Global Agendas: Rumors, Resistance and Alternatives

Rodrigo Ferrari-Nunes (University of Aberdeen / Universidade Metropolitana de Santos)
Inayat Ali (University of Vienna)
Displacements of Power
Room 02
Tuesday 3 September, 13:00-14:30, 15:00-16:30

Short abstract:

This panel invites critical reflections on the United Nations' 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, its goals, methods, and epistemology; proponents and opponents; and effects on ethnographic settings and relations between local people and global stakeholders.

Long abstract:

This panel invites contributions that focus on how people in ethnographic settings align themselves with or resist and critique the United Nations' 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development: its particular goals, methods of action, and universalizing approach to economic, sociocultural and environmental standards. The goal of ending poverty may be seen as a laudable objective and as a suspicious marketing and political tool (apparatus) for harnessing resources to powerful players or stakeholders. This means that the agenda's proponents and opponents draw on distinguishable rationalities, justifications and explanations. We, therefore, welcome contributions that focus on the effects of UN policies on corporate-industrial-governmental, social and mainstream media, and traditional ethnographic settings; analyses of both critical and supportive positions; intersections of public health policy and medical issues such as vaccinations and infectious diseases. For instance, vaccination has been given various identities, explanations and justifications - from global stakeholders (who advocate for its uptake) to local stakeholders (who refuse or resent vaccination for different reasons). This panel is open to receive papers focusing on theoretical discussions or empirical evidence irrespective of geographical focus.