Defending the territory by the rules : The role of environmental law in Yucatan's renewable energy conflicts
Bontempi, Antonio (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. Departament de Geografia)
Maturano, Ivet Reyes (Articulación Yucatán)
Sánchez Arceo, Jazmín (Articulación Yucatán)
Patiño Díaz, Rodrigo T. (Articulación Yucatán)

Data:	2025
Resum:	To what extent do environmental laws and policies aid in the pursuit of territorial defense and environmental justice? This article contributes to ongoing discussions on the environmental justice implications of existing institutions mobilized in the context of extractivism. It focuses on the legislative and policy frameworks and instruments influencing the development of industrial-scale renewable energy projects in the Mexican State of Yucatan. Through the analysis of nine environmental conflicts related to wind and solar parks in the region, we problematize the role of environmental laws and policies in governing Yucatan's renewable energy deployment as 'double-edged swords', disproportionately disadvantaging those defending their own territories. Controversial projects are frequently legitimized by the law, yet the procedures that authorities and developers follow are tendentially flawed. At the same time, local and Indigenous communities, along with environmental defenders, face limited access to legal recourse. We frame this analysis within critical environmental justice debates and explore how a fairer allocation of institutional power to local authorities, peoples and Indigenous communities could address environmental injustice in Yucatan.
Nota:	Altres ajuts: acords transformatius de la UAB
Nota:	Ajuts: We are grateful to all interviewees who shared sensitive information and their personal stories with us. Special thanks go to those environmental defenders who agreed to review the manuscript before submission. This work would not have been possible without the tremendous commitment of Drs. Alfonso Mungu\u00EDa Gil (RIP) and Ariana Escalante Kant\u00FAn, who actively engaged as activist scholars for several years in the collective Articulaci\u00F3n Yucat\u00E1n. Thanks also to Drs. Roser Maneja Zaragoza, Daniela Del Bene and Arnim Scheidel, who supervised the corresponding author during his research stay in Mexico. Thanks also to Drs. Clara Esteve Jord\u00E1, Yannick Deniau, Cristina Espinosa Mora-Bowen, Jevgeniy Bluwstein and all the participants of the author's workshop 'Politics Legal Processes to Redress Environmental Injustices from Contested Natural Resource Governance' held 15-17 November 2023 at the Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies (Freiburg, Germany), who provided useful comments on earlier versions of the manuscript. Finally, thanks to the Miranda Vallart family for borrowing their car for fieldwork purposes. A.B. acknowledges funding from the FI-SDUR 2020 464 scholarship awarded by the Catalan AGAUR Agency.
Drets:	Aquest document està subjecte a una llicència d'ús Creative Commons. Es permet la reproducció total o parcial, la distribució, i la comunicació pública de l'obra, sempre que no sigui amb finalitats comercials, i sempre que es reconegui l'autoria de l'obra original. No es permet la creació d'obres derivades.
Llengua:	Anglès
Document:	Article ; recerca ; Versió publicada
Matèria:	Law ; Policy ; Litigation ; Extractivism ; Yucatan ; Renewable energy ; Environmental justice
Publicat a:	Geoforum, Vol. 161 (may 2025) , p. 104243, ISSN 1872-9398

DOI: 10.1016/j.geoforum.2025.104243

12 p, 2.2 MB

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