geopolitical ecology

• Organizing the Tenant Class w/ Ricardo Tranjan

  In this episode, we’re joined by Ricardo Tranjan, political economist and author of The Tenant Class (2023). Ricardo’s work reframes housing—not as a temporary crisis—but as a long-standing, for-profit system that deliberately extracts wealth from tenants to enrich landlords, developers, and investors. Ricardo dismantles the conventional supply‑and‑demand narrative embraced by policymakers and the real estate industry—where building more is assumed to bring prices to "equilibrium"—showing instead how incentives for private developers can fuel speculation and steadily drive prices out of reach, all while wages stagnate or grow at a slower rate than inflation. He argues that the very frame of housing as a technical problem obscures its political dimensions: the pressure should be on collective tenant power, class solidarity—especially strong partnerships with labor unions—and moving beyond for-profit delivery models toward universal housing security. Ricardo Tranjan works at the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives. Previously, he managed the City of Toronto’s Poverty Reduction Strategy Office and taught in universities in Ontario and Quebec.His early academic work focused on the political economy of development in Brazil, his native country. His current research and commentary focus on Ontario public finances, and the economics of social policy, especially income supports, education, and rental housing. His book, The Tenant Class, published by Between the Lines in 2023, has become a national bestseller.Important Resources:​The Tenant Class;​High Rises and Housing Stress;​Vancouver Tenants Union; ​Syndicat de Locataires (MTL);​Toronto housing rights FAQ; https://yellowheadinstitute.org/2025/04/16/alternative-approach-to-economic-development-in-inuit-nunangat/​

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• Critical Minerals, Critical Conflicts w/ Emily Iona Stewart

  In this episode, we speak with Emily Iona Stewart to unpack the complex and deeply political dynamics behind the global rush for critical minerals.Why are these minerals—like lithium, cobalt, copper, and nickel—so important? Where are they found? What are the implications of their extraction for Indigenous communities, ecosystems, and the development trajectories of post-colonial nations?We explore how critical minerals sit at the intersection of climate technologies, militarism, and digital technologies. From defense-for-minerals deals between the US and Ukraine or the DRC, to stockpiling strategies that prioritize military use over energy justice, this conversation highlights the geopolitical, economic, and ethical stakes of today’s mineral boom.As Emily reminds us, it’s not enough to decarbonize. We must ensure that the transition to a zero-carbon world doesn’t reproduce the same systems of exploitation, dispossession, and inequality.Emily is the Head of Policy and EU Relations at Global Witness, a leading international NGO known for its investigative work exposing the connections between natural resource exploitation, environmental destruction, corruption, and human rights abuse.Emily has played a major role in shaping European climate and sustainability policy, including contributions to the European Green Deal. At Global Witness, she leads efforts to ensure that the extraction and use of transition minerals is not only responsible, but also just—centering the rights of affected communities and advocating for transparency and accountability.About Global Witness:For over 30 years, Global Witness has been investigating and exposing the systems that enable environmental harm, conflict, and corruption. Their work holds powerful actors accountable and supports movements fighting for climate justice and the protection of human rights. Learn more at ⁠globalwitness.org⁠.Resources: https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2025/1/2/modern-plunderers-lobito-corridor-plans-bring-fear-hesitation-in-drchttps://globalwitness.org/en/campaigns/transition-minerals/fuelling-the-future-poisoning-the-present-myanmars-rare-earth-boom/https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/congo-eyes-us-minerals-deal-by-end-june-ft-reports-2025-05-25/https://globalwitness.org/en/press-releases/clean-energy-dirty-consequences-mining-for-renewable-technologies-linked-to-global-social-unrest/https://smi.uq.edu.au/article/2022/12/54-per-cent-projects-extracting-clean-energy-minerals-overlap-indigenous-lands

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• Chennai Floods: a decade’s hindsight w/ Priti Narayan

  In this episode, we speak with Priti Narayan about the devastating floods that hit Chennai, India—a city grappling with the compounding effects of climate change and urban inequality. Reflecting on the floods a decade later, Priti unpacks how such dramatic events both reveal and deepen the everyday structural violence embedded in urban life.We explore how climate disasters are experienced unevenly, shaped by social, economic, and spatial injustices, and how responses to these events often reproduce the same inequalities they expose.Priti also shares powerful reflections on the role of public scholarship and activism—especially in moments when violence is not always visible, but deeply felt by marginalized communities.Priti is an Assistant Professor at UBC Geography. Her research and teaching interests center around urban processes and politics, particularly in India. In her primary research project, she examines how contemporary urban development interacts with state-society relations in Chennai, India. She uses ethnographic and archival methods to investigate how residents negotiate with local politicians, bureaucrats, and activists to preserve citizenship in urban landscapes marked by violent, large-scale slum evictions. She has been learning from collective struggles for tenure security for the urban poor in Chennai for over 13 years now. Priti is passionate about collaborative activist scholarship which highlights lived experiences — drawing on the politics of expertise and knowledge production, feminist methodologies, and public scholarship. She frequently collaborates to write about economic and social protections for unorganized workers and urban development in Tamil Nadu. Her writing has appeared in news and media outlets such as The Times of India, The Hindu, OpenDemocracy, and Kafila, among others.We encourage you to read Priti’s public articles, such as these:Slow violence and the Spectacle – Dispossession, segregation, and the Chennai Floods: Priti NarayanRosenman, E. and P. Narayan. 2023. Economic geography for and by whom? Rethinking expertise and accountability.Chapters:(00:00) Introduction & Experience(08:25) 2015 Chennai floods(15:35) How come is preparedness for disaster weak? (19:00) Is it "corruption"?(23:30) Actors of unevenness (41:00) On slow violence(46:43) Public scholarship(56:24) Suppression of dissent(1:11:00) Critical hope

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• A state without borders; borders without states w/ Hicham Safieddine: zionist border regimes, tools of empire, and McCarthysim on campus

  I had the honor to host Dr. Hicham Safieddine, a brilliant Lebanese scholar and historian at the University of British Columbia. His work has included a detailed study of the emergence and transformation of global and national monetary regimes and financial systems under capitalist expansion, debt, war, colonial conquest, national liberation and revolution. He also works on the history of economic thought, as well as modern Arab and Islamic thought, with an emphasis on the age of anti-colonial national liberation in the mid-20th century. In this episode, we discuss Hicham’s conception of the border regime that defines the geographies of zionist settler-colonialism. He put forth the conception of “a state without borders, borders without states” to help us hone in on an adequate framing to what’s happening in our homelands today. Then, we discuss what the new phase of US empire in terms of Trump’s ethnic cleansing plans for Gaza as well as all the tools of US empire he inherits, which have been used, albeit in variegated ways, all over the Global South throughout history. I ask Hicham to dissect and discern all the imperial tools that the US has at its disposal to assert and reassert its hegemony. Finally, we tackle the silencing and censorship we see in and out of the academy, specifically leaning on Hicham’s experiences at UBC as well as having taught and lived in the UK previously. As usual, we end with a note of critical hope. I ask Hicham what keeps him going, and I’m pleased that he felt comfortable enough to share it with me, despite the fact that he has personally been impacted by zionist violence. Please check out Hicham’s work, starting here:Banking on the State: The Financial Foundations of LebanonMahdi Amel, Arab Marxism and National Liberation: Selected Writings

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• The Present Moment in Lebanon, Syria, Palestine w/ Karim Safieddine

  A lot has happened and changed in Lebanon, Syria, and Palestine since we last spoke with Karim Safieddine over a month ago in our episode titled “Anti-Establishment Positions in Lebanon and Beyond.” So, we decided to have him back on to try and make sense of this moment, where a lot of shifts, some positive and some negative, are unfolding right before our eyes. We discuss a variety of issues, from the South of Lebanon which continues to have Israeli Occupation Forces on the ground in violation of the ceasefire agreement’s deadline to the introduction of two new figures into Lebanese politics—President Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam. If you haven't already, do check out our previous episode with Karim! Finally, here are some links to further explore/clarify some things mentioned in the episode: 1. When Karim mentions May 7, this is what he refers to: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Lebanon_conflict 2. "Self Criticism After Defeat" link to book: https://saqibooks.com/books/saqi/self-criticism-after-the-defeat/ 3. Links related to ecological crisis and ecocide: * https://www.jibal.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/Jibal-Research-design-eng-digital-DD20211123.pdf * https://www.hrw.org/news/2024/06/05/lebanon-israels-white-phosphorous-use-risks-civilian-harm * https://www.wilpf.org/the-ecocide-of-palestine/ * https://www.newarab.com/analysis/ecocide-gaza-environmental-impact-israels-war * https://www.newarab.com/news/gaza-conflict-has-caused-major-environmental-damage-un-says * https://www.arab-reform.net/publication/the-environmental-impact-of-syrias-conflict-a-preliminary-survey-of-issues/

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