News

Departmental Seminar - The Environmental State in Latin America: Challenges and Dynamics in a Persistent Extractive Context

11 December 2024, at 4 p.m. c.t. - Institute for Political Science, Room 124 or online via Zoom

About the lecture: While “Environmental states” began to emerge in Latin American countries in the 1980s, studies have only sporadically explored the emergence and dynamics of specific environmental institutions and organizations in the region. The book project presented in this talk provides a systematic, theory-guided, and comparative perspective on the environmental state in Latin America. We argue that extractivism is one of the most critical forces influencing Latin American environmental states, because:
1) Extractivism exerts direct control over nature and natural resources;
2) Political elites in various Latin American countries have historically relied on extractivism as an economic development strategy;
3) Extractive economies give rise to a specific political economy characterized by politicians and business elites’ rent-seeking and weakened state agencies;
4) The influence from non-domestic actors in environmental governance. The Latin American region provides a unique opportunity to explore how environmental states can originate and perform under these specific conditions.

Maritza Paredes is a Senior Professor of Sociology in the Department of Social Sciences at Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú (PUCP). She holds a Ph.D. from the University of Oxford and a Master’s degree from Columbia University.

Bettina Schorr holds a PhD in Political Science from the Department of International Relations and Foreign Policy Analysis of the Universität zu Köln, Germany. Currently, she is a lecturer at the Institute for Latin American Studies at Freie Universität Berlin, Germany, and the program director of trAndeS – Advanced Studies on Inequalitities and Sustainable Development

Zoom Meeting ID: 930 8975 0663, Passcode: 142311

Eventflyer

PLURIVERSUM – Discourses for a Just Future with Prof. Teresa Vicente

16 October 2024, Start: 17:30, Admission: 17:00, Pfleghofsaal (Schulberg 2) Tübingen

Join us for an evening of exciting impulses from Prof. Teresa Vicente, who is largely responsible for the recognition of the first Rights of Nature case in Europe: Since 2022, the Mar Menor saltwater lagoon has had its own rights and is recognised as a legal entity. In 2020, Teresa launched the campaign that led to this and was able to collect 500,000 handwritten signatures for a bill that was then passed by the Spanish Senate. Teresa is a professor of philosophy of law in Murcia and received the ‘Green Nobel Prize’, Goldmann Prize for her commitment in 2024 (https://www.goldmanprize.org/recipient/teresa-vicente/). Teresa Vicente's campaign represents a revolutionary European precedent for the paradigm shift in political practice - the understanding of recognising nature as a subject.

The two hosts Alberto Acosta, former president of the Ecuadorian Constituent Assembly, and ex-diplomat Sandra Weiß will lead through the evening, Grupo Sal will accompany the programme with music and Johannes Keitel with his video art.

The multimedia event will be held in German and Spanish.

Admission is free and everyone is warmly invited!

We would like to thank the Global Encounters platform, the Chair of ‘Political Struggles in the Global South’ of JP Dr Riccarda Flemmer and the Chair of Ethics, Theory, and History of the Life Sciences (MNF) of Prof Dr Thomas Potthast as well as the German Postcode Lottery, the Weltethos Institute, FAIRStrickt, Terre des Femme, Club Voltaire, xäls and the ESG Tübingen for their kind support.

Funded as part of the Excellence Strategy of the federal and state governments.

Performance Art and Science Lecture in and with the Forest

On 20 and 21 July in Kirnbachtal Schönbuch

The lecture and the dance performance (traces) invite you to the forest Schönbuch to experience different perspectives on human-nature relations.

Artist Jakob Jautz will show traces, a land art, dance and circus performance in and with a forest. It guides you along interactive, installatory, and performative stations through a landscape of wonder.

Junior Professor Dr Riccarda Flemmer, Institute of Political Science, University of Tübingen, will share insights into the global Rights of Nature movement, a leading agent to resist extractive industries and to politically change our planetary socio-ecological relations.

Registration: project.tracesspam prevention@gmail.com

Price: donation based

Location: Kirnbachtal Schönbuch (directions on how to get to the meeting point will be sent by e-mail after registration)

When:

Sat, 20 July 2024, 12 - approx. 2 pm in German and 6 - approx. 8 pm in English

Sun, 21 July 2024, 12 - approx. 2 pm in English and 6 - approx. 8 pm in German

You can find more information in the event flyer

Cine Latino - Reading and Panel Discussion

04 May at Liquid - Kelter Tübingen

1:00 p.m. READING: NATURE HAS RIGHTS (with the author Elisabeth Weydt)

When animals, forests and rivers go to court - for a radical rethink in the coexistence of humans and nature. We are on the brink of ecological collapse and time to change direction is running out. Paradoxically, a helpful remedy here could be a very protracted one: Changing our legal systems and worldviews: declaring nature a legal subject. Ecuador is the first and so far only country to have enshrined this idea in its constitution. Accordingly, nature is not only worth protecting here because it serves mankind, but simply because it exists. Taken to its logical conclusion, this idea can turn everything around: Our economy, our transport, our lives. Many initiatives around the world are working on its realisation, including in Germany. Journalist Elisabeth Weydt has been researching raw material extraction and land rights in Ecuador and other countries. In impressive stories, analyses, and portraits, she reports on the people who are translating this idea into reality and on the web of economic entanglements that make this difficult.

5:30 p.m. PANEL DISCUSSION: PEOPLE AND MOUNTAINS IN HARMONY? - CHANGE IN THE ANDEAN ALTIPLANO

Panel discussion on the thematic focus with Leonardo Barbuy La Torre (director), Rodrigo Otero Heraud (director), Alberto Acosta (Ecuadorian economist, politician), Fernando Dias Costa (musician) and Elisabeth Weydt (journalist, freelance reporter and author). Moderated by Riccarda Flemmer (Junior Professor of Political Science).

Find the full Cine Latino program here.

"Lawyers of nature" The rights of nature as a theater performance

Save the Date! January 23 at 20h at LTT - in cooperation with the University of Tübingen

Lawyers of nature
Theater performance in cooperation with the University of Tübingen at LTT

Do trees have rights? - When Christopher D. Stone posed this question 50 years ago, it sounded almost naive, or at least innocent. But in view of the current ecological threats, the rights of nature could prove to be a decisive lever for putting a stop to disastrous developments such as the climate crisis and the extinction of species. For this reason, more and more states are declaring individual actors of nature to be legal subjects. In 2022, for example, the Rivière Magpie in Canada and the Mar Menor saltwater lagoon in Spain were granted the status of legal entities. Are we at the beginning of a huge cultural transformation movement?

In Lawyers of Nature, conférencieuse Carrie Getman de Agudo, accompanied by music legend Kevin Mooney, embarks on a tour d'horizon to examine the changing relationship between nature and law. The planned visit soon develops into a wild journey that leads not only into the past and present but also into the future. With the traditional concept of an object-like nature, the historical continuum that leads from the dark zones of the mythical ages into the light-flooded world of omniscient rationality also collapses.

Frank Raddatz: writer, director and artistic director of the Theatre of the Anthropocene, which is based on Humboldt's idea that only an intact bond between man and nature, woven from knowledge and experience, empathy and emotion, can form the basis of a sustainable civilization.
In cooperation with the University of Tübingen, Riccarda Flemmer Professorship "Political Struggles in the Global South" and funded as part of the Excellence Strategy of the German federal and state governments.

Get your tickets here! Admission price: 12 euros, reduced 7 euros

Lecture by Prof Dr Riccarda Flemmer & Dr Matthias Kramm: "Why nature should have rights"

24 January 2024, 19:00 to 20:30 in the Munich Zukunftssalon

Nature is increasingly being granted its own rights. In this way, endangered forests, rivers and lakes are to be better protected against harmful environmental impacts caused by humans. The proposal dates back to the early 1970s, but was only implemented in 2008 when Mother Nature ("Pacha Mama") was granted her own rights as part of a constitutional amendment in Ecuador.

In the meantime, other Latin American countries, as well as New Zealand and the USA, have introduced such rights for certain ecosystems. Indigenous movements and philosophies have often played a decisive role in this. In 2022, Spain became the first European country to follow suit and recognise the Mar Menor saltwater lagoon as a legal entity.

The lecture shows how the idea of the rights of nature came about, how it has gained momentum over the last 15 years and how it can help us to better protect nature and endangered ecosystems in the future. The two speakers will be travelling through various countries and continents and presenting specific applications and initiatives.

Riccarda Flemmer is a junior professor at the University of Tübingen and a political scientist specialising in political movements for the rights of nature in the Global South and North.

Matthias Kramm is a political philosopher and researches the rights of nature in Mexico at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México and at Wageningen University in the Netherlands.

Hybrid event (presence/online) at the Münchner Zukunftssalon, Goethestr. 28, Munich, 80336
Register here!

PLURIVERSUM - Voices from around the world - discourses for a just future"

October 19, 2023 at 6:30 p.m., in the Alte Aula (Münzgasse 30, 72072 Tübingen)

exciting impulses of the editors Arturo Escobar, Ashish Kothari, Ariel Salleh as well as the winner of the Alternative Nobel Prize Nnimmo Bassey, with moderation by Alberto Acosta and Sandra Weiss, passionate music by Grupo Sal, and video projection art by Johannes Keitel!

The final and highlight of the fall tour will be the release of the German language edition of "PLURIVERSUM - An Encyclopedia of Good Living."

The multimedia event will take place in German and English on October 19, 2023 at 6:30 pm, in the Alte Aula (Münzgasse 30, 72072 Tübingen). Admission is free and everyone is very welcome!

Knowledge LAB "Critical Perspectives on Rights of Nature in South-North Dialogue"

14 -16 September 2023

The Knowledge LAB "Critical Perspectives on Rights of Nature in South-North Dialogue" should serve as an experimental thinking event engaging critical voices from the Global South and North in exploring Rights of Nature (RoN). The intention of the LAB is to create synergies in thinking about the different types of knowledges as well as the ontological, moral, and political underpinnings of RoN and other forms of transformative activism in order to better understand their differences and sameness. Central questions focus on understandings of "nature", "human", and "human-nature relations" providing starting points from where we then think together how and why indigenous, leftist/anarchists, far-rights, or liberal thoughts about RoN, or human-nature relationships in general, are similar or different. The objective of the workshop is to reflect on ongoing and planned research, including the conceptual and methodological research design of a larger research project by the applicant.

The LAB is organized in the framework of the project: “The Transformative Potential of Rights of Nature? Struggling for Alternatives to Destructive Anthropocentric Development” funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and the Baden-Württemberg Ministry of Science as part of the Excellence Strategy of the German Federal and State Governments

Become part of the Pluriverse!

More than 120 authors* present diverse economic, socio-political, cultural and ecological concepts, worldviews and practices from around the world. "Post-Development" questions the prevailing Western development model and presents alternatives that protect and respect life on Earth: A Pluriverse of Many Possible Worlds, encompassing a variety of system critiques and ways of living.

This encyclopedia aims to re-politicise the ongoing debate on socio-ecological transformation by highlighting its multi-layered nature.

3° South-North Knowledge Dialogue: Forests-Bosques-Sacha-Wälder

Join us for our 3° South-North Knowledge dialogue on 6th June from 6-8pm in Tübingen!
Adress/Dirección: Münzgasse 22-30, 72070 Tübingen (Alte Aula)

Not in town? For online participation via zoom please register here.

2° Knowledge Dialogue: Mountains-Montañas-Apus-Berge

15.06.2023 at/ a las 18:15-20:00hrs

Join us for our 2° South-North Knowledge dialogue on 15th June at 6.15-8.00pm in Tübingen!

Adress/Dirección:

Schloss Hohentübingen 72070 Tübingen; Room/Salón: Ernst von Sieglin Hörsaal

Not in town? E-mail us for online participation via zoom: ronresearchspam prevention@ifp.uni-tuebingen.de

1° Water-Ríos-Lagunas-Gewässer

Knowledge Dialogues between Latin America and Europe about Rights of Nature”

The trailer for our first South-North Knowledge Dialogue is now available! Click here for the video

Blog Launch 24th May

Stay tuned and check out our new Blog format on RoN

Follow Jun.-Prof. Dr. Riccarda Flemmers' Research on the transformative potential of Rights of Nature here.

Knowledge Dialogue between Latin America and Europe - 1° Water-Ríos-Lagunas-Gewässer

04.05.2023 at/ a las 18:00-20:00hrs

Join us for our South-North Knowledge Dialogue

on 4th May at 6-8pm in Tübingen!

Adress/Dirección:

Brechtbau Wilhelmstr. 50 72074 Tübingen

Room/Salón: 027

Not in town? E-mail us for online participation via zoom: ronresearchspam prevention@ifp.uni-tuebingen.de

22nd May 2023: Lecture of the RIFS focal topic year 2023 “Justice in Sustainability” with Riccarda Flemmer

“Rights of Nature and their Transformative Potential for more Sustainable Futures? Struggling for Alternatives to Destructive Anthropocentric Development”

May lecture of the RIFS focal topic year 2023 “Justice in Sustainability” with Riccarda Flemmer: “Rights of Nature and their Transformative Potential for more Sustainable Futures? Struggling for Alternatives to Destructive Anthropocentric Development”

Join us online on 22.05.2023 at 15:00-16:30 (CEST).

please register here: https://eveeno.com/riccardaflemmer

Abstract: Rights of Nature (RoN) denotes nature’s inherent right to exist and flourish. Inspired by indigenous ontologies, RoN have seen the recognition of rivers, mountains and forests as living beings in Latin America, former British colonies and inspired a fast-growing political movement worldwide. RoN’s transformative promise is a new mind set respecting human as well as non-human living beings as agents and to tackle one of the most pressing issues we are facing today: the emancipatory transformation of destructive and deeply unjust anthropocentric development models. This talk gives an innovative perspective on socio-environmental conflicts by (re)conceptualising them within the framework of ‘ontological politics’. Scaling-up insights on indigenous peoples’ understandings of nature and how these are mobilised in resistance to projects of resource extraction, development or conservation imposed on their territories, the lecture concludes with a research agenda to explore the potential of RoN in Latin America, Europe as well as in global climate activism to yield legal and institutional models for more sustainable and just human–nature relations.

Pluriverso: Voices from around the world - discourses for a just future!

May 5, 2023 in Tübingen!

PLURIVERSUM combines alternative development impulses and information from all over the world with high-quality music and fascinating projections to create an extraordinary multimedia event!

Together with the journalist Sandra Weiss, Alberto Acosta and Grupo Sal the event invites a prominent personality from a different region of the world each evening to present and discuss forward-looking thoughts, ideas and concepts.

The thematic presentations will be musically framed by the Grupo Sal - who embedds the content in an aesthetic context of visual and thematic condensation by the projection artist Johannes Keitel.

The evening covers and discusses sibjects such as: Climate justice, human rights, rights of nature, strengthening civil societies, bearing witness to current conflicts, building bridges between Global South and Global North, new concepts, new perspectives, participation, rights of indigenous peoples, new social movements, disruptive developments. Altogether under the motto: "What urgently needs to be done to change the world and make it more just."

Join us on 5 May 2023 at 19:30 in the Westspitze Saal 1 in Tübingen! More information here.

Crowdfunding for new book "Rights for Rivers, Mountains and Forests"

With this book we show how the idea of nature's rights came into being, how it gained more and more momentum and how it can help us in the future to protect nature and endangered ecosystems. Nature is increasingly being granted its own rights. Nature rights help endangered ecosystems in particular to defend themselves against harmful economic interests. Since their introduction into the Ecuadorian constitution in 2008, rights of nature have been introduced in Bolivia, India, Canada, Colombia, Mexico, New Zealand and the USA, among others. Most recently in Spain to protect a saltwater lagoon.

Support us now in publishing and making the book available Open Access! Find the crowdfunding campaign here.

Workshop Report "The Transformative Potential of Rights of Nature?" Out now!

We are very happy to present the final report on the workshop "Transformative Potential of Rights of Nature?" which took place in Tübingen, Germany From the 20th to 21st January 2023. It was an amazing experience to hear from and bring together diverse perspectives from the Pacific, Europe and Latin America. We also feel extremely privileged to have had the visual artist Alessandra Zaffiro from Housatonic with us who created graphic protocols as “visual harvests” of our sessions. Please check out the results of this fruitful event in our workshop report which is now available for download here.

Workshop on “The Transformative Potential of Rights of Nature?”

20th and 21st January 2023 in Tübingen, Germany

From the 20th to 21st January 2023, the workshop "Transformative Potential of Rights of Nature?" will bring together indigenous and non-indigenous academic and activist actors from different parts of the world (Europe, Latin America and the Pacific) to speak about the prospects and limitations of guaranteeing nature own rights, especially to forests. The aim of this event is to engage in a critical discussion about rights of nature and think about potential collaborative research perspectives.

For more info please contact: Riccarda.flemmerspam prevention@uni-tuebingen.de

New Publication in The Routledge Handbook of Indigenous Development: "The Implementation Paradox" (Flemmer 2022)

Flemmer, Riccarda (2022): ‘The Implementation Paradox. Ambiguities of Prior Consultation and Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) for Indigenous Peoples’ Agency in Resource Extraction in Latin America.’ In The Routledge Handbook of Indigenous Development, herausgegeben von Nancy Postero and John-Andrew McNeish. London: Routledge. (Online First)

Across the world, Indigenous peoples contend with national development models dependent on the extraction of natural resources. One of the bloodiest conflicts over resource extraction in Indigenous territories took place in Peru in 2009. This chapter argues that the ‘implementation paradox’ of prior consultation and Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) can best be understood by focusing on Indigenous peoples’ agency and studying political struggles over the contested normative meaning of Indigenous international rights. It highlights Indigenous peoples’ contestation to prior consultation and FPIC, bringing together contestation literature from critical International Relations with insights from anthropology, political ecology, and decolonial studies on law. The chapter begins with a brief conceptual overview of prior consultation and FPIC as international norms, highlighting that their interpretations are deeply entangled and highly ambiguous.

New Book chapter: "Luchas de pueblos indígenas, académicos y las “políticas de la traducción" (Flemmer 2022)

Flemmer, Riccarda (2022): ‘Luchas de pueblos indígenas, académicos y las “políticas de la traducción”.’ In Otro Derecho es Posible: Diálogo de Saberes y Nuevos Estudios Militantes del Derecho en América Latina, edited by Orlando Aragón Andrade und Erika Bárcena Arévalo. Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México: Morelia, 221–235. (Open Access)

Global Encounters Lecture Series

July 14, 2022

On 26th July, Jun.-Prof. Dr. Riccarda Flemmer will hold the inaugural lecture "The Transformative Potential of Rights of Nature: Struggling for Alternatives to Destructive Anthropocentric Development" under the Global Encounters Lecture Series. The event will take place at 6 p.m. in Neue Aula - Großer Senat.

Inaugural Lecture "The Transformative Potential of Rights of Nature: Struggling for Alternatives to Destructive Anthropocentric Development"

July 1, 2022

On 6th July, Jun.-Prof. Riccarda Flemmer will hold the inaugural lecture "The Transformative Potential of Rights of Nature: Struggling for Alternatives to Destructive Anthropocentric Development". The event will take place in the IfP, room 124 from 16-18h.

CIVIS Summer School

June 29, 2022

Between 26-30 September, the University of Tübingen will hold "The Pluriverse: Challenges of Post- Developmentalist Thought for Global South Studies" where theoretical debates will be combined with scholars from the CIVIS network with a dialogue between academia, art, and political activism. Apply by 3rd July.