Miriam Lang, Mary Ann Manahan & Breno Bringel (Eds.). 2024.

The geopolitics of green colonialism:

Global justice and ecosocial transitions. Pluto Press. ISBN 9780745349343. Paperback £24.99

Reviewed by Carlos Tornel. Email: tornelc "at" gmail.com

As the crisis of imagination that once made it difficult to envision the end of capitalism fades, the rise
of an extended conception of capitalism—highlighting its reliance on extractivism, colonialism, and
patriarchy—has become more prevalent, focusing in part on the challenges posed by 'decarbonization.' The
geopolitics of green colonialism examines resistance to capitalism's reconfiguration in the face of its self-
inflicted climate crisis and energy transition. In this edited volume, Miriam Lang, May Ann Manahan, Breno
Bringel and their colleagues explore how capitalism has shifted toward a consensus built on transitioning from
fossil fuels to low-carbon or "renewable" energy systems. However, this transition, the authors argue, requires
a radical simplification of nature, abstracting it into a new currency or "carbon metric" that enables capitalism
to continue uninterrupted. This process, termed "accumulation by defossilization," represents a profound
geopolitical reconfiguration, intensifying resource and energy extraction from the Global South to the North
while generating new "green" pressures. This includes turning Southern ecosystems into carbon sinks to offset
Northern emissions and creating green sacrifice zones where waste and extraction from the energy transition
disproportionately accumulate.
The book critiques this "green" turn in capitalism, arguing that green colonialism has become central to
contemporary capitalism. It fosters an "imperial reason" that reframes land grabs as a humanitarian or
sustainability concern under the guise of addressing the climate crisis. This logic reinterprets colonial practices,
justifying land expropriation or "green grabbing" as a form of "saving" or "improving" vulnerable areas. The
book provides a wide-ranging critique of the challenges posed by the conceptual frameworks and structural
mechanisms sustaining green colonialism, offering an in-depth analysis of capitalism's structural mechanisms
and proposing alternative political horizons to challenge the status quo. Divided into three sections, the book
begins with an exploration of the corporate-driven energy transition and its impacts on the Global South.
Kristina Dietz highlights the growing demand for minerals to fuel the energy transition, which is creating new
sacrifice zones—regions deemed expendable for the abstract "greater good" of decarbonization. This mineral
rush drives extractivism, especially in Latin America, reinforcing unequal material, energy, and power relations.
Maristella Svampa critiques corporate environmentalism, which often advances false solutions to
environmental challenges and obstructs efforts to democratize energy use and technology. Her analysis of
lithium extraction in Latin America underscores the transformation of certain regions into green sacrifice zones
while revealing the reconfiguration of geopolitical and socio-ecological dynamics.
Hamza Hamouchene expands on this critique by addressing green colonialism's impact in the Middle
East and North Africa (MENA). He critiques the failures of international climate negotiations, which perpetuate
colonial dynamics under the guise of renewable energy development. Green colonialism, as Hamouchene
defines it, extends colonial plunder and dispossession into the renewable energy era, dehumanizing
marginalized groups while maintaining exploitative practices. John Feffer and Edgardo Lander build on this by
illustrating how Green New Deal-style transitions in the Global North and countries like China fuel new waves
of green colonialism. These approaches sustain an 'imperial mode of living' while deepening global socio-
ecological crises. Ivonne Yáñez and Camila Moreno further critique green capitalism by adapting David
Harvey's concept of "accumulation by dispossession" into "accumulation by decarbonization." They examine
market mechanisms, green transitions, and the emergence of digital assets, exposing how corporate narratives
and technical jargon dominate energy transition discourses. Their chapter also highlights grassroots alternatives
advocating for just and equitable energy transitions.
The second section, focusing on interdependencies and entanglements, examines the systemic
inequalities perpetuated by green colonialism. Christian Döringer critiques the North's net appropriation of
wealth from the South, concealed under the pretense of free trade and market pricing. This unequal exchange
underscores the material-energy dependency imposed on the South by the North. Lang, Alberto Acosta, and
Esperanza Martínez investigate debt as a tool for perpetuating colonial legacies of extraction. They propose
reframing ecological debt by positioning the Global South as creditors and rejecting offsetting practices that
sustain exploitative dynamics. Their call for organized debt non-payment challenges the legitimacy of financial

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instruments that deepen global inequalities. Ulrich Brand and Lang address the contentious role of the state in
socioecological transformations, conceptualizing it as a historically specific and variegated structure tied to
capitalist domination. However, they also highlight the state's potential as a porous space where domination
intersects with emancipatory struggles. This tension is further explored by Nimmo Bassey, who critiques the
colonial mindset driving resource plunder and displacement across Africa, often enabled by government
complicity. Despite these challenges, Bassey emphasizes the importance of grassroots resistance, which defends
territories against extractivist incursions. Rachmi Hertanti explores the geopolitical implications of critical raw
materials and their supply chains, revealing how these dynamics reinforce global inequalities. Similarly,
Manahan critiques multistakeholderism and corporate-driven environmental governance, advocating for an
alternative form of multilateralism based on solidarity and mutual aid rather than top-down, corporate-centric
models.
The third section shifts focus to diverse pathways toward achieving a livable and dignified future. Tatiana
Roa Avendaño and Pablo Bertinat advocate for alternative ownership and management models, emphasizing
the state's role in fostering community energy initiatives grounded in social movements. They argue that energy
transitions must extend beyond decarbonization to include "decommodifying, democratizing, defossilizing,
deconcentrating, decentralizing, and depatriarchalizing" (p. 174). Zo Randriamaro presents an eco-feminist
perspective from Africa, drawing on Ubuntu philosophy to propose a Pan-African approach centered on micro-
and meso-level alternatives to privatization and financialization. This perspective situates women's roles and
struggles at the heart of resistance movements against green colonialism. Bengi Akbulut applies a feminist lens
to degrowth discourse, calling for its decolonization by redefining work as a measure and a means to achieve
justice, autonomy, and democracy. Similarly, Luis González Reyes addresses the material challenges of an
ecosocial transition, emphasizing the need for localized and diverse economies that integrate perspectives from
environmentalism, feminism, and international cooperation. He highlights the urgency, depth, and breadth
required for transformative shifts, advocating for economies that respect planetary boundaries while prioritizing
social justice. Farida Akhter contributes insights from Nayakrishi Andolon, a Bangladeshi agricultural
movement promoting seed preservation, biodiversity regeneration, and a community-centered relationship with
nature. María Campo and Arturo Escobar examine the role of design in counterhegemonic transitions, focusing
on three Colombian groups to advocate for a synthesis of decarbonization, food sovereignty, and post-
extractivism. Drawing on lived experiences and struggles of land-based communities, their chapter underscores
the potential of design as a tool for shaping pluriversal futures. Finally, Bringel and Sabrina Fernandes propose
an 'eco-territorial internationalism' that connects localized struggles through transnational networks and
coalitions. Their vision emphasizes the importance of connecting movements across scales to build a global
horizon of possibility while respecting and strengthening localized efforts.
The book addresses an impressive range of issues related to the expansion of green colonialism,
employing diverse and often novel approaches to tackle complex and necessary conversations. A central
premise is that ecosocial transformations—understood as a broader cultural, economic, political, and societal
shift in humanity's relationship with nature (p. 12)—are impossible without global justice and a significant
absolute reduction in energy and material consumption. These principles anchor the book's critique of the state's
role in transition "governance," which the editors warn risks perpetuating hegemonic, corporate-led energy
transitions unless reimagined through state-oriented reforms or prefigurative practices that prioritize localized
autonomy. The book enriches this discussion by examining the material and energy demands of ecosocial
transformation in both political and practical terms. By critically exploring degrowth in the Global South and
how various geographies resist green and climate colonialism, the editors provide a nuanced analysis of these
pressing issues. They highlight the growing dominance of a "green" capitalist consensus, which, they argue,
obscures and undermines meaningful resistance and dialogue. The authors' bold engagement with these
challenges makes this work a vital contribution to debates on ecosocial transformation, green colonialism, and
the future of energy transitions.
In the context of the corporate-led energy transition and the emergence of eco-territorial internationalism
as a response, a central challenge lies in the state's role in either facilitating or hindering these transformations.
While Brand and Lang provide a nuanced critique of the state, the unresolved tension between eco-territorial
internationalism and the state's complicity with capitalism remains significant. The experience of the Petro-
Marquez government in Colombia exemplifies efforts to position the state as a "steward" of a popular or
communitarian energy transition, offering a counterpoint to corporate-led approaches. Although the Colombian

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case is compelling and deserves closer analysis (p. 12), it underscores a deeper challenge that aligns with long-
standing anarchist critiques that argue the state does not simply "wither away," even when prefigurative praxis
seeks to build autonomous movements from below. The tension between public efforts to "empower
institutions" (p. 180) and the persistent influence of the market is fundamentally at odds with struggles for
prefiguration and autonomy. In other words, the state, by enabling power to shift its guise without addressing
its inherent alliance with capitalism and the international division of labor, perpetuates this contradiction. This
highlights the enduring challenge of reconciling state-centered strategies with broader goals of autonomy and
systemic transformation.
A second contentious point concerns the framing of energy as "a right," primarily discussed in Rao
Avendaño and Bertinet's chapter. The authors provide a vital analysis of the state's role in transitioning to
alternative forms of energy ownership and management, emphasizing that energy transitions are not solely
about decarbonization but also about "decommodifying, democratizing, defossilizing, deconcentrating,
decentralizing, and depatriarchalizing" (p. 174). Central to their argument is the interplay between the public,
the popular, and the common, proposing energy as "a collective right consistent with the rights of Nature and
recovering the public in terms of ownership and management" (p. 179). The authors argue that achieving such
a transition requires state, legislative, and regulatory reforms to challenge privatization and liberalization while
empowering institutions and actors operating outside capitalist market frameworks. However, while they
effectively critique the commodification of energy, framing energy as "a right" assumes, perhaps uncritically,
that the "right to energy" equates to a universal "need" for energy. As Ivan Illich (2009) warns, this framing
risks reaffirming the modern premise of people as inherently "needy," thereby reinforcing institutional
dependency and perpetuating some counterproductive dynamics of modernity. This critique raises important
questions for political ecologists, including how energy is conceptualized, how the notion of "rights" relates to
modern formulations of humanity, and how liberalism has historically framed these rights as individual rather
than collective struggles. The chapter thus opens critical debates about whether the conceptualization of energy
as a "right" can adequately support the broader emancipatory goals of political ecology or risks reinforcing the
very structures it seeks to challenge.
Thirdly, the proliferation of terms like green extractivism, green colonialism, and green capitalism
invites reflection on their interconnectedness. Bringel and Fernandez critique green extractivism for isolating
decarbonization from the metabolism of nature, thereby normalizing the imperial mode of living. However,
others like Chagnon et al. (2022) have emphasized extractivism's colonial mentality and its central role in
capitalist accumulation, while Dunlap et al. (2024) argue that green extractivism exploits the climate crisis to
create profit opportunities under the guise of sustainability and "carbon neutrality." While the authors rightly
reject reducing everything to decarbonization, the conceptual link between green colonialism and green
extractivism needs to be more tightly integrated. Discussing these terms together –rather than separating them–
reveals the interconnected dynamics of socioecological exploitation and the coloniality of power, nature, and
knowledge, enriching our understanding of capitalism's "green turn."
Finally, while the book offers a broad overview of green colonialism's many forms, one area that
warrants further attention is the conceptualization of energy within energy transition discussions. As Larry
Lohmann (2024) argues, understanding energy as inherently colonial reveals the imperial logic embedded in
thermodynamics. By framing energy as a "thing," its impact on landscapes and timescapes is often obscured,
reducing our challenge to the 'transition' rather than focusing on energy itself. While these critiques are not
absent from the book, they serve as provocations, encouraging readers to adopt a broader perspective on green
colonialism within capitalist structures.
In their compelling conclusion, Bringel and Fernandez identify several ways in which a new
internationalism is being forged through an eco-territorial turn. They reject the green-new-deal mentality that
has shaped much of the discourse on energy transitions, instead advocating for Doreen Massey's global sense
of place. This perspective moves beyond the outdated binary of development in the South versus degrowth in
the North, highlighting instead the potential of formal and informal networks—such as the Ecosocial and
Intercultural Pact of the South and the Global Tapestry of Alternatives1—as spaces and platforms for building
alternative political imaginaries, while also facilitating alliances against shared enemies and false solutions. The

1While the authors reference these initiatives in their chapter, I wish to disclose, in the interest of transparency, that I am
an active member of both networks.

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Geopolitics of green colonialism is a must-read for those seeking a deeper understanding of capitalism's reliance
on its "green" consensus. Its comprehensive critique of green colonialism, coupled with diverse perspectives
from twenty-five contributors, makes it an invaluable resource for anyone engaging with ecosocial
transformation, energy transitions, and global justice.
.
References
Chagnon, W. C., Durante, F., Gills, B. K. et al. (2022). From extractivism to global extractivism: The evolution
of an organizing concept. The Journal of Peasant Studies, 49(4): 760-792.
https://doi.org/10.1080/03066150.2022.2069015
Dunlap, A. Verweijen, J. & Tornel, C. (2024). The political ecologies of "green" extractivism(s). Journal of
Political Ecology, 31(1), 436–463. https://doi.org/10.2458/jpe.6131
Illich, I. ([1983] 2009). The social construction of energy. In R. Ghosn (Ed.). New Geographies #2. (pp. 11-
21). Harvard Graduate School of Design/Harvard University Press.
Lang, M., Manahan, M. A., & Bringel, B. (Eds.). (2024). The geopolitics of green colonialism: Global justice
and ecosocial transitions. Pluto Press.
Lohmann, L. (2024). Provincializing energy transitions. Grassroots – The Journal of Political Ecology, 31(1),
665–677. https://doi.org/10.2458/jpe.5602

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Carlos Tornel is an independent researcher and a member of the Global Tapestry of Alternatives and the
Ecosocial and Intercultural Pact of the South.

Journal of Political Ecology Vol. 32, 2025