Challenging Legitimacy at the Precipice of Energy Calamity [Paperback]

Human history has often been described as a progressive relinquishment from environmental constraints. Now, it seems, we have come full circle. The ecological irrationalities associated with industrial societies have a lengthy history, and our purpose in the proposed book is not to catalogue this litany of wrongs. Rather, this book is about political responses to global environmental crisis at a crucial turning point in history, by focusing on the political discourses surrounding the tar sands in Alberta, Canada.

This book focuses on the political discourse surrounding the proposed extraction of oil from the Athabasca tar sands in Alberta, Canada, tracing how language and visual representations are used to reinforce or challenge the legitimacy of oil extraction there.

Two intersecting moments of the Twenty-first Century define our politics, economies, and future prospects for civilization: the mounting evidence for global climate change, now unequivocally attributed to socio-economic activities, and its de-stabilizing effects on our biosphere, combined with the end of easy oil and the easy wealth it generates. On the energy question, non-conventional fossil fuels have been promoted by political elites as the next most attractive development option. The development of nonconventional fuels, however, does nothing to alleviate either climate change or the falling rate of energy supply, and generates multiple social and environmental consequences. The largest endeavour marking this historic nexusindeed the largest industrial project in history, is the extraction and processing of the Athabasca tar sands in Alberta, Canada. The social, environmental, and most importantly political outcomes of this grand experimel“.