STS 305
Environmental Political Thought Fall 2024
Division II Writing Skills
Cross-listed PSCI 305

In the face of planetary crisis, it is as difficult as it is crucial to find the time and calm “to think what we are doing” (Hannah Arendt’s famous line). This course aims to hold space for that thinking; to collaboratively find the presence of mind to take the measure of the doings that caused, and that may redress, the awful reality of earth’s degradation. To do so, we will read, discuss, and write about some of the most significant book-length works of environmental political thought published in the last five years. These books conceptualize and intervene into the politics of phenomena such as climate change, species depletion, toxic pollution and (a special interest of the instructor) waste by applying–and sometimes reinventing–approaches from political theory, political economy, science & technology studies, philosophy, and critical theory. They consider the enmeshment of environmental problems with racism, colonialism, economic inequality, and speciesism, among other modalities of power, and weigh the promise of political action and organization to reconstitute relationships among earth’s human and more-than-human elements. By interpreting, evaluating, applying and extending the arguments of these books in discussion and writing, students will be challenged to scrutinize their preconceptions and develop, support and articulate original arguments about politics and the environment.