Writing the New West: A Critical Review*

Abstract

A vast and growing interdisciplinary research effort has focused on the rise of the so-called New West, purportedly the product of regional socioeconomic, political, and ecological upheavals in states like Montana and Colorado. Reviewing the growing research on this problem in sociology, economics, geography, and conservation science, this article identifies four central questions at the core of this diverse scholarship. Our review demonstrates that none of these central questions has generated consensus conclusions and that there is untapped potential for more structurally robust analyses of the drivers and outcomes of rapid change in the region. Indeed, supporting other analyses that have called the consistency of the region into question, our survey suggests the ways in which this region is not unique, but largely reflective of larger scale socioecological forces playing out in similar ways around the postindustrial world. We conclude, therefore, with a series of crucial questions, which may be unanswerable by assuming the ''New West'' as a coherent geography.

A life course approach to understanding social drivers of rangeland conversion

“…Increased migration into rural areas is the result of pull factors, including proximity to public lands, ski areas, and universities (Robbins et al 2009). Push factors include an individual's desire to experience the so-called rural lifestyle, the ability to telecommute to work, and the desire to avoid crowded urban areas.…”

“…Additional research has focused on the macroscale social influences on land use change, such as the broad economic and political forces that drive land use patterns, including the forces that drive rural landowners away from ranching (Robbins et al 2009). Sometimes termed "shifting capitalism," this literature focuses on the movement away from production-oriented land use toward consumption-oriented land use (Walker 2003).…”

Nordic political ecologies

“…Scholars of Nordic political ecologies, drawing on analysis of regionalscale changes in agricultural development, settlement dynamics, and shifting impacts of land investment and abandonment, stand to make wide ranging contributions to the wider field of political ecology by scaling up the lens of analysis and the scope of theory. In particular, Nordic landscape geography and its recent strong focus on the discourses and materialities of postproductivist landscapes offer insights that might be relevant in similar contexts around the globe, especially where agricultural production, forestry, and mining have given way to tourism, recreational development, and real estate speculation, as they have in the American West (Robbins et al 2009). The intellectual tradition of Nordic landscape geography therefore offers intriguing and unique potential contributions to political ecological discussions and debates.…”

Does the region still have relevance? (Re)considering "regional" political ecology

“…An explicitly regional approach could also serve to address broad questions about the development of a region, which then could be utilized by individual researchers. For example Jenkins (2016) examines conservation outcomes in the context of the resurgence of mining in the American West, addressing questions posed by Robbins et al (2009) in a critical review of literature on the New West. Galt (2010Galt ( , 2016 has also called for increasing comparative and regional approaches within political ecology through scaling up political ecology analysis to include multi-scale and multi-method approaches.…”