Feminist Political Ecology and Peace in West Africa

Feminist political ecology is a relatively new theoretical marriage between political ecology, which asserts that ecological issues must be understood and analyzed in relation to political economy, focusing on power relations, and ecofeminism, an older theory with roots in feminism and development studies that aligns women with the natural world in social, cultural, and economic ways. As environmental issues, particularly climate change, are moving toward the mainstream of political science and international relations, feminist political ecology can be used as a lens to interrogate how communities understand the environment in relationship to their daily lives. Furthermore, as international organizations develop complex policies to address climate change and environmental degradation in West Africa, feminist political ecology can help detail the complex interplay between the politics of peacebuilding, women’s relationships with their environment, and their everyday material needs, all of which are affected by international donors and policymakers. Therefore, this paper aims to bring together literatures of women in peacebuilding, women in environmental movements, and environmental aspects of peacebuilding. We use feminist political ecology to reveal how women in West Africa articulate environmental degradation as an issue of peace and how discourses of environmentalism have influenced the governance of peace and security.