Lidskog Rolf, Mol Arthur Pj, Oosterveer Peter
Örebro University, Sweden.
Wageningen University, The Netherlands.
Curr Sociol. 2015 May;63(3):339-368. doi: 10.1177/0011392114543537.
A current debate on environmental sociology involves how the subdiscipline should conceptualise and investigate the environment and whether it should be prescriptive and deliver policy recommendations. Taking this debate as a point of departure this article discusses the current and future role of sociology in a globalised world. It discusses how environmental sociology in the US and Europe differ in their understandings of sociology's contribution to the study of the environment. Particular stress is placed on how these two regions differ with respect to their use of the tradition of sociological thought, views on what constitutes the environment and ways of institutionalising environmental sociology as a sociological field. In conclusion, the question is raised of whether current versions of environmental sociology are appropriate for analysing a globalised world environment; or whether environmental sociology's strong roots in European and US cultures make it less relevant when facing an increasingly globalised world. Finally, the article proposes some new rules for a global environmental sociology and describes some of their possible implications for the sociological study of climate change.
当前环境社会学领域的一场争论涉及该子学科应如何对环境进行概念化和研究，以及它是否应具有规范性并提供政策建议。本文以这场争论为出发点，探讨了社会学在全球化世界中的当前及未来作用。文中讨论了美国和欧洲的环境社会学在对社会学对环境研究的贡献的理解上有何不同。特别强调了这两个地区在社会学思想传统的运用、对环境构成要素的看法以及将环境社会学确立为一个社会学领域的方式等方面的差异。最后，文章提出了当前版本的环境社会学是否适合分析全球化世界环境的问题；或者说，鉴于环境社会学深深扎根于欧美文化，在面对日益全球化的世界时，它是否变得不那么适用了。最后，本文提出了一些适用于全球环境社会学的新规则，并描述了它们对气候变化社会学研究可能产生的一些影响。
