Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
BOX 4.1
UNDERSTANDING NATURE
For several philosophers, theorists and empirical researchers, 'social
constructionist' approaches to understanding 'nature' are as prob-
lematic as the realist-naturalist approaches opposed to them. Both
approaches take for granted a social-natural distinction that, it's
argued,
itself needs explaining
. What's more, both approaches are ulti-
mately contradictory. For instance, 'constructionists' seem to accord
'society' a power and existence being denied to 'nature'. Yet, implau-
sibly, this would mean societies are
sui generis
. What's more, even
supposing that there
is
such a thing as 'society' (being related to but also
ontologically distinct from the realm of 'nature'), critics argue that it's
never 'society as a whole' that 'constructs' nature in any given instance.
Instead, it is a set of specific actors, institutions or communities whose
activities are governed by certain relationships, norms and goals. As
an alternative, STS scholar Bruno Latour (1993) has famously talked
of 'actor-networks', 'quasi-objects' and 'intermediaries' in his critical
account of how post-Enlightenment Western societies have sought to
distinguish the indistinguishable in their analytical habits of thought.
For him, the categories of 'society' and 'nature', along with the other
antonyms listed in
Figure 1.5,
are symptoms of epistemic 'purification'.
They're not two different 'ontological regions' with a range of unique
causal powers but instead two categories whose formation invites a
contextual and historical explanation rather than mute acceptance.
Relatedly, in his latest book
Being alive
, the British anthropologist Tim
Ingold sees the world as a complex 'meshwork'. For him, all organ-
isms, including us, should be understood 'not as bounded entities
surrounded by an environment, but as an unbounded entanglement of
lines in fluid space[-time]' (Ingold, 2011: 64). This ontology of connec-
tivity, flows and imbrications has also been recommended by Donna
Haraway (2003: 6), to cite one more key contributor, who has observed
(in a typically memorable formulation) that 'Beings do not pre-exist
their relatings
The world is a knot in motion' (2003: 6).
The upshot of these arguments is that analysts need to look closely at
(1) the process of boundary making, marking and maintenance between
the 'natural' and the 'social'; (2) how boundaries are constantly trans-
gressed in practice; and (3) what gets lost to thought, ethics and practice
when the transgressions are ignored (see
Chapter 5
for more on these
subjects). These ideas have found an echo in Marxist writings about
nature (e.g. see Harvey, 1996:
chapter 1)
. However, as with many
advocates of
social constructionism
, these Marxists want to hold on
...
