From a ‘Sociology of Nature’ to Environmental Sociology: Beyond Social Construction¹

Abstract

This paper aims to provide some theoretical starting points for constructing a social science approach to environmental issues which goes beyond narrower forms of constructivism without dismissing the importance of interpretative sociology. An ecological understanding of society is compared with the notion of structuration and integrated into the concept of coevolution in order to shed light on the dynamic nature of socioenvironmental relations and move beyond the constructivist/realist dualism.

Global warming in the public sphere

“…The interactions between science and society argue for a hybrid model of social theory on the environment where the power and influence of scientific discovery and developments are mediated through social means. Tracing the emergence of climate change in the public sphere supports the notion of co-production of knowledge and understanding, a process which combines the strengths of realist, scientific discovery with contextual insights and knowledge, where society and science co-construct meanings of global warming (Latour 1987;Benton & Redclift 1994;Stern & Fineberg 1996;Jasanoff & Wynne 1998;Woodgate & Redclift 1998;Lorenzoni et al 2000;). These pathways advance meaningful framings of climate change as a policy problem and a range of responses that are meaningful in local and regional contexts through structured interface between a wide variety of stakeholders (human agency), institutional change and scientific endeavour (table 1; figure 1).…”

“…Several authors now argue that to understand and better advance responses to global environmental change problems, it is necessary to find a middle ground that combines interpretive, constructivist views with the power of scientific discovery (Latour 1987;Benton & Redclift 1994;Stern & Fineberg 1996;Jasanoff & Wynne 1998;Woodgate & Redclift 1998;Lorenzoni et al 2000;). An unproductive divide also exists within different strands of social theory accompanied by different methods and languages.…”

Los estudios sobre el ambiente y la ciencia ambiental

“…La literatura refleja múl-tiples variantes relacionadas con perspectivas históricas, epistemológicas, metodoló-gicas y valorativas de abordaje desde cada una (cf. Carter, 2000;Faber, Manstetten & Proops, 1992;Goody, 1996;Mueller, 2001;Munda, 1997;Spash, 1999;Woodgate & Redclift, 1998). Intentando un abordaje práctico, se pueden observar distintos tipos de estudios:…”

Probing the interfaces between the social sciences and social-ecological resilience: insights from integrative and hybrid perspectives in the social sciences

“…In contrast to "hybrid" perspectives, an ontological and conceptual separation of the social and nonhuman biophysical worlds is retained. Examples of such scholarship include Norgaard's (1984) concept of coevolution, Bunker's (1985Bunker's ( , 2003 and Bunker and Ciccantell's (1999) materio-spatial world systems/new historical materialist approach, Nauser and Steiner's (1993) human ecology, Crumley's (1994) historical ecology, Woodgate and Redclift's (1998) coevolution/social construction framework, Escobar's (1999) antiessentialist political ecology, Forsyth's (2001Forsyth's ( , 2003 and Forsyth and Evans' (2013) critical realist political ecology, Prew's (2003) notion of world-ecosystem, and Carolan's (2005) ecologically embedded sociology (regarding the nature-human dualism underpinning some of these works, see Ivakhiv 2002). Much of the postpositivist traditions in environmental subfields of the social sciences, e.g., ecological/environmental economics, and interdisciplinary fields, such as sustainability science, landchange sciences, global-change sciences, natural-hazards research, and vulnerability studies, can also be said to generally adopt an integrative approach (e.g., Burton et al 1978, Ostrom 1990, Blaikie et al 1994, Turner et al 2003, Sen 2004, Clark 2007, Dasgupta 2010, Kates 2011, Levin et al 2013).…”

“…As such, there is significant and in some instances intractable contestation around whether and how ecological systems, or the biophysical world, should be integrated into social theories, frameworks, and analyses. Space limits me from delving into these in more detail, but there are numerous overviews of the compatibilities and tensions among the diversity of naturehuman perspectives in the social sciences (for example, with regards to sociology, see Woodgate and Redclift 1998, Belsky 2002, Buttel 2002, White 2006, Dunlap and Marshall 2007, McLaughlin and Dietz 2008, Mol 2010, Catton 2012. Over the past two decades, in partial reaction to some strands of constructivism and to postmodernist perspectives, a contingent of social scientists have argued for bringing nature back in the social sciences (Catton 1992) and for "more engagement with ecological theory and ecological processes as they articulate with social processes in contingent, dynamic ways" (Nightingale 2002:1; see also Ivakhiv 2002, Zimmerer 2003, Carolan 2005, White 2006, Whatmore 2013).…”