Admission Requirements
Basic eligibility, English high school course 6

Learning Outcomes
- define and describe critical contemporary development processes, and environmental issues such as water scarcity, food production, urbanisation and global health
- identify and exemplify contemporary environmental problems and describe causes and consequences of an array of environmental issues
- describe the complexity of global environmental issues.

Programme
Environment and Development 7,5 ECTS
The course examines problems linked to contemporary development processes and provides examples of linked environmental issues such as water scarcity, food production, urbanisation and global health. A North-South perspective is used in examining possible solutions to the issues analysed and discussed. Strategies for building sustainability in development are discussed.

References
Robbins,P. 2019 Political Ecology: A Critical Introduction. (3rd Edition) Wiley-Blackwell

Ref. Literature (available online):
Beltrán, M.J., Kotsila,P., García López, G., Velegrakis, G., I. Velicu (eds.) 2016. Political Ecology for Civil Society. ENTITLE ‐ European Network of Political Ecology. http://cdca.it/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/imp_political-ecology-for-civil-society-160519-WEB-1.pdf

Kothari, A., Salleh, A., Escobar, A., Demaria, F. and A. Acosta 2019. Pluriverse: A Post-Development Dictionary. New Delhi: Tulika Books. (only Editors Introduction, Finding Plurilversal Paths Available through the following link or as an e-book through the library or through https://degrowth.org/2018/04/14/new-book-pluriverse-a-post-development-dictionary/

Teaching Methodology
The course includes lectures, seminars, group work and literature tests, plus the submission of lecture summaries, seminar papers and proposed examination questions.

Language of the Curriculum and Course
English

ECTS Credits
7,5 ECTS

Examination Methodology
Written and oral examination

Relevance
This course highlights some of the important contributions that political ecology makes to the study of the environment. In the initial part of the course, foundational concepts of political ecology are explored, including its historical roots, its key targets of explanation, and critical conceptual viewpoints/tools, including perspectives from ecology, Marxist political economy, common property, peasant studies, environmental history, gender studies and post-colonial theory. A key topic of interests across these different viewpoints has been environmental change (often with a rural focus) and its relationship to marginality in the Global South (although not only). More recent political ecology scholarship also focusses on processes of globalisation, situatedness and the relationality of unjust environmental politics spanning urban and rural environments in the Global South and North. A focal point of many expression of political ecology is to illustrate how environmental change (through forces such as the ongoing commodification of nature) can have dramatically different consequences for various groups or individuals, which are mediated by political, social, and economic structures.