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Today's emphasis on sustainable development (SD) emerged from the environmental movements of the 1960s and 1970s, which explicitly challenged the modern industrial project and its assumption of the centrality of growth. As SD discourse gained political influence, however, its message became increasingly coopted, and by the 1992 Earth Summit, the meaning and momentum behind the term had greatly deteriorated. Also around this time, neoliberalism gained hegemony in economic politics, weakening the power of the state and prioritizing the activity of a mythical free market in resolving social and environmental needs. In this paper, we argue that the recent interest in green economic development, a major theme articulated during the 2012 "Rio+20" conference, can be seen as a response to both the cooptation of SD and the strengthening of neoliberal policies. We further argue that the green economy (GE) can benefit from positioning itself within this broader history, bringing related lessons and insights into its fold. We conclude by suggesting that a strong GE discourse, one that prioritizes both people and the environment, provides an opportunity to revitalize the state, combat neoliberal primacy, and drive progressive economic and environmental policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Some of the most insightful work in the political economy of the world system area has been produced by deep familiarity with people and locales based on extensive fieldwork. Few other methods are as useful to understand the impacts of structural change on daily life and the ways agents resist, alter, and shape emerging structures. Yet fieldwork has been subject to twin limitations. First, in the majority of instructional materials on field methods, there is a reliance on social constructionist, social psychological, or interactionist perspectives for exemplars and, as a result, discussions of field work problems. Thus, field methods are largely taught as ways to understand the sociological 'micro' with emphasis on micro-level meanings, rather than wider political economic questions. This bias provides a limitation on pedagogical training. An important exception is feminist scholarship examining the structural impacts of gender and patriarchy. Second, world systems research and writing often privilege either historical methods to highlight long durée structures and dynamics, or quantitative cross-national studies. Although exemplars of fieldwork that successfully contributes to debates and understandings of larger structural processes abound, there is a lack of systematic attention to field methods by much world systems research. This paper examines how field method instruction can fruitfully move beyond the micro-level and how more explicit attention to fieldwork may strengthen political economy and world systems research. In the process, it may also help de-marginalize political economy informed fieldwork. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses the overuse of the concept of civil society. Our critique is based not just on the ubiquity of its use, but its overwide definition and application. We argue that the simultaneity of the concept's popular usage and the neoliberal era has facilitated neoliberalism's demonization of the state. Additionally, we find the concept enormously problematic because its assumption of unity contradicts the multiple differences found among social groups collapsed under the label of civil society. Such inaccuracy regarding a false unity stifles critical theorizing and efficient political organizing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]