Environmental crime, crisis & conflict

Green criminology studies the harms against the environment and analyzes the underlying dynamics and drivers of those harms, drawing attention to how environmental crises and conflicts have (not) been addressed. Since 2012, green criminologists from around the world have organized a (bi)yearly seminar that focuses on different aspects of environmental crime, with the aim of pushing green criminological scholarship further by bridging (sub)disciplinary boundaries, but also by bringing together junior and senior scholars as well as practitioners to learn from each other. Building on those insights from green criminology, in combination with political ecology, geography, law and political economy, and conflict studies, this year’s seminar is aimed at understanding and addressing the complex nexus of environmental crime, crisis, and conflict. We put the spotlight on the multifaceted visible and hidden environmental crises and conflicts and how they relate to environmental crime and harm. 

The event aims to foster an open and honest discussion on existing empirical and theoretical successes and challenges in green criminology, to strengthen our field of research. The program aims to achieve balance in terms of researcher gender and experience, representing scholars from the Global North and the Global South, exploring the range of environmental crimes, and engaging with qualitative, quantitative, and mixed method research.

The seminar is planned prior to the start of the main European Society of Criminology conference (this year in Bucharest, Romania) for scholars to be able to attend both events without extra travel expenses and carbon footprint.

Attendance is free, but registration is mandatory due to limited availability. We thank the following sponsors, who allowed us to host this seminar on Environmental Crime, Crisis and Conflict, as a free event: Universitat Rovira i Virgili Research Group Territory, Citizenship and Sustainability (Spain); Utrecht University’s Project Ecocide of Pathways to Sustainability (the Netherlands); University of South Wales (UK); UNODC (Austria); United Nations Office on Drugs & Crime (Austria); Erasmus University Rotterdam’s Initiative on Dynamics of Inclusive Prosperity and Sector Plan for Law Rebalancing Public Interests in Private Relationships (the Netherlands).

The conference will not be recorded nor live streamed. 

Programme

9.30-9.45 Introduction to the day announcing the GREEN working group by Marieke Kluin (and conference chair for the day)

9.45-10.55 Panel 1: War, conflict and ecocide 

• The Invisible Victims of Israel’s Genocide on Gaza: Crimes Against Animals and Nature - Rimona Afana, Independent researcher
• How international criminal law could be used to address large scale environmental destruction - Reinhold Gallmetzer, Office of the Prosecutor, International Criminal Court

10.55-11.15 Break

11.15-12.30 Panel 2: Local communities and environmental conflict

• Crime, crisis and conflicts in the Romanian forests - George Iordachescu, Waageningen University & Research
• Coastal communities,  industrial extractivism, artisanal fisheries and conflicts over natural resources in the Gulf of Guayaquil in Ecuador, Puerto Roma and Isla Costa Rica - Wendy Chávez-Páez, Bonn International Graduate School for Development Research
• Business as usual: armed groups, local communities and environmental conflicts in Eastern Congo - Daan van Uhm, Utrecht University

12.30-13.15 Lunch

13.15-14.30 Panel 3: Historic hidden environmental crises

• Forever polluted. The global chemical contamination crisis. - Lieselot Bisschop, Erasmus University Rotterdam
• Under our feet: the hidden waste crime around us - Tanya Wyatt, United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime 
• Air Pollution, Pervasive Exposure, and the Social Processes Underpinning Harm Visibility - James Heydon, University of Nottingham

14.30-14.45 Break

14.45-15.55 Panel 4: Implications for/of law enforcement

• A prosecutor’s experience with environmental crime, crises and conflicts in Romania - Aurelian Constantin, Office of the Prosecutor, Romania
• Southern Green Victimology: A look at the Cycle of Environmental Harms, resistance, and over-criminalization of Dissent in Argentina - Valeria Vegh Weis, Buenos Aires University & National Quilmes University Argentina & Universität Konstanz Zukunftskolleg

15.55-16.15 Constant crises: The environment as the silent victim of crime, conflicts and war - Nigel South, Essex University

Organizers

This year’s organizers are Jenny Maher (University of South Wales, UK), Mònica Pons Hernández (Universitat Rovira i Virgili, Spain), Tanya Wyatt (UNODC, Austria), Marieke Kluin (Leiden University, the Netherlands), Daan van Uhm (Utrecht University, the Netherlands), Lieselot Bisschop (Erasmus University Rotterdam, the Netherlands).