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Abstract

Ecological States critically examines ecological policies in the People's Republic of China to show how campaigns of scientifically based environmental protection transform nature and society. While many point to China's ecological civilization programs as a new paradigm for global environmental governance, Jesse Rodenbiker argues that ecological redlining extends the reach of the authoritarian state. Although Chinese urban sustainability initiatives have driven millions of citizens from their land and housing, Rodenbiker shows that these migrants are not passive subjects of state policy. Instead, they creatively navigate resettlement processes in pursuit of their own benefit. However, their resistance is limited by varied forms of state-backed infrastructural violence. Through extensive fieldwork with scientists, urban planners, and everyday citizens in southwestern China, Ecological States exposes the ways in which the scientific logics and practices fundamental to China's green urbanization have solidified state power and contributed to dispossession and social inequality

Bios

Author: Jesse Rodenbiker is assistant teaching professor of geography at Rutgers University and associate research scholar at the Center on Contemporary China at Princeton University.
Discussant: I-Chun Catherine Chang is associate professor of geography at Macalester College.
Discussant: Jia-Ching Chen is assistant professor of global studies at UC Santa Barbara.
Moderator: Louisa Schein is associate professor of anthropology and women's, gender and sexuality studies at Rutgers University.