Buch, Englisch, 75 Seiten
Histories from the Critical Zone
Buch, Englisch, 75 Seiten
Reihe: Elements in Environmental Humanities
ISBN: 978-1-009-68319-7
Verlag: Cambridge University Press
The Mar Menor, Europe's largest saltwater coastal lagoon, was long sustained by high salinity and low-nutrient waters that supported remarkable biodiversity. Since the late twentieth century, however, intensive tourism, industrial agriculture linked to the Tagus–Segura water transfer, and legacy mining pollution have driven accelerating ecological degradation. The eutrophication crisis of 2016 and the mass anoxic events of 2019 and 2021, which caused extensive marine die-offs, marked a profound ecological and political rupture. In response, a civic movement led by Teresa Vicente achieved an unprecedented outcome in 2022: the lagoon was granted legal personality, becoming the first ecosystem in Europe to obtain such status. This Element examines the social, legal, and scientific transformations surrounding this case and argues that recognising the lagoon as a subject opens new possibilities for rethinking human–nature relations and imagining more-than-human political communities grounded in ecological justice.
Autoren/Hrsg.
Weitere Infos & Material
Introduction; 1. A deep history of the Mar Menor; 2. Modern tales: from Spanish-American war (1898) to developmentalism in franco times and the struggle for water in democratic Spain green water and dead fish; 3. We, the people of Mar Menor more than a legal revolution: ecological justice and the terrestrials in the Mar Menor; Conclusions; References.
