Steering clear of the apolitical: Advancing research in service of community struggles and desires

Earlier this summer, I attended a global political ecology conference in Barcelona, in the height of tourist season and amid a blistering heatwave. As one can imagine, it was a swirl of limited and overpriced accommodation options, stressful and expensive visa applications and border waiting for Global South scholars, and conversations on emerging research around the concerning rise of far-right environmentalism, militarized nature conservation, the so-called “green” just transition, and many other topics. The number of panels and attendees ballooned from the previous conference in the series, which takes place every two years. The field of political ecology – which examines the contested and power-laden ways in which concepts like “nature” the “environment” and “sustainability” are understood within capitalism – is a disciplinary field I have gravitated to for more than a decade. Over this same period, as greenhouse gas emissions have skyrocketed, devastating floods, droughts, and wildfires rage and new false solutions continue to be promoted by the billionaire class, the number of scholars applying to present their work and engage in the discipline of political ecology has only expanded in tandem. 

I was invited to speak on a panel discussing the role of political ecology research and the academy more broadly in an era where genocide is normalized and ecology and the environment weaponized for land dispossession and settler colonial expansion. The relationship between the AI boom, ecocide, and genocide is a disturbing triad that trickles down along classed, racialized and gendered divides. It results in knowledge erasure, targeted weaponry for precision killing, greenwashed “smart city” real-estate development, land dispossession, water and energy grabbing, habitat loss, and overall loss of sovereignty over one’s own mind, body, land and culture (Ghantous et al., 2026; Ashraf and Kolinjivadi, 2026). Universities have by and large bought into the “tech-bro”-first hype under the illusion that this will keep top jobs and investments flowing.. 

There is also no limit to critical research. Without politicizing how and in what ways knowledge gets generated, critical ideas and reflections end up serving a bigger role in the neoliberal knowledge economy.

Without any intention to come up with “answers” for which we all were muddling through, our panel discussed what our role should be as scholars and educators in times of genocide. We discussed how to confront and challenge armchair theory and apathy within academic institutions over taking concrete and actionable positions in relation to the uneven risks scholars face in doing so. In short, we convened to commiserate over the state of paralysis in which the gravitas of our words, seminars, and lectures are clearly insufficient to neither stop the bombs, the incessant drones, and checkpoints imposed by the apartheid state nor the proliferation of AI data centers and socially and ecologically-destructive AI bubble being forced down our collective throats. 

Navigating the political ecology of knowledge production is central for engaging in the work of political ecology.

There is also no limit to critical research. Without politicizing how and in what ways knowledge gets generated, critical ideas and reflections end up serving a bigger role in the neoliberal knowledge economy. Subsequently, the ruling classes and elites, in turn, attempt to gentrify oppositional or critical language in new fora ranging from UN-speak to Gen-Z friendly “woke” corporate marketing. Techno-accelerationists and eco-modernists also use poststructuralist critique in ways that risk serving the far-right (Kallis and Bliss, 2019). As Geo Maher recently writes: “As critique becomes approach, and approach becomes school of thought, new challenges inevitably arise, and decolonial thought is not immune to these dangers” (Maher, 2026:4). 

One particularly helpful reflection raised by Liboiron was the colonial nature of curiosity-based research—referring to the “hungry mind, eyeball, and ears” keeps wanting to know, to consume, and experience [...] Liboiron suggested us think about whether we were invited by communities to ask such questions in the first place and that getting invited is an outcome of sustained relationship building.

How can research generated in universities genuinely serve communities? Can we create learning spaces that equate knowledge generation with reciprocal relationship-building for social transformation? I was inspired by two other events I attended this summer in university settings that took a very different approach than the political ecology conference. The first was a joint live podcast for The Data Fix and public event that took place at the SHIFT Centre in June of this year that brought together citizen-led efforts and community organizers from Canada and the US to share best practice in halting the steamrolling of AI data centres despite public opposition to them. This event demonstrated how university spaces and resources (as public goods!) can and should be redirected in service of research that supports citizen-led or grassroots-driven initiatives and projects in support of just and equitable futures for all and against unwanted pipe dreams of elite private interests. 

The second was a talk at McGill’s Engineering department by Michif-settler scholar Dr. Max Liboiron from Memorial University who shared insights from their acclaimed book Pollution is Colonialism as well as on building resistance infrastructure that rejects the tendency of liberals to appease contesting interests through moves to innocence that advocate mutuality and consensus-building. Liboiron described a range of strategies that “cockblock the entitlement” (p. 139) of the extractive gaze ever-present in settler societies, including by encouraging community peer-review of research methods and questions and prioritizing the development of data sovereignty protocols as part of the research process. One particularly helpful reflection raised by Liboiron was the colonial nature of curiosity-based research—referring to the “hungry mind, eyeball, and ears” keeps wanting to know, to consume, and experience. When asked how one distinguishes between curiosity-based research and a genuine desire for justice and equity in society, Liboiron suggested us think about whether we were invited by communities to ask such questions in the first place and that getting invited is an outcome of sustained relationship building. Acting out of curiosity without any invitation is precisely how we end up with dumpster fire solutions like AI and the speculative spinoff industry of AI-related research. Billionaires don’t care what anyone thinks about their get-rich(er)-quick ponzi scheme.

As a teaching and research professor, I would like to prioritize research praxis that clearly distinguishes research as “currency” within the academy—with important implications notably for junior scholars—and directing research in service of building social power against settler colonialism and racial capital.

Doing research that helps communities in struggle to resist false solutions or imagine workable and desirable alternatives starts by recognizing the role one plays within existing power structures, without denying or ignoring that they exist within those structures. Instead, it aims to creatively strategize how to use the resources and privileges of power (and more broadly, class position) to redirect those resources, skills, time, and labour to build plural infrastructures for the common good and which are territorially rooted and historically informed. From this perspective, we have seen researchers coming together to discuss interesting methodologies like power mapping and tracking investment flows and their origins in service of anti-colonial and abolitionist organizers, with unions and dockworkers in places like Italy and India who refuse to unload ships linked to the genocide supply chain, and with citizen-groups refusing the AI-takeover of their energy and water supply. 

As a teaching and research professor, I would like to prioritize research praxis that clearly distinguishes research as “currency” within the academy—with important implications notably for junior scholars—and directing research in service of building social power against settler colonialism and racial capital. This means knowing what roles researchers should play according to the relative power they hold in the academic class structure, including when to cede place for others, and to engage with communities in ways that respect their expertise and focus on long-term relationship building as part of the research process. Research outputs can and should take many forms outside the conference and publications circuit. Key to this process is ensuring that the value of knowledge generated is owned and controlled by the movements and communities of the territory and not by the neoliberal and colonial academic industry. 

References:

Ashraf, A. and Kolinjivadi, V. (2026). Chapter 3: Sustainability Fantasies / Genocidal Realities. In: A. Bae and H. Hamouchene (Eds.). Towards Palestinian liberation: Global Perspectives on Anti-Colonial Resistance and Solidarity. Pp. 87-114. Daraja Press. 

Ghantous, W., Joronen, M., and Shalhoub-Kevorkian, N. (2026). Stench atmospheres: Policing, affect, and colonial boomeranging in Palestine/Israel. Security Dialogue 57(3): 189-201.

Kallis, G., and Bliss, S. (2019). Post-environmentalism: Origins and evolution of a strange idea. Journal of Political Ecology, 26(1).

Liboiron, M. (2021). Pollution is Colonialism. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

Maher, G. (2026). On the Materiality of Decolonization. Development and Change p. 1-16. Doi: 10.1111/dech.70079