Offsetting Justice? Environmental justice in the age of market and militarized conservation

Event Type
Enjust Conference 2025

Location / Date
Bonn, 03.12.2025 until 05.12.2025

Enjust network, Department of Geography at Kiel University, German Institute of Development and Sustainability (IDOS)

Despite mounting evidence of their limited effectiveness in reducing emissions or halting biodiversity decline, techno-managerial and market-based approaches—such as carbon markets, biodiversity offsets, green bonds and protected areas—remain widely used. These approaches continue to dominate responses to environmental crises.

The global expansion of protected areas to meet biodiversity targets, along with newer forms of "green" and "blue" enclosures aimed at carbon and biodiversity offsetting, has drawn significant criticism from peasant movements, small-scale fishers, and indigenous rights activists worldwide. These communities are already burdened by the expansion of agro-industrial monocultures, industrial fisheries, mining (including for minerals essential to the energy transition), large-scale infrastructure projects, and the escalating impacts of climate change. Fisher, peasants, and forest dwellers find themselves at the heart of environmental conflicts that connect diverse actors and geographies—ranging from corporations pursuing carbon offset projects, to conservationists financing sometimes militarized protected areas through the sale of carbon and biodiversity credits, to local communities striving to retain or expand access to land and resources. These conflicts reflect deep contradictions and ambiguities inherent in environmental governance—specifically, efforts to sustain a fossil-fuel-based accumulation regime by outsourcing climate mitigation to supposedly low-cost regions and offsetting biodiversity loss elsewhere.

Biodiversity offsetting presents further challenges since their design and implementation are limited by our incomplete understanding of biodiversity. Even the most advanced biodiversity metrics capture only a fragment of the complex relations between species and ecosystems. Replicating biodiversity elsewhere is not only uncertain, but also ecologically slow—often taking decades to achieve similar conditions. Moreover, offsetting sites are not uninhabited voids—they are often homes to both human and non-human beings. Their creation raises fundamental questions of environmental justice: What kinds of nature are prioritized? Who decides what survives, dies or is displaced? What are the consequences of offsetting and energy transition for human and non-human life? The increasing demand for resources essential to the energy transition—such as lithium, cobalt, and rare earth elements—adds further complexity, with significant consequences for people, non-human life, and the planet. 

Conference aim
The aim of this conference organized by the Environmental Governance department at the German Institute of Development and Sustainability (IDOS), the Department of Geography at Kiel University and the Enjust Network, is to strengthen and institutionalize justice in climate and biodiversity governance by creating a common space of reflection for scholars, activists and conservation practitioners. We welcome contributions that explore topics such as:

• The equity and justice implications of market-based conservation, including the socio-ecological impacts of carbon markets, carbon offsets, REDD+, biodiversity offsets, credit systems, and green bonds.
• Politics of infrastructure development and the role of offsetting and compensation schemes.
• Practitioner insights on inclusive approaches to designing and managing protected areas.
• Just alternatives: how to shift discourses towards more equitable and inclusive ways of protecting life on earth.
• Critical analyses of terrestrial and marine protected areas, particularly in light of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework.
• Political ecologies of militarized conservation.
• More-than-human perspectives on conservation and environmental justice. 

Call for Abstracts
We warmly invite you to submit an abstract for consideration to participate in our upcoming conference. Abstracts should be no more than 300 words and should clearly outline the focus and key arguments of your proposed contribution. The deadline for submission is 20 July 2025. Please send your abstract (as PDF document) to enjust@geographie.uni-kiel.de with the subject line: Abstract Submission – EnjustConference2025.

We look forward to receiving your proposals and to engaging in thoughtful discussions together.

Hinweis

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