Environment on the periphery of international relations: An explanation

Abstract

Media attention on Rio and its aftermath, coupled with growing academic interest among political scientists and international relations scholars in environmental issues, might suggest that the environment is now central to political activity within and between states. This seeming centrality of environmental concerns may be mistaken. Powerful reasons, essentially political in nature, may keep the environment on the periphery both within the practice of international relations, and within the academic subject of international relations. Academics studying the environment tend to work within a pluralist framework which assumes exactly what needs to be confronted. Both within the states‐system and within the academic discipline of international relations, there is a dominance of specific interests, such that proposing that the environment needs to be taken seriously threatens the whole edifice. Environmental scholars, and environmental issues, may be marginalised unless the fundamental relationship between knowledge and power is addressed.

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