Once a month, we put together a list of stories we’ve been reading: news you might’ve missed or crucial conversations going on around the web. We focus on environmental justice, radical municipalism, new politics, political theory, and resources for action and education.
We try to include articles that have been published recently but will last, that are relatively light and inspiring, and are from corners of the web that don’t always get the light of day. This will also be a space to keep you up to date with news about what’s happening at Uneven Earth.
This month, we are thinking about animal rights. Many of us know that industrial, for-profit animal agriculture must end—but is eating animals, or animal byproducts, inherently wrong, and how do we organize for supporting animals? And what about ecosystem rights, versus animal rights in particular? We feature several articles on different sides of the debate, including those from feminist socialist, Indigenous, social ecology, and Global South perspectives.
We also saw many articles about what Uneven Earth editor Vijay Kolinjivadi calls green gaslighting in an essay for Al Jazeera: ““climate solutions” that protect, if not boost, profits of big corporations are deployed and presented as the only way to combat climate change.” Finally, there has been some excellent discussion on climate reparations and what a truly global Green New Deal would look like.
If you find these lists useful, you can support us by sharing them on social media and with your friends and family!
A small note that the articles linked in this newsletter do not represent the views of Uneven Earth. When reading, please keep in mind that we don’t have capacity to do further research on the authors or publishers!
Uneven Earth updates
Exciting news from Uneven Earth: we have had our first ever Annual General Assembly, approved our new constitution, and are on the way to becoming a non-profit registered in Germany. Stay tuned: we’ll have some more big announcements in the coming months.
Top 5 articles to read
The fight for reparations cannot ignore climate change. Racial redress should be modeled on the global anticolonial tradition of worldbuilding, says Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò.
Why climate justice must go beyond borders. Harsha Walia on why we need a truly internationalist alternative.
If the desert was green. Mass tree-planting programs in the desert often cause lasting damage to the ecosystems they are purportedly trying to repair.
Re-learning the past to re-imagine the future. In his new book, Modibo Kadalie examines the convergence of maroon and Indigenous cultures in the US and rediscovers a lost history of intimate direct democracy.
Keeping the world alive and healthy: The radical realism of the “forces of reproduction”. An interview with Stefania Barca.
News you might’ve missed
Why Cuba’s extraordinary Covid vaccine success could provide the best hope for low-income countries
New nuclear power plants are unlikely to stop the climate crisis
How a married undercover cop having sex with activists killed a climate movement. Mark Kennedy spent seven years pretending to be a climate activist. People he deceived are still rebuilding their lives.
Cities under water. An incredible photo essay on the places in the world at risk from sea-level rise.
‘The treeline is out of control’: how the climate crisis is turning the Arctic green
Wealth of world’s 10 richest men doubled in pandemic, Oxfam says
Animal rights
It’s time to challenge animal agriculture—without the “go vegan” campaigns
Our animals, ourselves. The socialist feminist case for animal liberation.
Towards a universal animal rights approach
Oh friends, the forest burns. Does friendship between human communities and with the more-than-human realm offer a way forward in an age of climate crises and racial nationalisms?
Beings seen and unseen. Amitav Ghosh on decentering human narratives and re-centering stories of the land.
Green gaslighting
Carbon offsetting is not warding off environmental collapse – it’s accelerating it.
Resisting greenwashing in the Naqab. Israel’s relentless land theft as conservation is bringing Palestinians closer together.
Green gaslighting: Another face of climate denialism
Global struggles
Guardians of nature: How Samburu women are saving their forest
Esta todo incendiado. A conversation on the anti-mining struggle in Argentina.
Bulldozers, violence and politics crack an Indian dream of utopia
Solidarity with anti-mine struggle in Sweden. Plans for new iron ore mine in Gállok, Sweden, threaten Indigenous rights and the environment.
‘We are the power’: Canada’s Indigenous land defenders fight on
Waste colonialism in Bosnia and Herzegovina
Where we’re at: analysis
Here’s how to repay developing nations for colonialism – and fight the climate crisis
There is nothing past about historical land injustice. Kenya still faces intractable land problems, including unequal concentration of land in the hands of the wealthy, land grabbing, landlessness, and unresolved historical land injustices.
How British colonizers caused the Bengal famine
Why climate change is inherently racist
Same old. What is the point of imagining new technologies without new ways of living?
What is going on? Thea Riofrancos on strategy, flexibility, and “green capitalism”
What the ‘Don’t Look Up’ action campaign gets so wrong
Degrowth
Degrowth: The future that fashion has been looking for?
How the Global South can lead the way to a post-growth future
Degrowth is about global justice
Just think about it…
Economics is once again becoming a worldly science. After generations of ‘blackboard economics’, Berkeley and MIT are leading a return to economics that studies the real world.
The revolution is always already underway. Or, how your bowling league can matter.
Our ancestors worked less and had better lives. What are we doing wrong?
How vecindades design shaped Mexico City life
bell hooks and Thich Nhat Hanh on building a community of love
Sci-fi and storytelling
What good can dreaming do? Ursula K. Le Guin’s The Lathe of Heaven reminds us of the radical power of collective imagination.
Can science fiction wake us up to our climate reality? Kim Stanley Robinson’s novels envision the dire problems of the future—but also their solutions.
Resources
Diversifying and Decolonising Economics alternative reading list (part 2)
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