Arthur P. J. Mol – författare

As the information revolution continues to accelerate, the environment remains high on public and political agendas around the world. These two topics are rarely connected, but information - its collection, processing, accessibility and verification - is crucial in dealing with environmental challenges such as climate change, unsustainable consumption, biodiversity conservation and waste management. The information society (encompassing entities such as the internet, satellites, interactive television and surveillance cameras) changes the conditions and resources which are involved in environmental governance: old modes and concepts are increasingly being replaced by new, informational ones. Arthur P. J. Mol explores how the information revolution is changing the way we deal with environmental issues; to what extent and where these transformations have (and have not) taken place; and what the consequences are for democracy and power relations. This book will appeal to scholars and students of environmental studies and politics, political sociology, geography and communications studies.

As the information revolution continues to accelerate, the environment remains high on public and political agendas around the world. These two topics are rarely connected, but information - its collection, processing, accessibility and verification - is crucial in dealing with environmental challenges such as climate change, unsustainable consumption, biodiversity conservation and waste management. The information society (encompassing entities such as the internet, satellites, interactive television and surveillance cameras) changes the conditions and resources which are involved in environmental governance: old modes and concepts are increasingly being replaced by new, informational ones. Arthur P. J. Mol explores how the information revolution is changing the way we deal with environmental issues; to what extent and where these transformations have (and have not) taken place; and what the consequences are for democracy and power relations. This book will appeal to scholars and students of environmental studies and politics, political sociology, geography and communications studies.

This accomplished book argues that we can only make sense of environmental issues if we consider them as part of a more encompassing process of social transformation. It asks whether there is an emerging consensus between social scientists on the central issues in the debate on environmental change, and if concerns about the environment constitute a major prop to the process of globalization?

The book provides a thorough discussion of the central themes in environmental sociology, identifying two traditions: ecological modernization theory and risk society theory.

For a long time in industrialized countries the state occupied a comfortable and unquestioned position in dealing with environmental problems. Since the 1960s we have witnessed the rather smooth institutionalization of environmental tasks in state policies and politics, leading to the emergence of the "environmental state". In the 1980s, the ideologies of deregulation and privatization formed the start of the debate on the environmental state and the 1990s left the debate facing new challenges. First, the debate became broader and more sophisticated, moving away from simple deregulation and privatization arguments and toward the issue of political modernization and reinventing government. Second, in addition to the ongoing debate on the environmental state within national boundaries, the processes of and political debates on globalization led to new challenges in the viability of the (nationally ordered) environmental-regulatory state. Third, the debate widened geographically, from Europe and the North American continent to the central and East-European countries undergoing transition away from centrally planned economies with all-dominating states, and to states in the so-called South. Various analytical frameworks and social theories are now being applied to understanding and evaluating the nature of these social processes, transformations and continuities related to the environmental state. This text provides a thorough examination of these issues with particular emphasis on the treadmill-of-production and the ecological modernization perspectives. The volume draws upon case studies and evidence from environmental states in the North American continent, Western Europe, Africa, Southeast and East Asia and Central and Eastern Europe.