ABSTRACT
In the past decade, a vast and largely critical academic literature has been established around the concept of neoliberalism and, as an extension, on neoliberal environments. Conceived as an ‘ideology of the market’ (Block, 2003) and as a radical form of ‘market fundamentalism’ (Stiglitz, 2002; Hilgers, 2010), neoliberal economic ideology and practice have represented a powerful force for reorganizing economic, political, social and ecological relations worldwide over the past 30 years. In Southeast Asian studies, scholars have applied and refined approaches to environmental neoliberalism (or neoliberal natures) as a way of understanding the intense ecological and socio-natural transformations ongoing in the region. At its core, environmental neoliberalism seeks to conceive of, manage and govern natural environments and environmental politics through the establishment of free markets, and through the knowledge systems, norms, institutions and rationalities of a competitive neoliberal-capitalist society. 1
In this chapter, I introduce ways in which different scholars have approached the concepts of ‘environmental neoliberalism’ and ‘neoliberal natures’. I draw upon a number of examples that highlight the utility, as well as the limits, of neoliberalism as an ‘ideal type’ concept, and of the notion of ‘neoliberalization’ as an ongoing political-ecological project, for understanding the complex environmental transformations ongoing in Asia. Southeast Asia is a particularly fertile region for studying the application and (partial) uptake of neoliberal modes of environmental governance and governmentality – not just due to the diversity of places, local social relations and institutional landscapes (Roth and Dressler, 2012) but also, I suggest, due to the enduring presence in the region of alternative logics of state power, and modes of political-economic rule. These alternatives to neoliberalism in Southeast Asia include dominant paternalist and developmentalist orientations of different regional states, and the persistence of more overtly illiberal and authoritarian governance formations, as well as the growing dynamism of East/Southeast Asian state capitalism. This leads me to highlight the potential for further grounded research into the relational connections and contradictions between neoliberal environmental ideologies, actor-networks, institutions and practices on the one hand, and the consolidation of alternative and hybridized forms of power and authority in Southeast Asia on the other.
