Grassroots Ecologies of Value: Environmental Conflict and Social Reproduction in Southern Italy

Antonio Maria Pusceddu

doi:10.1111/anti.12609

Abstract

AbstractIn this article I examine socio‐environmental conflicts through the category of value. Drawing from a single case study, an industrial city in southern Italy, I address the revaluation projects underpinning the conflict around socio‐ecological arrangements that are considered unfair, unsustainable and detrimental to life. Focusing on the trajectory of local environmentalism and the specific case of a women group, the article shows how the intensification of the socio‐ecological crisis prompted the shift of environmental conflicts from the sphere of production to the broader relations of social reproduction. I propose to analyse this shift through the concept of grassroots ecologies of value, which outlines a framework for thinking about how people deal with the socio‐environmental contradictions in which they live, and their struggles for dignity and worth.

Highlights

In this article, I analyse socio-environmental conflicts through the category of value
Towards a Revaluation Project The narrative articulated by the environmentalist movement in Brindisi configures a grassroots ecology of value that prioritizes the redefinition of local social arrangements, which had been shaped and affected by the presence and activity of heavy industry complexes
Looking at the trajectory of the local environmentalist movement, the article has suggested that this revaluation project unfolds within the fundamental shift from production to reproduction, as the expanded realm of socio-environmental struggles

Summary

Introduction

I analyse socio-environmental conflicts through the category of value. Grassroots ecologies of value can, incorporate notions of socio-ecological worth as a component of social metabolism and make them visible within the larger dominant relations mediated by capitalist value.13 the framework addresses the plural forms through which the inner logics of capital accumulation can be contested and questioned by valuation practices grounded in the dilemmas of working people regarding their livelihoods and social reproduction.

Results

Conclusion