Conflicts over Botanical Knowledge in the Case of (Trans)Atlantic Rainforests (Brazil and Great Britain)

Subproject A07 investigates conflicts surrounding knowledge about biodiversity conservation against the backdrop of the dramatic increase in the extinction of non-human life on Earth. As a paradigmatic modernist regime that has historically determined the spatial organization of humans and non-human entities, conservation has been massively destabilized since the 1960s by contemporary forces, changing climatic conditions, efforts to decolonize (knowledge) and developments in digitalized biotechnology.

The subproject adopts a spatial perspective on this existential planetary problem, examining the refiguration of spaces in relation to the fragmented transatlantic forests stretching along the Atlantic Ocean coastline, which has been shaped by imperialism and colonial expansion, and examines the refiguration of spaces in this context. Using an interdisciplinary design research approach that bridges sociology and architecture and combines multi-sited ethnography with expert interviews and hybrid mapping, the subproject explores how transatlantic forests and the subjectivities of nature custodians (including park rangers, Indigenous Guaraní leaders, and IUCN staff) are co-constituted within spatial conflicts over conservation knowledge. Taking Brazil and the United Kingdom as case studies, this research project asks: Which knowledge conflicts challenge the stability of the modern conservation regime, and what effect do these conflicts have on the ongoing co-constitution of spaces of nature and the subjectivities of nature custodians in transatlantic forests?

The problem of biodiversity loss not only raises the question of the significance of biological knowledge for conservation but also highlights a socio-political and spatial issue – namely, the struggle over who determines how human and non-human life on the planet is spatially ordered and reorganized. By investigating the spatialization of conflicts within conservation regimes, the subproject aims to reveal how botanical knowledge is materialized and reproduced within spaces of nature. Overall, the project intends to capture processes of spatial refiguration in which hegemonic epistemologies of the Global North are being challenged by more diverse forms of knowledge (e.g. local, traditional, subaltern, and artisanal forms).

PI
Dr. Jamie-Scott Baxter
Dr. Séverine Marguin, Technische Universität Berlin, Institut für Soziologie

DFG Fund, 2026-2029

Student Staff
Maria Leticia Bordignon Fogaca