Edited by Kyla Tienhaara (Queen’s University) and Joanna Robinson (York University)
Over the past year, the “Green New Deal” has moved from relative obscurity to front and centre of policy discussions and public debates about how to respond to the climate crisis. It has been credited with radically changing the nature of the conversation on climate change and with re-energizing the environmental movement at a critical time.
While many will associate the Green New Deal with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the freshman United States congresswoman from New York who has championed it, the idea has actually been floating around for more than a decade. It’s also not an exclusively American idea. A Green New Deal Group was formed in the UK in 2007. The European Greens also have a longstanding Green New Deal manifesto and Spain’s Socialist Party was re-elected in 2019 on a Green New Deal Platform. Further afield, Korea launched a Green New Deal in 2009. In the same year, the United Nations Environment Program proposed a Global Green New Deal that largely focused on how G20 countries could maximize the environmental benefits of fiscal stimulus packages rolled out in the wake of the global financial crisis.
Given the rapid rise in popularity of the Green New Deal over the past year, we see this Handbook as an important opportunity to take stock of the emerging literature on the topic, but also to actively shape the discourse. In particular, we are keen to use the Handbook to outline a vision of the Green New Deal as a transformative project rather than purely a program of public investment aimed at decarbonization. We believe that the most important aspect of the Green New Deal is the way that it merges environmental concerns and social justice, for example through calls for job guarantees, wealth redistribution and inclusivity.
Our plan is to divide the Handbook into four parts. The first part will focus on the history of the Green New Deal, examining both its roots in the original New Deal as well as the numerous proposals that emerged following the 2008 Global Financial Crisis. The second part will involve chapters that explore how the Green New Deal engages with contemporary debates about sustainability (e.g. degrowth, just transition) and how it relates to other movements (e.g. feminism, Indigenous rights). In the third part, authors will detail case studies of Green New Deal proposals at the national or regional level. Finally, part four will cover global issues, including how a Global Green New Deal could involve a rethink of global economic institutions and address the particular challenges that the Global South faces in addressing the ecological crisis.
We are inviting proposals (from academics, students, and practitioners) for chapters that fit under any of these broad themes. Examples of chapters that we would particularly welcome:
- Green elements of the original New Deal
- Lesson’s from Korea’s Green New Deal
- Public Finance and the Green New Deal
- A Green New Deal for Africa
- Concerns about a Green New Deal from the Global South (‘climate colonialism’)
Chapters are expected to be approximately 8000 words, but longer and shorter submissions will be considered.
Please submit a proposed chapter title, 500-word summary, and a short CV to kt71@queensu.ca by 15 March 2020.
Important dates:
| Deadline for proposals: | 15 March 2020 |
| Acceptance of proposals: | 31 March 2020 |
| Draft chapters due to editors: | 31 August 2020 |
| Edited chapters returned to authors: | 1 October 2020 |
| Final chapters due to editors: | 1 December 2020 |
| Full manuscript delivered to Routledge: | 31 January 2021 |
If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to Kyla Tienhaara – kt71@queensu.ca