Construction nature - Elements for a post-structuralist political ecology

This paper argues for the development of a poststructuralist political ecology, While political ecology studies the relationships between society and nature in contexts of power-particularly from the perspective of political economy-this study, it is proposed, must include a consideration of the discourses and practices through which nature is historically produced and known. The paper examines the complex cultural and discursive articulations between natural and social systems established by capital and technoscience, particularly through discourses of sustainable development and biodiversity conservation. The paper concludes with the implications of the analysis for imagining alternative productive rationalities in conjunction with social movements. (C) 1996 Elsevier Science Ltd