Description du projet
Envisager la cueillette comme une stratégie économique de base
Définie comme la pratique de la collecte, de la récupération ou du glanage, la cueillette («foraging» en anglais) est un phénomène mondial de notre époque. Cependant, il reste très peu pris en compte dans le cadre des grands débats sur la conservation et le développement. Ce qui manque, c’est une compréhension conceptuelle de la cueillette en tant que stratégie économique de base et en tant que forme d’enchevêtrement socio-environnemental. Le projet FORAGING, financé par l’UE, a pour objectif de s’atteler à cette tâche et de développer une perspective d’écologie politique de la cueillette au cours de l’Anthropocène. À une époque où le rêve d’une vie de classe moyenne reposant sur un emploi stable et salarié ne semble plus viable, et dans des endroits où l’État-providence est sous pression, n’a jamais existé ou a disparu, la cueillette semble souvent la seule voie vers une forme d’ascension sociale.
Objectif
In this moment of economic and environmental breakdown, an unexpected source of income has risen in global importance: foraging. In Tibet and Nepal, scores of collectors rush to the mountains each spring to collect yartsagunbu – a rare mushroom more valuable than gold. In Siberia, “tuskers” scavenge for woolly mammoth ivory in the thawing permafrost. From Amazonia to Mongolia, artisanal miners extract precious minerals where transnational conglomerates have left. In the US, “Amazon nomads” tour foreclosed shops and sell their bounty online.
Broadly understood as practices of collecting, scavenging and gleaning, foraging is a global phenomenon of our times. However, it only gains patchy attention in mainstream debates on conservation and development. What is missing is a conceptual understanding of foraging as a basic economic strategy and a form of socio-environmental entanglement. The objective of this project is to take on this task and develop a political ecology of foraging in the Anthropocene.
The project is timely. In the aftermath of the world financial crisis between 2008 to 2011, foraging has gained in relevance around the globe. In an era when the dream of a middle-class life based on a stable, salaried job no longer seems viable, and in places where the welfare state is under pressure, has never existed or has vanished, foraging is often the only avenue to upward social mobility. At the same time, the climate crisis and concerns for the rapid loss of biodiversity are raising the urgency for environmental conservation. To understand the evolving frictions at this interface is highly relevant at this historical moment – both in academia and beyond.
Interdisciplinary in outlook but grounded in anthropology, the project will be carried out by an international team of five researchers at the Rachel Carson Center, LMU Munich. Outputs include 2 monograph, 3 edited collections, 3 PhD thesis, 12 peer-reviewed articles, a film and an exhibition.
Champ scientifique
Programme(s)
Régime de financement
ERC-COG - Consolidator GrantInstitution d’accueil
80539 MUNCHEN
Allemagne