1st Edition

Brazil in the Anthropocene Conflicts between predatory development and environmental policies

Edited By Liz-Rejane Issberner, Philippe Léna Copyright 2017
    368 Pages
    by Routledge

    384 Pages
    by Routledge

    Brazil is considered one of the world’s most important environmental powers. With a continental territory containing almost 70 per cent of the Amazon rainforest, along with a rich biodiversity and huge amount of natural resources, its geopolitical role in environmental decisions is crucial to ongoing global negotiations surrounding climate change.

    Development policies based on extraction and exportation of raw materials by the mining and agribusiness sectors threaten the global environmental balance and the long-term sustainability of Brazil’s economy. Brazil in the Anthropocene examines Brazil's role within the global ecological crisis and considers how national and international policy is influenced by the interdependence of social, political, ethical, scientific and economic factors in the modern age.

    With chapters from a diverse range of international scholars this interdisciplinary volume will be of great interest to students and scholars of environmental politics, environmental sociology and the environmental humanities.

    Anthropocene in Brazil: an inquiry into development

    obsession and policy limits
    PHILIPPE LÉNA AND LIZ-REJANE ISSBERNER

    PART I

    Development dynamics and social-environmentalcontradictions

    1 Brazil in the history of the Anthropocene
    JOSÉ AUGUSTO PÁDUA

    2 Population, development and environmental degradationin Brazil
    JOSÉ EUSTÁQUIO DINIZ ALVES AND GEORGE MARTINE

    3 The Amazon before the Brazilian environmental issue
    VIOLETA REFSKALEVSKY LOUREIRO

    4 Deregulation, relocation and environmental confl ict –considerations on the control of social demands in contemporary Brazil
    HENRI ACSELRAD AND GUSTAVO NEVES BEZERRA

    5 Markets or the Commons? the role of indigenous peoples,traditional communities and sectors of the peasantry in the environmental crisis
    JEAN-PIERRE LEROY

    PART II

    Controversy and disinformation

    6 Planned disinformation: the example of the Belo Monte dam as a source of greenhouse gases
    PHILIP M. FEARNSIDE

    7 Biosafety regulations and practices and consequences in Brazil: who wants to hide the problems?
    LEONARDO MELGAREJO

    8 Tax incentive for pesticides: a debate on its(un)constitutionality from the environmental rule of lawand the environmental public order
    JOÃO ALFREDO TELLES MELO AND GEOVANA DE OLIVEIRA PATRÍCIO MARQUES

    PART III

    Facing the consequences of climate change

    9 From co-leader to loner: Brazilian wavering positions in climate change negotiations
    LARISSA BASSO AND EDUARDO VIOLA

    10 From environmental information to precaution in the face of environmental risks: an analysis of Brazil’s National Policy on Climate Change and rulings by higher courts
    CARLOS JOSÉ SALDANHA MACHADO AND RODRIGO MACHADO VILANI

    11 Shaping up Brazil’s long-term development considering climate change impacts
    SÉRGIO MARGULIS AND NATALIE UNTERSTELL

    12 Pathways to a low carbon economy in Brazil
    EMILIO LÈBRE LA ROVERE, CLAUDIO GESTEIRA, CAROLINA GROTERA AND WILLIAM WILLS

    13 Financing sustainability: where has all the money gone?
    LADISLAU DOWBOR

    14 Climate change and the integration of public policies
    MARCEL BURSZTYN AND MARIA AUGUSTA BURSZTYN

    15 Environment policy and governance in Brazil: challenges and prospects
    ADRIANA MARIA MAGALHÃES DE MOURA

    16 Collective forest reserves in agrarian reform settlements: measures to prevent a non-commons tragedy in the Brazilian Amazon
    PETER MAY, ROBERT DAVENPORT, PEDRO NOGUEIRA AND PAULO CÉSAR NUNES

    Are the multiple social-ecological initiatives the sign of apolitical and cultural shift?
    PHILIPPE LÉNA AND LIZ-REJANE ISSBERNER

    Biography

    Liz-Rejane Issberner, Philippe Léna

    In this important new book, the editors and authors make creative and insightful use of the Anthropocene concept as a way of understanding Brazil as a totality, while shedding new light on the concept itself. The volume represents a vital intellectual convergence essential for anyone wanting to grasp the changing Brazilian dispensation. Clive Hamilton, Professor of Public Ethics at the Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics, Charles Sturt University in Canberra, Australia, co-editor of The Anthropocene and Global Environmental Crisis