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Impact of Environmental Struggles and Political Theorizing on the Notion of Justice

A Study of the Dialogical Relations between Political Struggles against the Corporatization of Ground Water and the Political Theorization on ‘Rights’, ‘Justice’ and ‘Citizenship’

Researcher: T. Kannan

The study tries not only to address how the ongoing environmental struggles are influencing the political theory to emerge with some green political theoretical notions but also tries to understand how these changing theoretical notions of green political theory is influencing in turn the political articulations of the environmental movements. The present study understands the dialogic relationship that exists between environmental struggles and political theorization by analyzing the political struggles against the corporatization and commercialization of ground water in Kerala and Tamil Nadu. The dominant voice of the commercialization of water, conceives water as an economic good that must be priced in market terms, not only to maintain the financial viability of water utilities, but also to reflect the “real” value of water, and to promote equity and resource sustainability. This view is contested and opposed by the affected local communities and civil society organizations. The political mobilization of the local communities in defence of their rights against the commercialization and corporatization has led to a significant paradigm shift in the articulation of notions of ‘Rights’, ‘Justice’ and ‘Citizenship’. The existing political theorizations on these notions have hardly any space for the ecological concerns of the new environmental movements. The critical positions of environmental political theory on the existing liberal notions of political obligation, citizenship, justice and rights can bring some new insights into the understanding of the emerging new environmental consciousness. The present study makes one such attempt to throw some new lights on emerging green political consciousness.

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