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Presentation short abstract

The paper focuses on how ecofascism and authoritarian developmentalism have led to polarisation, inequality and ecological harm. It looks at experiences and challenges from below to understand strategies for survival and resistance in the face of growing repression and dispossession.

Presentation long abstract

In the current expansion of authoritarian rule, India forms a paradigmatic case. Despite impressive ‘economic growth’, a particular kind of authoritarian developmentalism is intensifying processes of polarisation and growing inequalities with the State increasingly co-opting institutions and policies to the detriment of basic liberties and rights amidst consolidation of unbridled power. This paper looks at the Gujarat Model of Development which underpins these trends. This model is often attributed to the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, originating in his home state Gujarat where he was Chief Minister from 2002 – 2014, and expanding nationally after he came India’s Prime Minister in 2014. Taking the case of the controversial Sardar Sarovar (Narmada) dam, one of the earliest examples of this model, and other infrastructure projects in Gujarat, this paper examines how a capitalist intensive approach to addressing livelihood, water and food security has led to the manufacture of singular/ authoritarian solutions that have drowned out alternative perspectives. In doing so top-down infrastructure-led development is increasingly associated with ethno-nationalism, majoritarianism, masculinity, authoritarian populism, increasing inequality and a toxic state-capital nexus. These have legitimised ethno-religious agendas and the dispossession of minorities, Adivasis (Indigenous people) as well as poor resource users ( pastoralists, fishers, farmers) from their livelihood base and commons. The paper explores how these authoritarian practices and the Gujarat model are experienced and also challenged from below with an aim to understand strategies for survival and resistance in the face of increasing repression and dispossession.

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Presentation short abstract

In this presentation, I draw on in-depth interviews with current and former U.S. federal workers to trace ecologies of resistance within federal agencies. I highlight strategies used inside and outside agencies to navigate political interference, institutional constraints, and uphold democracy.

Presentation long abstract

What happens when far-right authoritarianism infiltrates the very agencies designed to protect public goods and the environment? Upon Trump’s inauguration in January 2025, a deliberate effort to reshape, and in many ways, dismantle key U.S. federal agencies began. Agencies across the board have been impacted, but those working on public health, the environment, humanitarian aid, and disaster response are particularly vulnerable. In March 2025, the Environmental Justice Office of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was terminated, resulting in the elimination of millions of dollars of funding aimed at alleviating environmental injustices, key research programs, and hundreds of dedicated staff members. Climate science research has also been heavily targeted, including removing climate data websites, cutting funding, and the EPA has shifted to an increasingly de-regulatory environment. Yet, these actions have not occurred without resistance. In this presentation, I draw on in-depth interviews conducted with current and former federal workers to trace ecologies of resistance emerging from within and outside of federal agencies. I describe different mechanisms of resisting far-right authoritarianism, including accounts from those who have stayed with their agency and those who have sought to take their work elsewhere due to political interference. Moving beyond accounts that treat the state as a monolith, I highlight how bureaucrats operate under—and adapt to—significant legal, institutional, financial, and political constraints. Findings expand existing knowledge on how bureaucrats navigate tensions between institutional mandates, political directives, and their own ethical commitments, developing a more nuanced understanding of the possibilities of bureaucratic insurgency and resistance.

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Presentation short abstract

This paper analyses the farmers protests in Europe in 2023-25 in light of the rise of right-wing populism. It examines the strategies employed by far-right groups to co-opt farmers' protests, as well as the farmers' responses to these co-optations.

Presentation long abstract

The farmers’ protests of 2023–25 were the largest in the history of the European Union. Starting sporadically in different countries across Europe, they soon spread and gained momentum, fuelled by common issues in the EU: falling farm incomes, rising production costs, unfair competition from non-EU imports, and mounting red tape and environmental regulations. The farmers’ protests would likely have remained solely about agricultural and trade policies if right-wing populist and far-right groups had not joined the protesters. Populists have exploited farmers’ discontent for their own political gain. Although farmers’ unions and other organisations taking part in the protests were against the involvement of far-right groups and tried to distance themselves from them, the farmers protests 2023-25 became associated with the rise of right-wing populism in Europe.

This paper aims to analyse the overlap in timing and demands between protesters and right-wing populists. It examines the strategies employed by far-right groups to co-opt farmers' protests, as well as the farmers' responses to these co-optations. The paper is based on discourse analysis of public speeches, slogans, and protest posters of both farmers (and their representatives) and right-wing populists. It discusses successful attempts by farmers to distance themselves from far-right groups, as well as failed attempts that led to co-optation and merger with populists. The paper concludes with a number of strategic recommendations for tackling populist involvement in protests from within.

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Presentation short abstract

This paper examines environmental contestation of the repeal of the world’s only blanket ban on mining, which occurred against the backdrop of one of the largest swaps for nature by an authoritarian government that combines conservation and extraction with punitive and securitarian imaginaries.

Presentation long abstract

This paper explores environmental contestation in El Salvador against the backdrop of one of the world’s largest swaps for nature by a government that is highly mediatic and popular yet also authoritarian and repressive. Using digital ethnography and media research, we examine the repeal of a mining ban and the resulting mobilisation involving manifold uses of the law. Environmental resistance has faced complex challenges since the government of El Salvador removed checks and balances, undid the separation of powers, and declared a state of emergency that has become the country’s governing system. In 2024, prior to the UN Biodiversity Conference (CBD COP16), the world’s largest swap for nature to benefit a river basin, which consisted of a complex financial operation involving the governments of El Salvador and the USA as well as financial organisations, was announced. The government of El Salvador committed to investing in the protection of the Lempa River basin. However, soon after it repealed the world’s only blanket ban on mining and announced its intention to facilitate mining investment affecting the same river basin. We argue that this parallel move is not a policy contradiction, but rather part of a form of ‘environmentalism’ that presents extraction as being compatible with conservation through compensations and green accounting, combined with punitive and securitarian imaginaries. Such far-right and authoritarian ‘environmentalisms’ are rendering the actions of environmental movements increasingly illegitimate. Re-legitimising these actions and promoting alternative futures has called for forms of contestation that highlight the paradoxes of such ‘environmentalisms’.

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Presentation short abstract

The presentation outlines the connections between different forms of social control mechanisms that emerge around the environmental and social harms caused by an EV battery factory in a Hungarian town, with a particular emphasis on the factors that contribute to the suppression of local resistance.

Presentation long abstract

How do local residents perceive the environmental harm and social conflict caused by an EV battery factory operating in their neighbourhood? What tools are available to the local civil organization, and what hinders their activities? The presentation outlines the points of connection between different forms of social control mechanisms that emerge around environmental harm, with particular emphasis on the factors that make mobilization difficult and contribute to the suppression of local resistance in an authoritarian context. The theoretical background of the presentation integrates social control theory into a green-cultural criminological framework, distinguishing between formal control (laws and institutions) and informal control (local resistance) of environmental harm. The case study illustrates how green transition policies can themselves generate new environmental harms and social conflicts, while the state prioritizes economic interests over environmental protection and public health. Due to weak institutional control, local resistance becomes the primary informal mechanism for addressing harm, yet authorities and corporate actors employ legal, administrative, rhetorical, and soft control tools to suppress it.

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Presentation short abstract

This workshop presents the concepts and learnings from FARN’s educational project countering authoritarian capture in rural socio-ecological transformation conflicts. Participants map transformation struggles from their contexts, analyse far-right narratives, and develop dialogical interventions.

Presentation long abstract

This interactive workshop presents the German educational organization FARN and its pilot project “Region in Transition: Understanding Conflicts, Shaping Dialogues, Strengthening Cohesion” as a concrete practice example of resistance to far-right authoritarianism in rural socio-ecological conflicts in Germany. Rooted in radicalisation prevention within nature and environmental protection, the project responds to authoritarian, nationalist and fossilist backlash against climate and transformation policies by empowering local multipliers to work conflict-transformatively and democratically.

The workshop foregrounds how socio-ecological transformation conflicts become key terrains for authoritarian capture and counter-hegemonic organising. A concise input introduces FARN’s approach, which links conflict research, environmental psychology and political education to train actors from civil society, municipalities and small and medium-sized enterprises to analyse transformation conflicts, recognise far-right and conspiracist narratives, and design values-based dialogues that strengthen democratic cultures in their regions.

Participants then work in groups to map transformation conflicts from their own research or home regions and identify how far-right actors exploit these arenas for their political projects. Inspired by the Region in Transition model, the groups sketch dialogical and educational interventions that can build local resilience and solidarity. The workshop thus functions as a translocal laboratory for thinking political ecology together with concrete practices of democratic resistance to far-right authoritarian projects in contested rural futures.