Introduction: The Environment as Master Narrative: Discourse and Identity in Environmental Problems

• Published in: Anthropological quarterly Vol. 74; no. 3; pp. 101 - 103
• Main Author: Harper, Krista M.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Washington Catholic University of America Press 01.07.2001; George Washington University Institute for Ethnographic Research; Institute for Ethnographic Research
• Subjects: Activists; Anthropology; Biodiversity; Citizen participation; Civil society; Cold War; Cultural anthropology; Culture; Ecology; Environmental degradation; Environmental impact; Environmental justice; Environmental protection; Environmentalism; Environmentalists; Ethnography; Intellectual property; Knowledge; NGOs; Nongovernmental organizations; Political activism; Political representation; Politics; Property rights; Social activism; Sustainable development; Transnationalism; New York; Colombia; Thousand Oaks California; United States > US
• ISSN: 0003-5491; 1534-1518; 1534-1518
• DOI: 10.1353/anq.2001.0027

Anthropologists working in remote communities around the world have observed local groups deploying terms from the international environmentalist lexicon, such as biodiversity and sustainable development, to defend indigenous claims to land, intellectual property rights, and political representation (Brosius 1997; Zerner 1995; Escobar 1996). Drawing from sociologist Ulrich Beck's concept of "anthropological shock," the author analyzes how environmentalists connect private crises in daily life provoked by environmental risks with the development of a public identity as activists participating in a global environmental movement. In the process of seeking private partners and federal resources, local environmental groups are drawn into discourse of "ecological modernization," a neo-liberal environmentalism that is friendly to capitalist development. According to Milton, environmentalism has been a particularly potent globalizing discourse because the "particular understanding of the planet as `one place' has fuelled the development of environmentalist discourse as a global phenomenon" (p. 171).