken in the country during this recent period under structural adjustment and neoliberal paradigms, mainly, the adoption of the IWRM principles by the Lebanese government and the ground preparation to Public-Private Partnerships. The fourth chapter offers a public good model analyzing the concerns behind the allocation of water projects during the last two decades. Econometric results clearly approve our hypothesis that the distributive politics are solely driven by partisanship concerns during this period with no consideration about socio-economical and environmental features of regions. The fifth chapter develops the links of water use to the Lebanese agricultural economy in order to understand the main drivers of irrigation. We shed the light on the privileges of big landowner in accessing to subsidies following a water intensive production destined to the Gulf countries. This chapter detects the link between country's food system and water by presenting the virtual water balance and food water footprint. Finally, the chapter verifies the state of water in the liberalization process of the country by using a gravity model. From our reading of the socio-natural process of water in Lebanon, our results show that the modes of use, production and appropriation of the resource in the country are produced by a close relation between land property and power, an inherited link from the political history of Lebanon maintained by the confessional system.