IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jscscx/v12y2023i3p161-d1091420.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

“Frankly, My Dear, I Don’t Want a Dam” in the US or in Iran: Environmental Movements and Shared Strategies in Differing Political Economies

Author

Listed:
  • Elham Hoominfar

    (Program in Global Health Studies, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL 60208, USA)

  • Claudia Radel

    (Department of Environment and Society, Utah State University, Logan, UT 84322-5215, USA)

Abstract

In this comparative study, we explore why environmental movements against two neoliberal water transfer projects emerged and how they work in different political economies—a hegemonic capitalist democracy (Colorado, US) and a centralized authoritarian capitalist system (Iran). We apply Polanyi’s and Gramsci’s political–economic theories, using interviews and document analysis to examine and compare movement framing and mobilization and resistance strategies and tactics through this lens. The existing social movement literature leads us to expect fundamental differences, but although we find some differences, particularly in tactics, we find that these environmental movements have unexpected similarities in terms of framing and resistance strategies. Additionally, in both cases, outcomes remain uncertain despite the ostensibly large differences in political opportunities. In Colorado, project developers and social protesters may reach a compromise agreement through the civil society channel of the courts. In Iran, with a centralized state suppressing opponents whereas the project threatens local people’s livelihoods, the environmental movement has assumed a more radical face.

Suggested Citation

  • Elham Hoominfar & Claudia Radel, 2023. "“Frankly, My Dear, I Don’t Want a Dam” in the US or in Iran: Environmental Movements and Shared Strategies in Differing Political Economies," Social Sciences, MDPI, vol. 12(3), pages 1-21, March.
  • Handle: RePEc:gam:jscscx:v:12:y:2023:i:3:p:161-:d:1091420
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0760/12/3/161/pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0760/12/3/161/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Raffaele Giordano & Marcela Brugnach & Irene Pluchinotta, 2017. "Ambiguity in Problem Framing as a Barrier to Collective Actions: Some Hints from Groundwater Protection Policy in the Apulia Region," Group Decision and Negotiation, Springer, vol. 26(5), pages 911-932, September.
    2. Batchelder, Ronald W. & Freudenberger, Herman, 1983. "On the rational origins of the modern centralized state," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 20(1), pages 1-13, January.
    3. Kosnik, Lea, 2010. "The potential for small scale hydropower development in the US," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 38(10), pages 5512-5519, October.
    4. Hayagreeva Rao & Sunasir Dutta, 2018. "Why Great Strategies Spring from Identity Movements," Strategy Science, INFORMS, vol. 3(1), pages 313-322, March.
    5. Harvey, David, 2007. "A Brief History of Neoliberalism," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199283279.
    6. Beatriz Mayor & Ignacio Rodríguez-Muñoz & Fermín Villarroya & Esperanza Montero & Elena López-Gunn, 2017. "The Role of Large and Small Scale Hydropower for Energy and Water Security in the Spanish Duero Basin," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(10), pages 1-21, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Elham Hoominfar & Claudia Radel, 2020. "Contested Dam Development in Iran: A Case Study of the Exercise of State Power over Local People," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(13), pages 1-19, July.
    2. Hirshleifer,Jack, 2001. "The Dark Side of the Force," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521009171.
    3. Howard Stein, 2012. "The Neoliberal Policy Paradigm and the Great Recession," Panoeconomicus, Savez ekonomista Vojvodine, Novi Sad, Serbia, vol. 59(4), pages 421-440, September.
    4. Jamie Redman, 2020. "The Benefit Sanction: A Correctional Device or a Weapon of Disgust?," Sociological Research Online, , vol. 25(1), pages 84-100, March.
    5. Grzegorz W. Kolodko, 2009. "A Two-thirds Rate of Success: Polish Transformation and Economic Development, 1989-2008," WIDER Working Paper Series RP2009-14, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    6. Andrew Crookston, 2012. "Thomas J. Bassett and Alex Winter-Nelson: The atlas of world hunger," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 29(2), pages 277-278, June.
    7. Cohen, Joseph N, 2010. "Neoliberalism’s relationship with economic growth in the developing world: Was it the power of the market or the resolution of financial crisis?," MPRA Paper 24527, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    8. Kumar, Deepak & Katoch, S.S., 2015. "Sustainability suspense of small hydropower projects: A study from western Himalayan region of India," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 220-233.
    9. Yang Shen, 2015. "Why Does the Government Fail to Improve the Living Conditions of Migrant Workers in Shanghai? Reflections on the Policies and the Implementations of Public Rental Housing under Neoliberalism," Asia and the Pacific Policy Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 2(1), pages 58-74, January.
    10. Magdalena Correo Henao & Daniela Amaya Castro & Mario Andrés Ospina Ramírez & Federico Suárez Ricaurte, 2021. "Pobreza y desigualdad prospectiva 2030. XXI jornadas de derecho constitucional constitucionalismo en ransformación. Prospectiva 2030," Books, Universidad Externado de Colombia, Facultad de Derecho, number 1298, October.
    11. Blocker, Christopher P. & Ruth, Julie A. & Sridharan, Srinivas & Beckwith, Colin & Ekici, Ahmet & Goudie-Hutton, Martina & Rosa, José Antonio & Saatcioglu, Bige & Talukdar, Debabrata & Trujillo, Carlo, 2013. "Understanding poverty and promoting poverty alleviation through transformative consumer research," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 66(8), pages 1195-1202.
    12. Lise Arena & Leonard Minkes, 2019. "The virtues of dialogue between academics and businessmen," Post-Print hal-01620574, HAL.
    13. Kumar, Deepak & Katoch, S.S., 2014. "Harnessing ‘water tower’ into ‘power tower’: A small hydropower development study from an Indian prefecture in western Himalayas," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 39(C), pages 87-101.
    14. Baum, Fran & Ziersch, Anna & Freeman, Toby & Javanparast, Sara & Henderson, Julie & Mackean, Tamara, 2020. "Strife of Interests: Constraints on integrated and co-ordinated comprehensive PHC in Australia," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 248(C).
    15. Diana Floegel & Kaitlin L. Costello, 2022. "Methods for a feminist technoscience of information practice: Design justice and speculative futurities," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 73(4), pages 625-634, April.
    16. Sean Brayton, 2012. "Working Stiff(s) on Reality Television during the Great Recession," Societies, MDPI, vol. 2(4), pages 1-17, October.
    17. Wilkinson, Michael & Lokdam, Hjalte, 2018. "Law and political economy," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 87544, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    18. Ravenscroft, Sue & Williams, Paul F., 2009. "Making imaginary worlds real: The case of expensing employee stock options," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 34(6-7), pages 770-786, August.
    19. Lucy Burke, 2017. "Imagining a future without dementia: fictions of regeneration and the crises of work and sustainability," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 3(1), pages 1-9, December.
    20. Aisling Gallagher, 2014. "The ‘Caring Entrepreneur’? Childcare Policy and Private Provision in an Enterprising Age," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 46(5), pages 1108-1123, May.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jscscx:v:12:y:2023:i:3:p:161-:d:1091420. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.