Expanding treadmill of production analysis within green criminology by integrating metabolic rift and ecological unequal exchange theories
Document Type
Book Chapter
Publication Date
2020
Department/School
Sociology, Anthropology, and Criminology
Publication Title
Routledge International Handbook of Green Criminology (2nd Ed.)
Abstract
This chapter draws upon the treadmill of production (ToP) theoretical framework to demonstrate how capitalism produces environmental crimes and harms at both the local and global level. The chapter begins with a description of ToP before extending the political economic orientation of ToP by connecting it to two other radical political economic theories designed to make the linkage between capitalism and ecological destruction more visible: metabolic rift theory and ecological unequal exchange theory. The authors of this chapter argue that these views help round out the ToP approach and can be applied to understand any number of environmental crimes and injustices associated with ecological disorganisation. Encouraging further exploration by green criminologists, the authors make the case for establishing stronger connections to the ecological Marxist and environmental sociology literatures, as well as to the growing number of empirical studies in those fields that support these approaches.
Recommended Citation
Lynch, M. J., Stretesky, P. B., Long, M. A., & Barrett, K. L. (2020). Expanding treadmill of production analysis within green criminology by integrating metabolic rift and ecological unequal exchange theories. In N. South & A. Brisman (Eds.), Routledge international handbook of green criminology (2nd ed., pp. 79–94). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315207094-4
Comments
K. L. Barrett is a faculty member in EMU's Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Criminology.