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The Origins and Impact of Environmental Conflict Ideas STRATEGIC SCARCITY: THE ORIGINS AND IMPACT OF ENVIRONMENTAL CONFLICT IDEAS Elizabeth Hartmann Development Studies Institute London School of Economics and Political Science Submitted for the degree of PhD 2002 1 UMI Number: U615457 All rights reserved INFORMATION TO ALL USERS The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. In the unlikely event that the author did not send a complete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. Dissertation Publishing UMI U615457 Published by ProQuest LLC 2014. Copyright in the Dissertation held by the Author. Microform Edition © ProQuest LLC. All rights reserved. This work is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States Code. ProQuest LLC 789 East Eisenhower Parkway P.O. Box 1346 Ann Arbor, Ml 48106-1346 rM£ S£S F 20 ABSTRACT Strategic Scarcity: The Origins and Impact of Environmental Conflict Ideas Elizabeth Hartmann This thesis examines the origins and impact of environmental conflict ideas. It focuses on the work of Canadian political scientist Thomas Homer-Dixon, whose model of environmental conflict achieved considerable prominence in U.S. foreign policy circles in the 1990s. The thesis argues that this success was due in part to widely shared neo-Malthusian assumptions about the Third World, and to the support of private foundations and policymakers with a strategic interest in promoting these views. It analyzes how population control became an important feature of American foreign policy and environmentalism in the post-World War Two period. It then describes the role of the "degradation narrative" — the belief that population pressures and poverty precipitate environmental degradation, migration, and violent conflict — in the development of the environment and security field. Based on archival research and interviews with key policymakers, foundation officers, and scholars, the thesis identifies a process of "circumscribed heterodoxy" in which an illusion of openness to diverse views masks a politics of uniformity at both the project and policy level. It examines the intentional and unintentional effects of environmental conflict ideas on U.S. policy institutions, and considers the nature of the knowledge communities that formed around these ideas. In so doing, the thesis offers insights into the complex relationships between knowledge, power, and policy. 2 TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS 9 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 12 PREFACE 16 CHAPTER 1: 25 METHODOLOGICAL HOOKS AND EYES: REFLECTIONS ON KNOWLEDGE, POWER AND POLICY I. In the Footsteps of Foucault 27 The Political Economy of Truth 27 Biopower and Strategic Intelligibility 30 U. Constructivism and the Politics of Expertise 34 From Natural Science to Trans-Science 35 Ties that Bind: Knowledge Communities 38 Epistemic communities 38 Policy communities, coalitions and networks 40 The discursive bridge 43 HI. Money Talks: The Role of Private Foundations 46 IV. Making Threats: The Politics of Representation 52 Territories of Difference 53 Gender, Gender, Everywhere and Nowhere 57 V. From Representation to Securitization 59 VI. Conclusion 63 3 CHAPTER 2: 69 MALLEABILITY AND MAPPABILITY: THE PERSISTENCE OF NEO-MALTHUSIANISM IN THE UNITED STATES I. Quality and Quantity 71 II. Demography and Scientism 76 Transitioning the Demographic Transition 77 Madness in the Method 81 III. The Rise of the Population Establishment 85 Strategic Philanthropy and Institution Building 85 Message Dissemination 87 Mappability 89 Organizational Diversification 92 The Convenience of Mixed Motives 99 IV. Enter the Environment 102 People as the Enemy 102 The Politics of Either/Or 109 V. The Woman Question 113 VI. Neo-Malthusianism in an Era of Declining Population Growth 119 VH. Conclusion 124 4 CHAPTER 3: 127 TROPICAL TROPES AND BARREN SLOPES: DEGRADATION NARRATIVES AND ENVIRONMENTAL SECURITY I. The Destructive Peasantry: The Evolution of the Degradation Narrative 130 II. Upping the Ante: Population, Environment and Rethinking Security 137 During the Cold W ar From Throw Weights to Development Aid 138 Population and Planetary Danger 140 Elevating the Degradation Narrative 143 III. Whose Environmental Security? 148 Establishing the 'Us': Universalism, Stewardship and Superpower 151 Establishing the 'Them1: Fear, Loathing and Homogeneity 155 Environmental Conflict: First Wave and Second Wave 158 Green Bullets and Flash Points 161 Human and Ecological Security: A Challenge? 165 IV. The Extended Family of Degrading Tropes 168 Dante's Rain Forest and Invasive Germs and Species 168 The Youth Bulge and the Belly Bulge 171 Water Wars 174 V. Conclusion 176 5 CHAPTER 4: 180 ENVIRONMENTAL CONFLICT: WRONG TURNS ON THE CAUSAL PATHWAY I. Spinning the Web 181 Figures land 2 184 II. Assumption Tracing 189 The Ghost of Malthus 190 Ecological Marginalization and the Localization of Blame 193 Exclusion and Enclosure 200 Migration: Menace or Mitigation? 202 Under-specification 204 The Wind-Up State 206 The Rwanda Exception 212 Ingenuity Gaps 214 III. Related Models: Challenge or Corroboration? 217 The NATO CCMS 'Syndrome' Approach 218 Baechler's 'Maldevelopment' and Kahl's DES Variable 220 Multivariate Statistical Analyses 223 Alternative Approaches 225 IV. Conclusion 227 6 CHAPTER 5: 231 CIRCUMSCRIBED HETERODOXY: AN ACCOUNT OF THOMAS HOMER-DIXON'S THREE MAJOR PROJECTS I. The Project on Environmental Change and Acute Conflict 233 The Cambridge Period: On the Threshold 234 Forward Motion 238 n. Washington, D.C.: At the Table and Under the Tent 246 "An Unlikely Jeremiah" 246 The ICPD: Expanding the Foreign Policy Constituency 249 The Pew Global Stewardship Initiative 253 in . The Pew Period: The EPS and State Capacity Projects 259 On the Fast Track: The EPS Project 259 Challenges to the Fixed Frame: The State Capacity Project 264 CHAPTER 6: 275 TRUTHS AND THEIR CONSEQUENCES: REFLECTIONS ON THE IMPACT OF ENVIRONMENTAL CONFLICT IDEAS I. Reinscribing Environmental Conflict: Institutional Effects 278 The Clinton Administration: Something to Say 280 The Defense Department: Preventive Defense and Strategic Engagement 284 The Intelligence Community: Rhetoric, Rationale and Warning Signs 288 USAID: Agency within the Agency 292 Bilateral and Multilateral Institutions 296 7 II. In Search of a Knowledge Formation 299 Issue Networks and the Role of Consensus 302 Discourse Coalition or Discourse Tapping? 304 III. The Future of Environmental Conflict Ideas in the Strategic 311 Demography and Geography of Threats The Youth Bulge and the Muslim Terrorist 312 Environmental Surveillance: Securitizing the Local 315 IV. The Role of the Critical Intellectual 323 APPENDIX A: LIST OF INTERVIEWS 330 APPENDIX B: LIST OF PROJECT PUBLICATIONS 336 BIBLIOGRAPHY 338 8 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS AAAS American Association for the Advancement of Science Academy American Academy of Arts and Sciences ACTS African Center for Technology Studies CCMS Committee on Challenges of Modem Society CIA Central Intelligence Agency CIESIN Consortium for International Earth Science Information Network CSIS Center for Strategic and International Studies DCI Director of Central Intelligence DEC DCI Environmental Center DERA British defense intelligence agency DES Demographic and Environmental Stress DOD U.S. Department of Defense EC AC Environmental Change and Acute Conflict Project Ecologic Center for International and European Environmental Research ECSP Woodrow Wilson Center’s Environmental Change and Security Project EDSP Environment, Development and Sustainable Peace Initiative ENCOP Environmental Conflicts Project of the Swiss Peace Foundation EPA U.S. Environmental Protection Agency EPS Environment, Population and Security Project EU European Union GEC global environmental change GECHS Global Environmental Change and Human Security Project GIS Geographical Information Systems ICPD International Conference on Population and Development USD International Institute for Sustainable Development INSS Institute for National Strategic Studies IPFA Information Project for Africa IPPF International Planned Parenthood Federation IR International Relations ISA International Studies Association IUCN International Union for the Conservation of Nature IUSIPP International Union for the Scientific Investigation of the Population Problem IUSSP International Union for the Scientific Study of Population MIT Massachusetts Institute of Technology NATO North Atlantic Treaty Organization NGO nongovernmental organization NIC National Intelligence Council NPA New People's Army (Philippines) NSC National Security Council NSDM 314 National Security Decision Memorandum 314 NSSM 200 National Security Study Memorandum 200 OECD DAC Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, Development Assistance Committee OPR Office of Population Research PAA Population Association of America PAI Population Action International PCT Pew Charitable Trusts 10 PECS Population, Environmental Change and Security Initiative PGSI Pew Global Stewardship Initiative PRB Population Reference Bureau PRIO International Peace Research Institute, Norway SFTF State Failure Task Force SIVAM System for Vigilance of the Amazon SSRC Social Science Research Council State Capacity Environmental Scarcities, State Capacity and Civil Violence Project USAID U.S. Agency for International Development UNCED UN Conference on Environment and Development UNDP UN Development Program UNEP UN Environment Program UNFPA UN Fund for Population Activities
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