Responsibility and agency in securitizing climate change in the Anthropocene

Abstract

Based on the premise that security discourses are constructed along political and ethical contes-tations, Ecological Security: Climate Change and the Construction of Security traces the contours of ecological security — a normatively defensible and politically plausible approach to climate change. Matt McDonald (2021) eloquently weaves together security, ecology, and ethics in de fi ning ecological security ’ s commitment to the resilience of ecosystems and the rights and needs of vulnerable beings, including future generations and nonhuman nature. At a glance, a security discourse that includes all living beings, at present and in the future, is nothing more than a utopic vision given the state-centric and anthropocentric institutions, norms, and practices dominating the discussions on climate security. However, the book carefully laid the sociological groundwork on how these discourses are contested and constructed, and therefore can be challenged and changed by possibilities that are not just critical, but also emancipatory. Security is constructed through negotiation and contestation; it is also political because it rests on who drives the negotiation and who gives meaning to contestation, and it draws on ethical conceptions and commitments. Such grounding convinces the readers that not only is ecological security possible, it is also desirable and ethical given growing uncertainties and cascading risks due to climate change. It is this uncertainty about the future that makes McDonald ’ s proposal to integrate dialogue, re fl exivity, and humility into ecological security compelling in the context of the Anthropocene.