Just Transformations

‘Hugely important ... Drawing on grassroots alternatives from across the world, the book offers a vital guide’ Ian Scoones, Professor, University of Sussex

‘A fantastic collection that illustrates that just transformations are already being imagined and implemented on the ground’ David Schlosberg, Professor, University of Sydney

‘A splendid book co-produced by an impressive international group of academics and activists ... Optimistic and inspiring’ Joan Martinez-Alier, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona

The climate crisis is the greatest existential threat humanity faces today. The need for a radical societal transformation in the interests of social justice and ecological sustainability has never been greater. But where can we turn to find systemic alternatives?

From India, Turkey, Belgium and Lebanon, to Argentina, Bolivia, Venezuela and Canada, Just Transformations looks to local environmental struggles for the answers. With each case study grounded in the social movements and specific politics of the region in question, this volume investigates the role that resistance movements play in bringing about sustainable transformations, the strategies and tools they utilize to overcome barriers, and how academics and grassroots activists can collaborate effectively.

The book provides a toolkit for scholar-activists who want to build transformative visions with communities. Interrogating each case study for valuable lessons, the contributors develop a conceptualization of a just transformation that focuses on the changes that communities themselves are trying to produce.

Dr Iokiñe Rodríguez is an Associate Professor on Environment and Development based at the School of Global Development at the University of East Anglia. Dr Leah Temper is an ecological economist, scholar activist and environmental health campaigner currently based at the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment. Dr Mariana Walter is a Political Ecologist and Ecological Economist based at the Institute of Sciences and Technologies of the Autonomous University of Barcelona.

Dr. Iokiñe Rodríguez is Senior Lecturer at the University of East Anglia. She is co-founder of Grupo Confluencias, a consortium of Latin American conflict transformation practitioners, researchers and institutions that work on platforms for deliberation, joint research and training in this area. As a researcher in the ACKnowl-EJ project (Activist-academic Co-production of Knowledge for Environmental Justice), her work focuses on issues of local knowledge, power, environmental justice, equity and intercultural dialogue.
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Dr. Mariana Walter is a Political Ecologist and Ecological Economist based at the Institute of Sciences and Technologies of the Autonomous University of Barcelona. Her research has been published in books and journals such as Sustainability Science, Global Environmental Change, Geoforum, Ecological Economics, Land Use Change and Local Environment. She is currently the Scientific Project Manager for the Academic-Activist Co-Produced Knowledge for Environmental Justice Project.

Leah Temper is an ecological economist, scholar-activist and filmmaker based at McGill University and the Autonomous University of Barcelona. She is the founder and co-director of the Global Atlas of Environmental Justice, an initiative mapping ecological conflicts and spaces of resistance around the world, and Research Associate for the Leadership for the Ecozoic program. She is currently Principal Investigator of the ACKnowl-EJ project (Activist-academic Co-production of Knowledge for Environmental Justice).