I am currently working an a multivolume series that explores the intersections of social movements and civil society with respect to industry, sustainability, and justice in the United States. My specific problem is to find points of entry where countervailing forces exist to the "brown" industries, that is, industries that actively attempt to delay the policy transition to a greener economy. The first two volumes were completed with support from the STS Program of the National Science Foundation.
In 2007 I published the first volume: Alternative Pathways in Science and Industry (MIT Press). One of the central arguments of the book is that social movements play a generative role in scientific and technological change, rather than merely a role of opposing some new forms of technology or demanding access to others. However, I also explored the limitations of social movements and the tendency for the movements for sustainability and/or justice in the United States to achieve partial victories. The book won the Robert K. Merton award from the American Sociological Association. http://mitpress.mit.edu/catalog/item/default.asp?ttype=2&tid=11182
In 2009 I published Localist Movements in a Global Economy: Sustainability, Justice, and Urban Development in the United States (MIT Press). The book examines the social and environmental aspects of the "localist movement" of advocacy for increased local ownership, such as in "buy local" campaigns. Here I examine the potential of the green small business sector as an additional counterweight to the political power of the anti-environmental industries. See also the section of the web site on localism and sustainability. I also argue against the thesis that localism can be reduced to neoliberalism, a view that is sometimes found in the sociology of food and agriculture. Instead, I discuss the history of localist thought, its underlying concepts, and its differences from both social liberalism and neoliberalism.
The third volume, Good Green Jobs in a Global Economy, examines the politics of green energy policy reform in the United States. The book's overarching thesis is that the politics of the green transition in the United States are now deeply interwoven with the relative decline of the United States in the global economy. As a result, developmentalist ideology, which had been prominent in the country throughout the nineteenth century, is re-emerging. Developmentalism involves a reinvigorated industrial policy and a more defensive position with respect to trade. To that point, the book examines the responses at the federal and state government level to the challenge of developing green industries in the United States, especially when faced with subsidies and government support for competing industries in China and other countries. Theoretically, the book also involves a conversation with transition studies, an approach to the study of long-term changes in large technological systems. I argue for the value of a field-oriented approach to the relationship between "landscape" changes in politics and society and "regime" changes in sociotechnical systems. Specifically, I argue for the importance of focusing on power conflitcs in policy fields to explain the unevenness of long-term transitions in the energy, buildings, and transportation systems. To that point, the book investigates the role of green transition coalitions (environmental, labor, and green business networks) and the increased polarization of the Democratic and Republican Parties as explanations of the unevenness of green transition policies in the U.S.. The book grew out of the NSF doctoral training grant described as the Green Jobs Project (see tab to the left).
Selected Publications and Papers
2012 Good Green Jobs in a Global Economy: Making and Keeping New Industries in the United States. MIT Press, in press.
2012 “The Green Transition, Neoliberalism, and the Technosciences.” In Luigi Pellozzoni and Marja Ylönen (eds.), Neoliberalism and Technosciences: Criticial Assessments. Edward Elgar. In press. Email me for a copy.
2012 “Sustainable Consumption, Energy, and Failed Transitions: The Problem of Adaptation.” In Maurie Cohen (ed.), Sustainable Lifestyles in a New Economy. Edward Elgar.
2012 “Nanotechnology and the Environment.” By Anna Lamprou and David Hess. In Donald Mclaurcan, ed., Nanotechnology and Global Sustainability. CRC Press.
2010 "A Political Economy of Sustainability: Alternative Pathways and Industrial Innovation." In Steven Moore (ed.), Pragmatic Sustainability: Theoretical and Practical Tools. Routledge. Article here.
2010. "Sustainable Consumption and the Problem of Resilience." Sustainability: Science, Practice, Policy. 6(2): 1-12. Open source, available at the journal web site. Link forthcoming.
2010. "The Environmental, Health, and Safety Implications of Nanotechnology: Environmental Organizations and Undone Science in the
2010 Localist Movements in a Global Economy (MIT Press)
2011 "Electricity Transformed: Neoliberalism and Local Energy in the
2007 Alternative Pathways in Science and Industry: Activism, Innovation, and the Environment in an Era of Globalization, (MIT Press)
2007 "What is a Clean Bus? Object Conflicts in the Greening of Urban Transit." Sustainability: Science, Practice, and Policy 3(1): 45- 58. PDF file here.
2004 Organized a conference on Science, Technology, and the Environment . Details here.
2001 Alternative Pathways in Globalization, Vol. 1. This was an electronic preprint of the first section of what became Alternative Pathways in Science and Industry.