Contested imaginaries and the cultural political economy of climate change
Abstract
This article analyses the evolving cultural political economy of climate change by developing the concept of ‘climate imaginaries’. These are shared socio-semiotic systems that structure a field around a set of shared understandings of the climate. Climate imaginaries imply a particular mode of organizing production and consumption, and a prioritization of environmental and cultural values. We use this concept to examine the struggle among NGOs, business and state agencies over four core climate imaginaries. These are ‘fossil fuels forever’, ‘climate apocalypse’, ‘techno-market’ and ‘sustainable lifestyles’. These imaginaries play a key role in contentions over responses to climate change, and we outline three main episodes in the past two decades: the carbon wars of the 1990s, an emergent carbon compromise between 1998–2008 and a climate impasse from 2009 to the present. However, climate imaginaries only become dominant when they connect with wider popular interests and identities and align with economic and technological aspects of the energy system to constitute ‘value regimes’.
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Biographies
David L. Levy is Chair of the Department of Management and Marketing at the University of Massachusetts, Boston. David founded and is currently Director of the Center for Sustainable Enterprise and Regional Competitiveness, which engages in research, education and outreach to promote a transition to a clean, sustainable and prosperous economy. David’s research examines corporate strategic responses to climate change and the growth of the clean energy business sector. More broadly, his work explores strategic contestation over the governance of controversial issues engaging business, states, and NGOs. Address: Department of Management and Marketing, University of Massachusetts, Boston, 100 Morrissey Boulevard, Boston, MA 02125, USA.
André Spicer is a Professor of Organisational Behaviour at Cass Business School, City University, London. His work focuses on political dynamics in and around organizations. He is currently investigating the role stupidity plays in organizations. Address: City University, 106 Bunhill Row, London, EC1Y 8TZ, UK.
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Article first published online: September 12, 2013
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