From Crisis to Coordination: Conversations Between Philosophy of Environmental Justice & Philosophy of Conservation Science

Kyle Whyte’s “Against Crisis Epistemology” (2021) urges those concerned by climate change and for environmental justice away from a crisis epistemology and toward an epistemology of coordination. In contrast to a crisis epistemology—which is apt to intensify colonial oppression due to the assumption that present challenges are new, unprecedented, and urgent—epistemologies of coordination seek to address challenges by developing and renewing relations of kinship, expressed as moral bonds of mutual responsibility. Inspired by this recommendation toward coordination, this conference aims to promote dialogue among philosophers of environmental justice and of conservation science. We seek to discover what we can mutually cogenerate toward the common goals of stewardship and environmental justice. Central to the conference are the questions: What can philosophers of conservation science learn from those of environmental justice, and vice versa? What would coordination look like?