Short Abstract:

The Workshop explores the dynamics of un/commoning of renewable energy sources and related energy landscapes. The focus is on the communal management of renewable energy sources, resistance movements, and new communities of solidarity that aim at creating more sustainable and resonant landscapes.

Long Abstract:

The Workshop explores processes and perceptions of un/commoning of renewable energy sources and related energy landscapes. Against the background of the climate and biodiversity crises, the accelerating transition to renewable energy sources on a global scale brings about a substantial transformation of (predominantly rural) landscapes in the Global South and the Global North. The creation of new energy landscapes as well as the resourcification of wind, solar or geothermal energy sources can lead to expropriation and the creation of “sacrifice zones”, as well as to dynamics of communal valorization. We suggest to examine these processes through the lens of un/commoning, by focusing on three interrelated issues: First, the practices and politics of communal management of renewable energy sources and related landscapes either in opposition or in addition to the state and private sector; second, resistance movements against an extractivist logic of implementing renewable energy sources, as well as against the drastic remodeling of landscapes; and third, by asking how these dynamics may lead to new communities of solidarity and responsibility that aim at creating more sustainable and resonant landscapes that benefit humans as well as non-human species. We are interested in contributions which focus on settings in both the Global South and Global North and examine the interrelations between energy landscapes and the un/commoning of renewable energy sources from contemporary and/or historical perspectives.

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