Another remarkable joint publication by PhD student Peter Bori and alumni Balsa Lubarda has been published this March, this time in the Handbook of Environmental Political Theory in the Anthropocene with the title: 'Far-right ecologism: revisiting ecofascism and violence'.
Balsa Lubarda, who was recipient of the Advanced Doctoral Student Award at CEU, graduated from our department in 2021 with Summa Cum Laude dealing with the topic of far-right ecologism, and is publishing regularly since. He is author of "Far-Right Ecologism: Environmental Politics and the Far Right" (Routledge, 2024) and was listed as best Montenegrin Scientist under 30 in 2023.
Presently he is Head of Research at DAMAR - Research Institute, Podgorica, Montenegro and Maria Sklodowska-Curie postdoctoral fellow at the Johns Hopkins University - Universitat Pompeu Fabra Public Policy Center in Barcelona working on EXEMPT - the manifestations of social exclusion in environmental movements, as well as being a National Consultant to UNDP.
Péter J. Bori is a PhD Candidate at the Department of Environmental Sciences and Policy, recipient of the First-Year Doctoral Student Award, working on environmental politics within authoritarian illiberal political contexts under the supervision of Alexios Antypas. He is also a Europaeum Scholar and also conducts research on energy justice in Hungary within a project funded by the Swedish Research Council on Sustainable Development at the Democracy Institute of CEU. (Peter has been recently interviewed for the article: Assessing the environmental fallout as Europe lurches rightward by Trellis, March 14, 2025)
The Handbook is edited by Amanda Machin and Marcel Wissenburg, and includes chapters from such important authors of environmental theory like Erik Swyngedouw, Avner de-Shalit, Jens Marquardt, among others; providing a comprehensive overview of the transforming landscape of environmental political theory. Embracing both classical and marginalised approaches in the field, it demonstrates the central role of political theory in rethinking the strategies, discourses and imaginaries of the Anthropocene epoch.
'Our contribution examines how the concept of 'far-right ecologism,' intersects with violence—often assumed to be limited to the most extreme, terrorist manifestations, such as those seen in Christchurch and El Paso. This chapter, in a way, challenges the (unintended) interpretation that dismisses ecofascism as largely irrelevant to understanding the contemporary far-right environmental agenda. While that agenda appears technocratic and ostensibly eco-modernist, it remains deeply violent in multiple ways.' - say the authors.
Congratulations for both of them!
- The chapter can be assessed below:
https://lnkd.in/dUxK3_h9 - DOI:
- https://doi.org/10.4337/9781802208955.00027
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- Balsa's book "Far-Right Ecologism: Environmental Politics and the Far Right in Hungary and Poland" (Routledge, 2024) had its first review recently published by Environmental Politics, arguably the most prestigious journal in the field, and was reviewed by John Hultgren, the author of "Border Walls Gone Green: Nature and Anti-immigrant Politics in America" (2015).
"The strength of the monograph lies in the empirical research that Lubarda has conducted; the snippets that he includes from his forty-five interviews with far-right activists are fascinating."
"Lubarda clearly has an eye for nuance. He does an excellent job of showing just how contested environmental politics are within the far-Right, and he time and again emphasizes the protean nature of far right ecologism."
The review on the book can be found here:
https://lnkd.in/dHrnkfJr