The Drama of Environmental Politics

Abstract

Environmental politics is captured by the political rules according to which it is performed. These rules, that have developed since 1972, constitute ‘the Political’, the institutional practices through which values are authoritatively allocated. This organization of the Political should not be taken for granted but analysed for its consequent biases. This chapter introduces a dramaturgical analysis to do so. It identifies a ‘dramaturgical regime’, a routinized set of performances and conventions through which politics are enacted. Dramaturgical and discursive conventions determine how issues are defined and discussed in contemporary environmental politics, how decisions are made, and because of their theatrical quality, also determine how politics is reported on in the media. This chapter calls attention to how this creates a mould, a funnel, for the way in which we imagine and discuss political issues. It traces the historical origins of this funnel, the discourse of ‘ecological modernization’, and the crucial role of scientific expertise. Focusing on the way in which expertise is featured, the chapter identifies the current script for environmental politics, with sets of conventions and eight dramaturgical mechanisms through which politics now operates, focusing on the interaction between science and policy. This delineates the confined political space for debate, which makes it difficult to arrive at the ‘futures we want’.