Contribution short abstract

Social-ecological transformation involves restructuring and reducing the social metabolism, but this process is highly contested. Bridging socio-metabolic and political ecology research, this contribution introduces a typology of socio-ecological transformation conflicts.

Contribution long abstract

From a socio-ecological perspective, transformation refers to both a qualitative restructuring and a quantitative reduction of social metabolism, but this transformation is highly – and increasingly – contested. Socio-metabolic research has so far argued that an increasing social metabolism also leads to more conflicts. The EJOLT Atlas, for example, has linked “ecological distribution conflicts” to increases in socio-metabolic processes around the world. Political ecology, in turn, has emphasized the political-economic structures as well as the discursive or onto-epistemic relations in which transformation pathways and respective conflicts unfold but lacks more detailed references to biophysical and socio-metabolic processes. This contribution builds on social metabolism and political ecology research to propose a typology of socio-ecological transformation conflicts that captures both the socio-metabolic dimension and the transformation dimension of such conflicts. This helps a) to better understand both the productive and obstructive role of conflicts and b) carve out the potentials and barriers for transformative change. From such a perspective, contemporary transformation processes are especially contested because they are not only about the introduction of new technologies, infrastructure or sectors (i.e., an increasing social metabolism) but at the same time about the phase-out and termination of fossil fuels and environmentally destructive resource use, technology and sectors (i.e., the reduction and qualitative transformation of the social metabolism).