This volume makes an important contribution by assessing, through social constructionist approaches, how mobilizations of power are linked to production of knowledge(s) on the issue of climate change. The book's two parts approach the theme from different constructivist positions: the first addresses how social constructions contribute to normative (dis)order, and the second focuses on how constructions shape discursive processes. Editor Mary Pettenger states in the Introduction that this book seeks to (1) enhance understanding of climate change, and (2) contrast the two perspectives. Various contributions weave together both theoretical considerations and insights from diverse case studies.
While the theoretical engagements therein link usefully to wider constructivist explorations, the strength of the book lies in its concrete cases. Contributions range from assessments of dominant Western discourses in US American, German and British contexts vis-à-vis international norms (Loren Cass) to explorations of how intersubjectivity shapes climate knowledge in indigenous non-Western Totonac culture (William Smith). While some chapters are more descriptive than analytical, this breadth of perspective carefully grapples with challenges from the everyday to those of the distant future or ‘other’.
Moreover, the contributions provide historical richness through detailed descriptions of developments in climate policies and practices. This is particularly prominent in the first section with respect to the Netherlands (Mary Pettenger), Japan (Takashi Hattori), and the USA (Cathleen Fogel). The second section further situates cases through temporal and spatial scales. For instance, Bäckstrand and Lövbrand look at how competing discourses, from ecological modernization to radical resistances, shape the critical post-2012 international climate policy architecture, and Patterson and Stripple examine how discourses of territory shape climate change unfolding discourses and policy alternatives. Through the twin emphases of social constructivist interpretations, the volume provides an expanded and valuable reading of multi-scale relations of norms and discourses from the local hegemon or subaltern to (inter)national climate policy actors.
This is not to say these papers are seamlessly assembled. Disagreement and divergent views within the volume are evident. In her chapter on indigenous voices in climate policy discourses, Heather Smith critiques fellow author Cathy Fogel's failure to ‘even give a nod to indigenous peoples in the so-called North’ in her larger body of research. In fact, this collection (or set of explorations) is uneasily situated in international relations conversations (Myanna Lahsen's chapter in particular). Nonetheless, this edgy aspect to the project embodies many of the complex contestations that intersect and move within these issues of power, knowledge, norms, discourses and climate change. I suspect this low-intensity dissonance is by design. While the attention paid to the theoretical divisions within constructivism risks reifying what is operationally often a matter of emphasis, this restlessness in the book works well overall.
The editor is clearly sensitive to a number of issues as she pre-figures many potential critiques in the Introduction. She writes ‘. . .the book cannot contain all possible perspectives. . .we urge others to learn from our efforts and to generate further studies, comparisons and constructive suggestions. . .’. She is correct. Nonetheless, while her own self-evaluation rightly calls for analyses of other contexts, such as Africa and Asia, I found that biophysical agency was remarkably underconsidered. The book could have benefited from more consistent accounting of this unmistakably vital ‘actor’. Moreover, greater attention paid to the varied natural science processes shaping understanding of climate change (along with social, political and cultural factors) in the theatre of discursive structuration would have further strengthened the volume. As it stands, analyses of the variegated role of biophysical processes in the social construction of climate change are awkwardly obscured. While Nicholas Onuf notes this heterogeneity in the Foreword, it is not consistently carried through the book.
In highly contentious neo-millennial environmental challenges such as climate change, social constructionist approaches need to be scrupulous in order to minimize sparking illusory and counterproductive debates. While such interventions seek to enhance understanding of complex and dynamic human-environment interactions, misuse (catalogued voluminously through time) instead can enhance obfuscation.
Amid these dangers, I found that the present collection very successfully navigated around these potential pitfalls by treading that treacherous ‘middle ground’ between positivism and pure subjectivity, and provided an incisive and illuminating series of papers. Thus, meeting the editor's aforementioned goals many times over, the volume provides highly informative and valuable building blocks for understanding of power-knowledge interactions as they relate to climate change. With a critical edge, these contributions trace shifts in discourses and policy considerations, while they help to anticipate future changes in various contexts and social settings.
