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Papers by Lorenzo Pellegrini

Global Environmental Politics, 2022

International Development Planning Review

Global Environmental Politics

To limit the increase in global mean temperature to 1.5°C, CO2 emissions should be capped at 440 ... more To limit the increase in global mean temperature to 1.5°C, CO2 emissions should be capped at 440 gigatons. To achieve this, about 89 percent, 59 percent, and 58 percent of existing coal and conventional gas and oil reserves, respectively, need to remain unburned. This implies an economic cost for fossil fuel rights owners, and any successful climate policy will rely on resolving the distributional challenge of how to allocate the right to use the remaining burnable reserves. We discuss the possibility of compensating rights holders of unburnable oil and gas reserves, producing the first estimates of the financial resources needed to secure full compensation. We estimate that approximately US$ 5,400 billion (109) would be needed. Despite the vast amounts required, compensation is nevertheless economically feasible. We suggest a Keynesian “whatever it takes” approach for climate action, combining partial compensation for unburnable fuels and investment in low-carbon technologies to dr...

European Journal of Development Research, 2016

World Development, 2015

ABSTRACT

Forum for Development Studies, 2013

Journal of International Economic Law

The Texaco/Chevron lawsuit, which started in November 1993 and is still being litigated in 2020, ... more The Texaco/Chevron lawsuit, which started in November 1993 and is still being litigated in 2020, is a prominent example of the process of judicialization of environmental conflict. The Ecuadorian plaintiffs claim that the oil company’s operations generated ruinous impacts on the environment and on the development prospects and health of nearby individuals and communities. The tortuous and lengthy judiciary process was further hindered by an arbitration process, an Investor–State Dispute Settlement mechanism nested in the Ecuador—United States Bilateral Investment Treaty. The significance of the case goes beyond the specifics of Ecuador and provides further arguments fuelling the protracted legitimacy crisis experienced by International Investment Agreements. The current praxis of Investor–State Dispute Settlement mechanisms is generating an asymmetrical system, protecting the interest of investors, and intruding into the space of human and environmental rights. These issues are reso...

Immiserizing Growth, 2019

Why do some residents of the Ecuadorian Amazon support the expansion of oil extraction in their c... more Why do some residents of the Ecuadorian Amazon support the expansion of oil extraction in their communities even when they believe that the impact of extractive industries on their communities and families has been negative, environmentally as well as economically? Building on nearly a decade of participatory research in the region, this chapter contextualizes this paradoxical choice within Ecuador’s encounter with oil extraction, which has not only failed to deliver the anticipated economic miracle but also resulted in a variety of immiserizing effects, be they economic, cultural, or ecological. Caught between the state whose functions are governed by an ‘extractive imperative’ and the oil sector whose presence is overwhelming, indigenous and peasant communities have not scored meaningful gains either by protesting against these dominant actors or by engaging with the much vaunted but ultimately ineffective concept of buen vivir (living well). The chapter argues that immiserization...

The Yasuní Ishpingo Tambococha Tiputini (Yasuní ITT) initiative is a proposal to enact a permanen... more The Yasuní Ishpingo Tambococha Tiputini (Yasuní ITT) initiative is a proposal to enact a permanent ban on oil exploration and extraction activities within an Ecuadorian National Park and to obtain financial resources from the international community to compensate (partially) forgone oil revenues. The initiative brings into focus a classic dilemma between extraction by a state that needs economic resources versus the conservation of global public goods and the rights of indigenous people. Conventional ...

European Environment, 2006

Economics of Governance, 2007

The Extractive Industries and Society, 2014

Ecological Economics, 2021

Basilicata is a region of Southern Italy where the expansion of oil operations in the 1990s was p... more Basilicata is a region of Southern Italy where the expansion of oil operations in the 1990s was promoted as an opportunity to foster economic development. Flash-forward to 2020, Basilicata is one of the poorest regions in Italy despite the exploitation of some of the largest onshore hydrocarbon reserves within the European Union. The coincidence of high poverty rates with abundant natural resources suggests that the region is experiencing a ‘resource curse’; however, socio-economic problems predate the oil boom, complicating any causality claim. To disentangle and estimate the effects of oil exploitation, we employ the synthetic control method that compares the actual trends of development indicators of Basilicata with a counterfactual that is created by taking a weighted average of trends of other Italian regions –a ‘synthetic’ Basilicata. The analysis finds that the development of oil operations has generated no detectable improvement to employment, nor to a range of social indicators, nor to educational attainment. The absence of quantifiable beneficial effects is coupled with negative impacts on other dimensions of development that are more difficult to estimate with our method –especially on the environment and human health. Taken together the evidence offers a sobering prospect over the potential of resource-based development for disadvantaged regions in developed countries.

COVID-19 and International Development, Elissaios Papyrakis (ed)

International Development Planning Review, 2022

Since the early 2000s, there has been an 'extractive imperative' in Latin America that made inten... more Since the early 2000s, there has been an 'extractive imperative' in Latin America that made intensified extraction the policy solution to all socioeconomic challenges. More recently, a similar consensus has emerged in a diversity of political, economic and geographical contexts-such as Turkey, India and the United States-that makes it possible to speak of a 'global extractive imperative'. The imperative is especially evident in settings also characterised by authoritarian neoliberalism and the burden of resistance against extractivism is suffered overwhelmingly by marginalised communities at extractive frontiers. Emerging efforts to declare a share of existing reserves of fossil fuels 'unburnable' would not only help make progress towards tackling the climate crisis, it would also broaden the societal bases of societal struggles against capitalism's extractive excesses.

Global Environmental Politics, 2022

International Development Planning Review

Global Environmental Politics

To limit the increase in global mean temperature to 1.5°C, CO2 emissions should be capped at 440 ... more To limit the increase in global mean temperature to 1.5°C, CO2 emissions should be capped at 440 gigatons. To achieve this, about 89 percent, 59 percent, and 58 percent of existing coal and conventional gas and oil reserves, respectively, need to remain unburned. This implies an economic cost for fossil fuel rights owners, and any successful climate policy will rely on resolving the distributional challenge of how to allocate the right to use the remaining burnable reserves. We discuss the possibility of compensating rights holders of unburnable oil and gas reserves, producing the first estimates of the financial resources needed to secure full compensation. We estimate that approximately US$ 5,400 billion (109) would be needed. Despite the vast amounts required, compensation is nevertheless economically feasible. We suggest a Keynesian “whatever it takes” approach for climate action, combining partial compensation for unburnable fuels and investment in low-carbon technologies to dr...

European Journal of Development Research, 2016

World Development, 2015

ABSTRACT

Forum for Development Studies, 2013

Journal of International Economic Law

The Texaco/Chevron lawsuit, which started in November 1993 and is still being litigated in 2020, ... more The Texaco/Chevron lawsuit, which started in November 1993 and is still being litigated in 2020, is a prominent example of the process of judicialization of environmental conflict. The Ecuadorian plaintiffs claim that the oil company’s operations generated ruinous impacts on the environment and on the development prospects and health of nearby individuals and communities. The tortuous and lengthy judiciary process was further hindered by an arbitration process, an Investor–State Dispute Settlement mechanism nested in the Ecuador—United States Bilateral Investment Treaty. The significance of the case goes beyond the specifics of Ecuador and provides further arguments fuelling the protracted legitimacy crisis experienced by International Investment Agreements. The current praxis of Investor–State Dispute Settlement mechanisms is generating an asymmetrical system, protecting the interest of investors, and intruding into the space of human and environmental rights. These issues are reso...

Immiserizing Growth, 2019

Why do some residents of the Ecuadorian Amazon support the expansion of oil extraction in their c... more Why do some residents of the Ecuadorian Amazon support the expansion of oil extraction in their communities even when they believe that the impact of extractive industries on their communities and families has been negative, environmentally as well as economically? Building on nearly a decade of participatory research in the region, this chapter contextualizes this paradoxical choice within Ecuador’s encounter with oil extraction, which has not only failed to deliver the anticipated economic miracle but also resulted in a variety of immiserizing effects, be they economic, cultural, or ecological. Caught between the state whose functions are governed by an ‘extractive imperative’ and the oil sector whose presence is overwhelming, indigenous and peasant communities have not scored meaningful gains either by protesting against these dominant actors or by engaging with the much vaunted but ultimately ineffective concept of buen vivir (living well). The chapter argues that immiserization...

The Yasuní Ishpingo Tambococha Tiputini (Yasuní ITT) initiative is a proposal to enact a permanen... more The Yasuní Ishpingo Tambococha Tiputini (Yasuní ITT) initiative is a proposal to enact a permanent ban on oil exploration and extraction activities within an Ecuadorian National Park and to obtain financial resources from the international community to compensate (partially) forgone oil revenues. The initiative brings into focus a classic dilemma between extraction by a state that needs economic resources versus the conservation of global public goods and the rights of indigenous people. Conventional ...

European Environment, 2006

Economics of Governance, 2007

The Extractive Industries and Society, 2014

Ecological Economics, 2021

Basilicata is a region of Southern Italy where the expansion of oil operations in the 1990s was p... more Basilicata is a region of Southern Italy where the expansion of oil operations in the 1990s was promoted as an opportunity to foster economic development. Flash-forward to 2020, Basilicata is one of the poorest regions in Italy despite the exploitation of some of the largest onshore hydrocarbon reserves within the European Union. The coincidence of high poverty rates with abundant natural resources suggests that the region is experiencing a ‘resource curse’; however, socio-economic problems predate the oil boom, complicating any causality claim. To disentangle and estimate the effects of oil exploitation, we employ the synthetic control method that compares the actual trends of development indicators of Basilicata with a counterfactual that is created by taking a weighted average of trends of other Italian regions –a ‘synthetic’ Basilicata. The analysis finds that the development of oil operations has generated no detectable improvement to employment, nor to a range of social indicators, nor to educational attainment. The absence of quantifiable beneficial effects is coupled with negative impacts on other dimensions of development that are more difficult to estimate with our method –especially on the environment and human health. Taken together the evidence offers a sobering prospect over the potential of resource-based development for disadvantaged regions in developed countries.

COVID-19 and International Development, Elissaios Papyrakis (ed)

International Development Planning Review, 2022

Since the early 2000s, there has been an 'extractive imperative' in Latin America that made inten... more Since the early 2000s, there has been an 'extractive imperative' in Latin America that made intensified extraction the policy solution to all socioeconomic challenges. More recently, a similar consensus has emerged in a diversity of political, economic and geographical contexts-such as Turkey, India and the United States-that makes it possible to speak of a 'global extractive imperative'. The imperative is especially evident in settings also characterised by authoritarian neoliberalism and the burden of resistance against extractivism is suffered overwhelmingly by marginalised communities at extractive frontiers. Emerging efforts to declare a share of existing reserves of fossil fuels 'unburnable' would not only help make progress towards tackling the climate crisis, it would also broaden the societal bases of societal struggles against capitalism's extractive excesses.

The electoral success of Evo Morales – sworn in as president in January 2006 – coincided with num... more The electoral success of Evo Morales – sworn in as president in January 2006 – coincided with numerous departures from recent Bolivian history. The Morales Administration has been hailed as revolutionary, anti-hegemonic and globally influential (Dunkerley 2007; Escobar 2010). Two distinguishing features of the recent transformation in Bolivia are the nationalization of natural resources and the ensuing increase in government revenues that finance high levels of public investment and expanded social policies. Underpinning these processes is a
discourse of resource nationalism, which claims that colonial patterns of foreign exploitation are being broken and the benefits of extracting natural resources are accruing to the Bolivian population at large. At the same time, and similarly
related to anti-imperialist struggles, the country has been re-founded with a new constitution based on alternative development models, which acknowledges the plurinational character of the country, and endorses indigenous autonomy
(Tockman and Cameron 2014). However, the indigenous territories where autonomy should be exercised often coincide with the areas where the extractive frontier is expanding and intensifying. This overlap creates tensions between some
indigenous organizations and the very government that institutionalized their right to autonomy. These organizations – acting as resistance movements – are also using a discourse draped in natural resource nationalism, to defend their
autonomy and resist foreign-led exploitation of natural resources. This chapter investigates the tensions generated by the extractive process and the way these are legitimized by and resisted through nationalist discourses.
Pellegrini, L. (2016). Resource Nationalism in the Plurinational State of Bolivia, in Paul A. Haslam and Pablo Heidrich (eds.) The Political Economy of Resources and Development: From Neoliberalism to Resource Nationalism (Routledge, 2016)