Political Ecology: A Critical Introduction

Not a bad text for advanced environmental studies students. The layperson outside of the classroom may have some difficulty identifying the underlying structure, and deeper meaning of political ecology, which I find to be a radical de-constructionist perspective.

Robbins has provided the new standard for political ecology texts, at least in geography, although this book is far different from a mundane "textbook." He summarizes both the thrust of what political ecology, what political ecologists do, and the shifting ground beneath our feet as we all struggle to understand and explain human-environment relationships in a political and economically complex world. Some readers and reviewers have fairly pointed out that the volume is too accommodating to perspectives that traditionally clash, or don't mesh very well, to the point of neglecting important differences in how political ecologists conduct research and how they frame it in a particular body of ideas. I am not sure how some of the authors of past works in cultural, human and political ecology (or anthropology) would view Robbins' interpretation of their work, either in the time-line diagrams of how the sub-discipline has evolved or in the sense of being lumped with other practitioners with whom they shared little in common. So, while the book is exceptional, the volume can be critiqued for being a bit too inclusive: Robbins has tried to build a tent large enough to house all of the bickering schools, personalities and research approaches...that rarely agree to enter the same tent.