Peder Anker | New York University (original) (raw)

Papers by Peder Anker

Minerva, Oct 25, 2007

Buckminster Fuller's experiences in the Navy became a model for his ecological design projects an... more Buckminster Fuller's experiences in the Navy became a model for his ecological design projects and suggestions for the global management of 'Spaceship Earth'. Inspired by technocratic ideas of the 1930s, Fuller envisaged, in the 1970s, an elitist world without politics, in which designers were at the helm, steering the planet out of its environmental crises.

Metascience, Mar 1, 2006

From time to time, scientists and environmental activists embrace technocratic or authoritarian s... more From time to time, scientists and environmental activists embrace technocratic or authoritarian solutions to the ecological crisis that are at odds with democratic values. In this fine book Stephen Bocking argues that a more democratic culture must be developed among 'Nature's Experts', in view of their importance for the environmental decision-making process. Bocking should be familiar to readers of Metascience as the author of Ecologists and Environmental Politics (1997), a book that spells out key events in the history of ecology in Britain, the United States, and Canada. Though Nature's Experts draws on historical examples, it is a book entirely about science policy. This reflects Bocking's current position as professor at the Environmental & Resource Studies Program, Trent University in Ontario, Canada, where he uses Nature's Experts as a textbook in his courses. In addition to providing students with an overview of important science-policy issues with respect to environmental questions, this book is an original piece of scholarly work. In the first chapters Bocking clarifies why the sciences can be an uncertain authority for politics. If science rules, he points out, one could be in danger of developing ''an ever-expanding application of administrative rationalism: seeking, with the guidance of technical expertise, rational and efficient solutions to the problems of society, translating the authority of science into political power'' (p. 21). This is a familiar

Our Common Future "A bang, I see a flash of light before I get hit in the air. So this is what's ... more Our Common Future "A bang, I see a flash of light before I get hit in the air. So this is what's at the end of life, I think, imagining myself being thrown into the air, how long I don't know. Lying in the snow waiting for everything to end." 1 The Sámi civil rights leader Niillas A. Somby survived, but lost his arm in his failed attempt to blow up the bridge leading to the construction site of the Alta-Kautokeino river power plant. It was March 1982 and the Supreme Court had just ruled that the development of the waterway was lawful. Both events were front-page news in all major newspapers. After being told he faced at least a decade in prison, Somby fled with his family to First Nations people in Canada, who helped them to hide and escape extradition to Norway. In hindsight, the explosion at the bridge was an act of desperation, reflecting the breaking point of the bitterest Sámi civil rights and environmental conflicts in the nation's history. Somby was recovering in the hospital when Gro Harlem Brundtland, the Labor Party leader behind the decision to build the hydropower plant, was asked to chair the World Commission on Environment and Development. Wisely, she kept quiet about the invite as the timing was not right for the announcement of her as the United Nations' voice for environmentalism and the interests of the Global South, including the rights of Indigenous people. Ten years later, in June 1992, Brundtland led a delegation of Norwegian environmental politicians to promote sustainable development at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro (formally known

Journal for The Study of Religion, Nature and Culture, Jun 23, 2023

In this fine study, Marion Grau investigates the spiritual culture of pilgrimage in Norway, inclu... more In this fine study, Marion Grau investigates the spiritual culture of pilgrimage in Norway, including the surfacing of old rituals that reflect on the very origins of Christianity in the nation. Among pilgrims, a new sacred geography and identity has emerged, she argues, which has fostered informal beliefs that defy the binary between sacred and secular, spirituality and religion. Pilgrimages are popular. Most famous, perhaps, is the Camino de Santiago with hundreds of thousands of people walking for weeks from cities as far away as Seville, Lisbon, and Lyon. These walks may cross national boundaries and have thus been promoted by the European Union as one of many ways to socially refigure and unite Europe at little cost. For local businesses, pilgrims may entail guests in faraway hostels and bistros. Progressive church leaders see pilgrimages as an ecumenical project that connects different branches of Christianity, while also appealing to the young. They may even foster respect for God's creations and each other, as walking together cultivates proximity to landscapes, democratic values, and perhaps also a renewed sense of belonging to a congregation. Grau walks the reader through these arguments and much more while focusing on Norway. Protestantism has long dominated Norwegian spiritual life, and Martin Luther was no fan of pilgrimages. '"Let every man stay in his own parish, where he finds more than in all the shrines of pilgrimage"', he once argued (p. 57). No wonder, then, that conservative-leaning Protestant theologians are skeptical of the new phenomenon. At the same time, churches have become increasingly empty with priests worried about the spread of secularism. Perhaps pilgrimages can renew the parish and convert people to the Christian faith? The most famous convert in Norwegian history is Olav Haraldsson, a gruesome Viking King that ruled a substantial part of Norway between 1015 and 1028. According to the myth-which is not entirely fictional-he christened the nation, and as a result, was later made into a Saint. Known as St. Olav, his life serves as the chief origin story of Norwegian Christendom. The country's most important cathedral, The Nidaros in Trondheim, was even erected over his tomb. As a chief destination for pilgrimages, the tomb of St. Olav serves as an homage to the convert and as a place harboring both the origin and a new spiritual beginning for the nation. He was 'an ideal convert, moving from Viking bloodthirst to Christian charity, serving perhaps as a mirror for the corporate journey of the population', Grau argues (p. 10). Indeed, her analysis of the various rituals of St. Olav within a

Cambridge University Press, May 1, 2020

The Power of the Periphery, 2020

The Acid Rain Debate On December 23, 1969, the Phillips Petroleum Company announced that they had... more The Acid Rain Debate On December 23, 1969, the Phillips Petroleum Company announced that they had found oil in the North Sea. After many empty wells, the Ekofisk oilfield was the first major find in the Norwegian oil sector. "A sense of sheik well-being spread around" in the new "oil nation," a journalist noted, as the oilfield was estimated to be among the twenty largest in the world. 1 It was a "fairy-tale" that came true setting the nation in a Klondike black gold rush. 2 Indeed, Ekofisk and subsequent discoveries of oil and gas would forever change the nation's industries and finances. Norway would, over the next half a century, be propeled into being one of the richest countries in the world. Only months before Phillips' announcement about the oilfield, the press wrote for the first time about climate change. It came in an article published in one of the country's largest newspapers. It claimed that industrial smoke would cause a "hothouse effect" and result in a colder overall climate for the world due to suspended dust in the atmosphere keeping the sunshine out. 3 By 1971 the same paper reported that the hothouse effect would instead cause global warming due to carbon dioxide emissions from petroleum. It was said this "may cause the polar ice to melt, the ocean to rise above its shores, cities and large territories of land to be submerged under water, [and] humans to be displaced to the mountains." 4

Environmental History, Apr 1, 2002

Two thirds of Finland is covered by forests. It is therefore no surprise that this fine contribut... more Two thirds of Finland is covered by forests. It is therefore no surprise that this fine contribution to environmental history from Finnish historians focuses on woods. The balance of methodological discussions and case studies makes this anthology ideal as an introduction to new students of the field. Finland is a new nation. It was part of Sweden for nearly 700 years until 1809 when the land was lost at war to Russia, who ruled it until Finnish independence in 1917. The country has since then been in strategic alliances with ...

History of Science, Dec 1, 2007

What should we do? How should we live?" In his famous lecture, "Science as a vocation", Max Weber... more What should we do? How should we live?" In his famous lecture, "Science as a vocation", Max Weber told his students that scientists could and should not provide answers. Instead, he told them to look at science as "a 'vocation' conducted through specialist disciplines to serve the cause of refl ection on the self and knowledge of relationships between facts, not a gift of grace from seers and prophets dispensing sacred values and revelations". 1 This ideal of a value-free science came to a standstill, as this article will argue, when students of the late 1960s demanded advice from scientists on what to do with the ecological crisis and how to live in harmony with the natural world. The University of Oslo became an infl uential hotbed for such ecologically informed policies and philosophies advising the world about what to do and how to live. The co-author of The limits to growth (1972) Jørgen Randers, the founder of Deep Ecology Arne Naess, the Chair of the World Commission on Environment and Development Gro Harlem Brundtland, and the famed peace researcher Johan Galtung, were all engaged by the Oslo ecologists. This article will describe in some detail this hitherto largely unknown group of scientists and environmental activists, as their innovative thinking about "ecophilosophy", "ecosophy", "eco-politics", and "eco-religion" came to dominate international debates for decades. Science as a vacation does not mean that these scholars were lazy or did not take their work seriously. On the contrary: they were hardworking, committed scholars. Indeed, much of their research was carried out while they were supposed to be on vacation, as some of the mountain fi eldwork could be done only during the short semi-arctic summer. What I propose instead is that ecological sciences in Norway grew out of a culture in which nature was understood not as a place of work but in terms of outdoor vacationing. 2 Moreover, by taking a social and political stand on environmental questions, these ecologists came to oppose the value-free way of practising science. Thus science as a vacation suggests the opposite of Weber's vocation ideals. Furthermore, the Protestant work ethic and the spirit of capitalism Weber once described represented the very industrial horror Norwegian ecologists believed caused the environmental havoc of our age. Finally, science as a vacation addresses the calling for a new eco-philosophy about what do to and how to live in the wild. Weber warned that such "academic prophecy will create only fanatical sects, never a true [scientifi c] community". 3 Was he right? Weber had an inclusive view of the scientifi c community, encompassing the entire body of academic research.

Springer eBooks, 2011

The plant community concept was first introduced by the Danish botanist Johannes Eugenius Bülow W... more The plant community concept was first introduced by the Danish botanist Johannes Eugenius Bülow Warming (1841–1924) in his book “Plantesamfund” of 1895, where he suggested a general theory of explaining different geographical distributions of plants. The title “Plantesamfund” can be translated both as Plant societies and Plant communities, since the Danish word samfund means both “society” and “community”(or alternatively “Gesellschaft” and “Gemeinschaft” in German). To keep the broad meaning of the original ...

Journal of the History of Biology, 2004

The South African ecologist and political activist Edward Roux (1903-1966) used evolutionary biol... more The South African ecologist and political activist Edward Roux (1903-1966) used evolutionary biology to argue against racism. During the cold-war, he transformed his communist beliefs into advocacy for scientific rationalism, management, and protection of nature against advancing capitalism. These pleas for saving the environment served as a vehicle for questioning the more risky issue of evolution and racial order in society. The link between ecological and political order had long been an important theme among the country's ecologists and politicians alike. The statesman Jan Christian Smuts' holistic theory of evolution and racial order inspired the nation's ecologists to sanctify an ecologically informed racial policy. This idealist informed methodology stood in direct opposition to the materialist approach to ecology of Roux. These methodological debates reflected differing political support from within the Union Party and people on the radical left, respectively. Ecology was of concern to politicians because understandings of the order of nature had direct implications for the racial order of the South African society.

Environmental History, Apr 1, 2007

Abstract Environmental debates are greatly indebted to artistic communication. This article discu... more Abstract Environmental debates are greatly indebted to artistic communication. This article discusses the work of the former faculty member of the German Bauhaus school, Herbert Bayer, who introduced modernist imagery in relation to globalization, conservation values, and maps dealing with environmental concerns in the United States. His Romantic defense of environmental design demonstrates that the humanist legacy of modernism has made more constructive contributions to the history of environmental debate than its critics have ...

Ethics, Place & Environment, Jun 1, 2003

The etymological origin of ecology in the human house is the point of departure of this article. ... more The etymological origin of ecology in the human house is the point of departure of this article. It argues that oikos is not merely a vague metaphor for ecology, but that built households provide a key to understanding the household of nature. Three households support this claim: the cabins of Henry Thoreau, Aldo Leopold and Arne Nœss. The article suggests that their views on the household of nature stand in direct relationship with their respective homes. They also have a distant epistemological bird&amp;#x27;s-eye view of nature seen ...