Volume 54 Number 1 February 2023
Edited by: Lídia Cabral, Sérgio Sauer and Alex Shankland
Brazil is recognised as a world leader in the production of agri-food commodities in large, highly mechanised farms, but also as a centre of resistance movements advocating for land rights and food sovereignty. Brazil’s portrayal as a success story of agricultural modernisation is invariably linked to the expansion of the production frontier and, specifically, the conversion of the Cerrado region into industrial farmland.
A vast savannah zone in the centre of the country, the transformation of the Cerrado region has been driven by intensive soybean and livestock production for export. However, the Cerrado ‘miracle’ has come at a high cost. Besides the environmental impacts of land clearance and the removal of native vegetation, the expansion of the frontier has exacerbated poverty and injustice, deepening the historical inequality of land distribution and wealth.
This issue of the IDS Bulletin highlights the legacy of tensions in the Cerrado, arguing that this legacy cannot be ignored in debates on global agri-food systems to which the region is increasingly central. Authored mainly by early career scholars from Brazilian and British universities, the papers here offer new research and empirical material on the battles that have engulfed people and nature in the Cerrado. Three themes emerge: the logic of extraction in an agricultural frontier; the grabbing of natural resources in the name of sustainability; and conflicts and resistance movements.
This IDS Bulletin concludes with an agenda for research and action to reclaim the Cerrado, alongside other agricultural frontier territories across the world, as part of the global effort towards sustainable transformation of agri-food systems to secure justice for nature and people alike.
Volume 53 Number 4 December 2022
Edited by: Amber Huff and Lars Otto Naess
Despite a growing focus on the justice dimensions of climate and environmental change, this issue of the IDS Bulletin argues that there are still ‘blind spots’ in dominant mainstream approaches to climate and environmental justice. These approaches share a tendency to place growth, not ecology, nor climate, and certainly not justice, at the heart of the international policy agenda.
The articles in this issue bring together a range of empirically grounded studies that add to – and challenge – some of the dominant views and approaches, and unearth some key ‘hidden’ aspects of the justice dimensions of climate and environmental change. In particular, this IDS Bulletin highlights three major ‘blind spots’ in climate and environmental justice debates: a persistent failure to recognise diverse contexts and knowledges; continuing failure to sufficiently appreciate the deep-seated contestations around climate and environmental justice; and the risks associated with ‘recovery’ and ‘emergency’ mindsets driving climate and environmental policy agendas.
The articles offer principles to address those ‘blind spots’ in order to move towards more just and inclusive pathways for climate and environmental policy processes. In doing so, the articles recognise that there will be variation – across sites and social groups – in the needs, aspirations, and meaningful notions of justice for those who experience the greatest vulnerabilities in the face of change. True solutions may require that powerful political and economic actors’ interests are challenged or that dominant forms of ‘expertise’ are questioned. Approaches to climate and environmental justice must reject efforts to apply one-size-fits-all solutionism.
Volume 53 Number 3 July 2022
Edited by: Peter Taylor and Paul Knipe
Responding effectively to the Covid-19 crisis and in ways that address systemic inequalities in the longer term raises many challenges – and opportunities – for researchers and commissioners of research.
Launched in October 2020, the Covid Collective brought together the expertise of eight initial partner organisations coordinated by the Institute of Development Studies, and it currently involves 28 partners and supports 56 projects in 34 countries. The Covid Collective seeks to inform decision-making on some of the most pressing Covid-19-related development challenges, and to address emerging social science questions and needs arising in relation to the pandemic.
This issue of the IDS Bulletin draws on experiences from the social science research projects around the world supported by the Covid Collective and provides concrete examples of how researchers have demonstrated innovation and adaptation in a range of contexts. Important lessons have been learned about research processes and evolving technical approaches and methods in the areas around access and engagement; consent, ethics, and incentives; and power and perspectives.
This IDS Bulletin subsequently offers insights for research and provides potential directions for policy and decision-making around research prioritisation, funding, and support. It concludes that research supported by the Covid Collective is providing useful insights for ‘doing development research differently’, which in turn provides real hope for research to help transform knowledge and transform lives. Lessons will continue to be learned and, ultimately may also be an important contribution in ongoing efforts to the significant, critical agenda around decolonising development knowledge.
