‘Hambi bleibt!’ - Securitizing the Environment - A case study of discursive threat-construction surrounding the Hambach Forest

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‘Hambi bleibt!’ - Securitizing the Environment

A case study of discursive threat-construction surrounding the

Hambach Forest

LISA BECKER

Peace and Conflict Studies Bachelor’s degree

Spring 2019

Supervisor: John Åberg Word count: 14070

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ABSTRACT

Although issues linked to global environmental change and its role within peace, conflict and security have been subject to social and political controversy for years, they are still not sufficiently respected by energy companies, trade unions, national governments and international institutions alike. Through applying the tools of a single instrumental case study linked to the application of discourse analysis I, this study explores the process of securitization of the environment in the extraordinary case of the resistance and occupation surrounding the Hambach Forest, thereby countering the widely held assumption that collective action aimed at radically changing existing structures is not possible. The particular exploratory focus is put on the way this non-conventional environmental security discourse has been created within a redefined securitization framework. By challenging the traditional focus of securitization theory on top-down construction through elites, this study provides a broadened, bottom-up account of environmental securitization stemming from local civil society actors as non-powerholders that effectively proclaim their recognition of the environment’s intrinsic value from a grassroots level. Consequently, it argues for the significance of securitization as creative process of alerting policy makers, political leaders and the broader society to the emergency of climate change and global environmental degradation symbolized through the specific case of Hambach Forest.

Key words: securitization, environment, civil society actors, Hambach Forest,

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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

CS

Copenhagen School

HAMBI

The Hambach Forest

EU

European Union

PACS

Peace and Conflict Studies

RWE

Rhenish-Westphalian Power Plant

UN

United Nations Organization

UNDP

United Nations Development Program

LIST OF FIGURES

Cover Page

Occupation of the Hambach Forest

Figure 1:

Road barricades erected by environmental activists - 15 -

Figure 2:

Hambach Forest vs. Hambach Surface Mine - 44 -

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1. Introduction

“Because, underneath all of this is the real truth we have been avoiding: climate change isn’t an “issue” to add to the list of things to worry about, next to health care and taxes. It is a civilizational wake-up call. A powerful message—spoken in the language of fires, floods, droughts, and extinctions—telling us that we need an entirely new economic model and a new way of sharing this planet. Telling us that we need to evolve.” – Naomi Klein

Voices like this, articulating the need to radically and immediately address the growing emissions of greenhouse gases leading to global warming, loss of biodiversity and severe disruptions of ecosystems are becoming increasingly pressing. All human societies are depending on a functioning climate system due to the countless interconnections between people (social systems), animals and plants (natural systems) as well as livelihood opportunities (economic systems) worldwide. Since the basic structure of the planet’s climate system is being altered by mankind in unprecedented pace and scale, the functioning of healthy ecosystems is increasingly being threatened, leading to irreversible consequences if left unchecked (Mathews, 1989:163-169; Gemenne et al., 2014:7).

Although issues linked to global environmental change and its role within peace, conflict and security have been subject to social and political controversy for years, they are still not sufficiently respected by energy companies, trade unions, national governments and international institutions alike. Considering the widely held assumption that ‘individual and collective action to radically transform existing systems and structures is not possible’ (O’Brien, Barnett, 2013:284-385), the problem becomes whether structures and systems contributing to the tremendous changes will be changed voluntarily or if ‘structural change will be enforced violently and randomly by environmental crisis’ (Buzan et al., 1998:595).

1.1.

Research Problem

Recent years have produced a significant body of research, demonstrating that global environmental change will have dramatic impacts on social systems and pose a fundamental threat to human security (Barnett, Adger, 2007:640; O’Brien, Barnett, 2013:379). While climate change might not compose an immediate threat to national security at present (Gemenne et al., 2014:7), the UN aims at avoiding ‘dangerous’ interference in the climate system, thereby defining environmental degradation and climate change as a significant risk to security (Barnett, Adger,2007:640). However, an ‘oversimplified representation of security concerns linked to

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global environmental change can lead to counterproductive [mitigation and adaptation] policy responses’, which often ignore the problems’ root causes (O’Brien, Barnett,2013:379).

Thus, a new perspective of global environmental change and security beyond the understanding of environmental security as protecting ‘the maintenance of achieved levels of civilization’ from environmental threats, is needed (Buzan et al., 1998:76). Instead, it must change towards the recognition of the environment’s own inherent value (Khagram et al., 2003:296). Considering environmental degradation through the lens of non-traditional notions of security has constructed a new discourse in security studies, thereby powerfully affecting the relationship between state, society and nature (Hayes, Know-Hayes,2014:82). By reframing events that had traditionally been considered as natural disasters into matters of growing climate instability, elites delineate global environmental change as a burning, existential threat demanding immediate action. Through these politics of constructing threat agendas, various politicians and policy makers have actively contributed to environmental securitization through ‘typical’ top-down securitization moves (Trombetta, 2008:594; Williams, 2013:9).

However, ‘environmental issues […] provide an entry point for individuals and communities to participate in decisions about their own security and development’ (Jancar, 1993; quoted in Khagram et al., 2003:295). In this regard, the resistance and occupation surrounding the Hambach Forest has emerged as an extraordinary European case. It goes beyond traditional strategies (legal protests, petitions, public campaigns) of the environmental movement and towards a bottom-up, local civil society account of non-traditional securitization as a way of articulating their demands. Therefore, it becomes necessary to investigate how this non-conventional environmental security discourse has been created, providing space for marginalized parts of society to effectively proclaim their recognition of the environment’s intrinsic value from a grassroots level.

1.2.

Research Aim and Research Question(s)

By applying the tools of a single instrumental case study as comprehensive research strategy, the following thesis aims at unpacking the process of securitization of the environment in the specific case of the resistance and occupation surrounding the Hambach Forest as meaningful symbol of resistance, climate justice and environmental security. The particular exploratory focus is put on the way the environment has been constructed as a security issue by environmental activists, and the social and political mechanisms underlying this phenomenon. The purpose of the study is threefold:

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Firstly, investigating the discourses underlying the use of speech acts, images and audiovisual

material as strategy of security construction to justify extraordinary actions and provoking social and political change.

Secondly, challenging the traditional focus of securitization theory on top-down construction

through elites and instead providing a broadened, bottom-up account of environmental securitization.

And thirdly, providing an example of an unusual, but powerful form of securitization stemming from local civil society actors as non-powerholders gaining widespread attention and support from within the global fight for environmental justice and climate action.

To attain this goal, the present thesis will be organized around the following research question: How is the environment securitized by the environmental activists participating in the occupation and resistance aimed at protecting the Hambach Forest?

The following operational questions will organize and structure the research and answer the main question:

1. Which reoccurring themes, expressions and visual representations can be found in the chosen material concerned with the occupation and resistance surrounding the Hambach Forest?

2. What are the underlying discourses reflected in this material?

3. What are the defining features of the threat-construction (existential threat/referent subject) and who/what is portrayed as being threatened (referent object)?

4. How do the environmental activists (securitizing actors) portray the occupation and resistance (extraordinary measures) to protect the Hambach Forest?

5. How do they articulate the necessity of their actions and in what way are they presenting them as legitimate to the German population (audience)?

A variety of textual, visual and audiovisual material will be presented and analyzed through the theoretical lenses of securitization and environmental security, making use of discourse analysis I as accounted for by Rose (2001). Since the general aim of discourse analysis is to identify and investigate the social consequences of discourse(s), it is vital to conduct a detailed analysis of the chosen material from various angles in order to provide an insight into the different measures and rhetoric used by the activists.

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1.3.

Relevance for the Field of Peace and Conflict Studies

For demonstrating the importance of environmental issues for the academic field of Peace and Conflict Studies and thus the relevance of this study, the following arguments are of major significance:

The importance of ‘security’ as one of the major concepts within PACS

Due to this study’s focus on the securitization of the environment, this research fits perfectly within the tradition of Peace and Conflict Studies as interrelating with the field of security studies (Rogers, 2016:58ff.). The relevance of the dynamics of securitizing discourses surrounding environmental issues lies within securitization theory itself, especially due to its ‘power’ of enabling extraordinary measures. As argued by Ratner, the provisioning of ecosystem goods and services (such as access to clean water, food, climate regulation or soil formation) fundamentally underpins human well-being and, more importantly, human security (2018:6). The degradation of these services, thus, can significantly harm human livelihood, which makes the link between environmental resources and human security particularly clear.

Relationship between Global Environmental Change, Conflict and Peace

As stated by Vandana Shiva, ‘wars against the earth become wars against people’, while the ‘sustainable use of resources is the way towards peace and justice’ (2009:1). I argue that the importance of studying PACS is not limited to studying human relations in times of peace and conflict, but to be seen within a wider framework including the human connection with the environment based on the notion that the well-being of all human beings is only possible in connection with the well-being of their environment (Die, 2009:44). As explained by Homer-Dixon (1994), global environmental change can have huge effects on various types of conflict ranging from diplomatic or trade disputes to war and terrorism. Even if environmental degradation might not directly lead to violence, ecological decline, resource competition or inequitable distribution can function as ‘risk multipliers’, also in otherwise friendly countries. Therefore, environmental degradation, over-use, and exploitation can be understood as a ‘cause of human insecurity and can aggravate other sources of social division based on ethnicity, class, religion, or economic position’ (Ratner, 2018:2-3; Græger, 1996:110). If these issues are not addressed, the chances are high that they will increase the potential for domestic unrest or even civil war while hindering the development of cooperative solutions towards peace (Mathews, 1989:167-168). Importantly, most countries expected to be worst impacted by climate change and environmental degradation are also most affected by violence and conflict, meaning that a

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disproportionate burden of environmental harms is carried by poor, often ethnic-minority communities in the periphery – concerns that are clearly related to the field of peace and conflict studies (Kostic, Krampe, Swain,2012:59).

Focus on Civil Society Actors as Agents of Power and Resistance within National and International Contexts

What makes this study further relevant for the academic field of PACS is its explicit focus on (local) civil society actors as agents of bottom-up approaches to social and political change, following Kaldor’s understanding of civil society as ‘the medium through which social contracts or bargains between the individual and the centers of political and economic power are negotiated, discussed and mediated’ (Kaldor, 2003:12). By leaning onto Lederach’s approach of bottom-up peacebuilding, the present study suggests the need to move beyond a sole focus on traditional top-level leaders as those responsible for transformation and development within society. Instead, I argue for a holistic and integrated approach characterized by multiple levels of actors, thereby highlighting the power and possibilities of non-traditional, non-state actors to generate social and political change through various acts of resistance, social mobilization or civil disobedience.

1.1.

(De)Limitations

This study is limited in various ways. By focusing on the specific case of the Hambach Forest, generalizability is limited. The research design linked to a form of Foucauldian discourse analysis precludes other approaches such as content analysis or narrative analysis to analyze the construction of securitization. The material is limited to only 9 different sources considered as relevant to illustrate the chosen case. Concerning the analytical framework, this study focuses only on the way the environment has been securitized by the environmental activists and does not address questions asking under which circumstances this process has been possible or whether it has actually triggered political change.

1.2.

Disposition

This study is organized into seven chapters. Following the introductory chapter, the next chapter offers a comprehensive background. After presenting the relevant academic literature in the third chapter, Chapter 4 is discussing the analytical framework of this study. The methodological framework is reflected on in the fifth chapter, while Chapter six is dedicated towards the analysis conducted in two parts. The final seventh chapter provides the conclusion

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based on an in-depth discussion of the material within the context of the broadened framework of securitization.

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2. Background

The following chapter provides a brief history of the Hambach Forest, with a particular focus on the current occupation, and its role in the Climate Justice Movement in Germany. The role of both domestic factors and social circumstances in climate and environment related issues is taken into consideration.

2.1.

The Role of the Hambach Forest within the Climate Justice Movement

The contemporary climate justice movement in Germany emerged after the 2007 G8 summit in Heiligendamm. Its point of departure is the activists’ criticism of Chancellor Merkel’s government, which had succeeded in renewing the eroding legitimacy of the G8 meetings by presenting themselves as climate saviors, although the summit only offered general and non-binding statements on international climate protection (Passadakis, Müller,2007; quoted in Sander, 2017:27). With the purpose of developing an independent, capitalist-critical position within the climate question as well as identifying starting points for directly addressing the main causes of global warming, several activist groups established a grassroots climate network (AntiRacism Office Bremen 2007; quoted in Sander, 2017:27).

Since 2008, one can speak of an independent climate justice movement in Germany, identifying itself as a movement oriented towards averting the socio-ecological dangers of climate change and promoting a climate-friendly society. The movement has always had a central network in which it exchanges ideas and agrees on common strategies - a process embedded in the formation of a new transnational global climate justice movement (Brunnengräber, 2013; Garrelts, Dietz, 2013; Dietz, 2013; quoted in Sander, 2017:27,28).

The disappointing results of the summit protests at the UN Climate Change Conference in 2009 plunged the German climate justice movement into crisis. A number of groups turned to other issues or dissolved completely. The remaining and new activists refused to work further on climate summit diplomacy, but instead proposed to address local and regional issues of climate justice for which they could develop politically effective, concrete alternatives (Climate!Movement Network, 2010; quoted in Sander, 2017:28).

During this time, two different approaches to climate justice emerged within the movement. The “social-ecological” arm focused primarily on the implementation of concrete projects that combine social and ecological justice to promote a climate-friendly society. The ”global-ecological” arm, on the other hand, puts its focus on the rapid and massive reduction of

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greenhouse gas emissions in the Global North. Groups such as AusCO2hlt primarily address fossilized capitalism and the so-called “carbon majors” (industrial and energy companies with high CO2 emissions such as RWE). The frame of this new movement is the concept of climate justice, which implies that a radical change in the socially and ecologically unjustly organized world has to occur (della Porta, Parks, 2013; quoted in Sander, 2017:27-28). Soon, the globally-ecologically oriented groups targeted the lignite industry in Germany, demanding rapid withdrawal from coal mining (ibid:26-29). It is within this relatively new movement that I locate the resistance and occupation surrounding the Hambach Forest.

The various forms of protest in the Hambach Forest under the slogan “Hambi bleibt!” (Hambi remains) are not merely directed against the clearing of the forest, but also towards challenging the state and the capitalist system in the form of police and RWE and their use of fossil fuels (Schink, 2019:77). By now, the forest developed into a symbol of the anti-capitalist climate justice and anti-brown coal movement, which since 2009 has moved "away from international politics and towards local struggles and climate protection from below" (Bosse, 2015:395; quoted in Pfeifer et al., 2017:1)

2.2.

The Hambach Forest

An Ancient Forest

The Hambach Forest (German: Hambacher Wald/Forst) is an ancient forest located between Cologne and Aachen in North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW). Its history dating back around 12.000 years ago, it is counted as one of the last remaining primeval forests in Central Europe. Recognized for its unique ecosystem and rich biodiversity, the Hambach Forest offers a habitat to a multitude of species important for conservation - including 100 bird species and 300 years old hornbeam and oak trees (Hambi bleibt!, 2018). Consequently, the Hambach Forest meets all criteria to be protected separately under the EU ecological network "Natura 2000", due to its wealth of rare and endangered animal and plant species (Oei et al.,2018:36). Not only climate protection reasons, but also the aim to conserve natural habitats, speak against a deforestation of the forest (ibid.)

Though, underneath the Hambach Forest lies a wealth of lignite – an extremely carbon-heavy fossil fuel so far presenting an important pillar of electricity generation in Germany. Today, only 10 percent of its original 13,590 acres remain and the lasting part of the Hambach Forest “sits in the crosshairs of coal mining, stirring debate about conservation and energy production” (Donahue, 2018)

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The Hambach Surface Mine and the Role of RWE

Between 1967 and 1971, the surrounding municipalities and private owners gradually sold their pieces of woodland to the former Rheinbraun AG (which later became part of RWE, Germany’s leading electricity provider), thus waiving all rights of use of the properties of the Hambach Forest. In 1976, the area became part of the Rhenish Lignite Mining Area, the biggest mining area in Europe, with opencast mining starting in September 1978. At that time, the lignite was given a higher value than ecosystem protection. At this point, neither the effects of coal combustion on climate change were as clear as today, nor could alternative power generation guarantee energy security in Germany. As the mining progressed, the Hambach Forest has been cleared progressively for the expansion of the Hambach mine (Brock, Dunlap, 2018:33). Today, in light of the coal phase-out plans in Germany, the use of the remaining parts of the Hambach Forest is no longer necessary for energy security in Germany, which RWE denies, however (Oei et al., 2018:36).

The Permanently Occupied Forest – An Ongoing Resistance

Since April 2012, the Hambach Forest has been a political platform for environmental, anti-capitalist and eco-anarchist activists as part of the anti-coal resistance directed against environmental destruction and towards the imminent phasing out of coal. What is left of the forest has been more or less continuously occupied by forest defenders opposing deforestation by RWE (Brock, Dunlap, 2018:33). Although there have been protests against the Hambach open-cast mine before, it was not until 2012 that the conflict between opponents of lignite mining and RWE has intensified and the permanent occupation began (Schneider, 2018). After protesters were repeatedly removed by police forces , the forest has been reoccupied shortly thereafter (Brock, Dunlap, 2018:33-34). In 2014, the current occupation started, involving a settlement with around two dozen tree houses and platforms, numerous road barricades and around 150 people currently living in the forest. While there have been initiatives to prevent further deforestation, in 2016/2017, the Higher Administrative Court of Münster ruled the occupation of the forest as illegal, while RWE secured the right to mine coal until 2040. Only in 2018 has the controversy around the Hambach Forest attracted nation-wide attention and massive media coverage (Schneider, 2018; Schink, 2019:77,78). In September, the state government decided to evacuate the tree houses based on an alleged lack of safety regulations. Importantly, the state government rejected any connection with the planned deforestations from October onwards (Dalkowski, 2018).

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When the evacuation was almost complete, after several weeks of police operations, resistance and both violent and non-violent confrontation between activists and the police, a court ruling gave the protest movement new motivation (Schneider, 2018). On 5 October 2018, the Higher Administrative Court of Münster grants an emergency application of the environmental association BUND, imposing a temporary stop to deforestation (Oei et al., 2019:13). The following day, a large-scale demonstration takes place with more than 50.000 participants, giving the protest an increased nationwide status (Schink, 2019:77).

The Administrative Court in Cologne will now have to decide whether the Hambach Forest may be further cleared by RWE, or the protection of the forest as a habitat for flora and fauna has priority. Until a legally binding decision has been made, the forest must not be cleared, which will probably take until 2020. Meanwhile, the protest against coal-fired power plants such as the conflict with RWE is entering a new round, with environmental activists already starting to erect new tree houses and barricades in the forest (Schneider, 2018). At least for now, “Hambi bleibt!” (Hambi remains).

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3. Previous Research

In order to adequately grasp the implications of this study, several areas of research are important. Hence, the aim of the following chapter is three-fold. While the first section offers a basic overview of previously existing notions of the concept of ‘security’, the second section outlines the shift from national to human security and its consequences for the environment.

Thirdly, a general overview of selected literature touching upon the relationship between the

environment and security will be provided. It then leads directly into the analytical framework of securitization and its evaluation outlined in the next chapter.

3.1.

The Concept of ‘Security’

‘Before one can start working on the impact of a particular object of study, one must first understand the very nature of this object’ (Leboeuf, Broughton, 2008:3).

Williams argues that there exist many different ways to think about security, leading to different understandings of which issues should be classified as such (2013:1-2; see also Bilgin, 2013, Græger, 1996). According to him, security is an essentially contested concept, meaning its meaning is ambiguous by definition (ibid.:2). Following from that, debates concerning security issues cannot be resolved definitely, resulting in some positions becoming dominant and enforced over others through the application of power. However, he portrays security as mostly associated with ‘the alleviation of threats to cherished values; especially those which, if left unchecked, threaten the survival of a particular referent object in the near future’ (ibid.:6), which functions as the working definition applied for the present study in order to inform following practices. Furthermore, Buzan sees security as ‘a powerful political tool in claiming attention for priority items in the competition for government attention’ (1991:370; quoted in Williams, 2013:2), claiming that decision-making authority over the meaning and subjects of security and how security can be achieved play a crucial role (ibid.:2,6). Accordingly, security studies should better be seen as ‘an area of inquiry revolving loosely around [this] set of core questions’ (ibid.:5), whereby perceptions of the future as well competing approaches towards achieving security are the main ground for opposition (ibid.:1-2).

In line with Williams, Baldwin adds that one can ‘differentiate between better and worse conceptualizations’ of security (1997:10). Hence, Baldwin criticizes much of the existing literature on security for lacking a clear and precise formulation of one’s own conception of security (ibid.:12).

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Following Ullman’s appeal to include events such as floods and other environmental matters into the understanding of security issues, Baldwin argues for a revised focus on the preservation of acquired values instead of the presence or absence of ‘threats’, an expanded understanding this study adopts (1997:13). It follows that Baldwin also puts a specific emphasis on the questions ‘security for whom?’, ‘security for which values?’ as well as ‘by what means?’ (ibid.), thus highlighting the importance to specify security with respect to the actors whose values are to be secured, the referent object and the acquired values as precisely as possible. Importantly, the choice regarding the question ‘security for whom’ (referent object) is situational , including obvious answers such as ‘the state’, ‘the individual’ or ‘the international system’ while not excluding exceptional answers such as ‘the environment’. Also, the decision to define these dimensions in either very broad or very narrow terms lies with the researcher (ibid.:17). Moreover, Baldwin criticizes the primary focus on military solutions for pursuing security , arguing for alternative approaches towards security problems (ibid.:16), which again becomes particularly relevant for the study at hand. In that way, Baldwin emphasizes the multidimensionality of the security concept (ibid.:23). Multidimensionality means that ‘new’ forms of security such as economic, social, identity and environmental security can be discussed on higher or lower levels without changing the main characteristics of the phenomenon, a finding already described by Wolfers (1962) before (ibid.).

3.2.

The Shift from National Security to Human Security and the

Consequences for the Environment

Before the Cold War, the traditional notion of security endorsed political realism and was concerned with ‘the four ‘S’s of states, strategy, science and the status quo’ (Williams, 2013:3). This means that nation states as the central referents and agents of security in international politics were the only focus of security studies aimed at preserving the status quo. Subsequently, the academic field of security studies has been narrowly defined as ‘the study of the threat, use, and control of military force’ (Walt, 1991:212; quoted in Balzacq, Léonard and Ruzicka, 2015:496) relating only to armed conflict. Thereby, a hierarchy of threats was created that separated between ‘high’ politics (such as military forces) as being legitimately included in the security agendas and ‘low’ politics (such as environmental problems) (Trombetta,2008:587). Since the early 1990s, this position has increasingly been criticized as insufficient to account for new, globally emerging threats (Williams, 2013:8; Dalby, 2013:312). This opened the ‘intellectual space’ for a renewed security discourse apart from state-centric security, shifting

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towards totally new dimensions (five major sectors: military, political, economic, societal and environmental security) - a development spurred specifically by social movements, activists and intellectuals (Bilgin, 2013:93). According to Mathews, one major reason for that was the blurring of the divide between foreign and domestic, breaking down ‘the sacred boundaries of national sovereignty’ (1989:162). In theoretical terms, a key development occurred in 1983 with the publication of ‘People, States and Fear’ by Barry Buzan. This book fundamentally broadened the framework of security beyond the sole focus on violent conflict as threatening national security and towards the inclusion of all human collectivities into the security agenda, contributing to the development of a human security discourse (William, 2008:4).

As stated by Khagram et al., especially shifting the focus on what/ who is to be secured as well as the expansion of what is understood as security are key elements within the transformation from state-centered security towards human security (2003:291-292). Following Khagram et al., O’Brien and Barnett explain how policies and decisions relating to peace, conflict, development or the environment are increasingly being framed in relation to human security, a valuable lens for understanding social aspects of global environmental changes since the late 1990s (2013:374). Within this context, environmental change is being framed as a ‘social problem with environmental dimensions’ as opposed to an abstract scientific problem (ibid.). This highlight ‘how political, [cultural and] economic processes drive environmental degradation and influence people’s exposure to it’ (ibid.:377). From this viewpoint, global environmental change is considered a political process raising important issues of equity/equality, justice, and ethics linked to history events such as colonization and war in larger sociopolitical contexts (Barnett, Adger, 2007:642).

Rita Floyd added that a fundamental function of human security is that it enables environmental issues to be raised above ordinary policy matters and into the agenda of global security concerns, thereby pulling together multiple perspectives and voices (2010; quoted in O’Brien, Barnett, 2013:375-376).

In conclusion, many scholars have argued that understanding global environmental change as a matter of human security presents the best possibility to approach environmental issues by moving the security concept away from state and military measures and towards a wider understanding based on experiences, values and everyday lives (O’Brien, Barnett, 2013:381). Within this human security framework, humans are agents of change actively contributing to global environmental change through their occupation and use of the natural environment. Accordingly, agency becomes central to the human security approach concerned with root

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causes of environmental change and human insecurity but also human responsibility for its solutions (ibid.:382-384).

Despite the importance of developing a human security discourse for the recognition of the environment as a security matter, Barnett and Adger criticize that one cannot separate human security and therefore the environment from the operation of the state, since states are critical in providing opportunities for people to pursue their, while simultaneously contributing to a stable environment (2007:642-646).

3.3.

Securitizing the Environment

With the appearance of threats of unprecedented scale (such as global warming), the need to redefine security and first attempts to securitize the environment have emerged around the 1990s. Since then, linkages between environmental degradation and human security have been the object of much research in recent decades, while only lately becoming a focus in international environmental policy.

Balzacq, Léonard and Ruzicka (2015:496) identify a reason for securitization’s fascination with the environmental sector in the way it challenges the theory in several regards, an acknowledgement already made by Buzan et al. However, Buzan et al. claim that most attempts to securitize the environment will result in ‘normal’ politicization since threats are too distant for securitization resulting in the deployment of exceptional measures (1998:82-82). This highlights a paradox: while securitizing actors may often try to construct a threat to ensure the survival of a referent object, for securing humanity from environmental threats much of human society would need to be transformed radically or even demolished (Balzacq, Guzzini, 2015:511).

Concerning needs for radical change, Mathews links security to the environment through the importance of economic growth to grant human security, however stating that contemporary growth contains too resource-intensive practices (1989:162). Consequently, he emphasizes the necessity to change the means of production drastically in order for planet earth to accommodate a growing population (ibid.:164).

Similarly, Dalby argues that any discussion on security and the environment demands a clear analysis of the way human actions change all aspects of life on the planet, transforming the world into an ‘artificial place’ in which climate change will increase the insecurity of people and states in the coming years (2013:312-313).

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Adding another element, Hayes and Know-Hayes highlight the important role of media in increasing the value placed on climate change and other environmental issues within the security framework (2014:95).

According to Trombetta, the first formulation of the concept of ‘environmental security’ appeared in the UNDP 1994 annual report, identified as a relevant component of human security, thereby broadening the security agenda and implying new roles for security actors as well as different means for providing security (2008:585,594). In line with this, Ratner’s understanding of the term as ‘a foundation of human security more broadly’ essential to sustainable livelihoods’ links global environmental benefits to more immediate concerns such as employment, social stability or effective governance. Additionally, he adds the role of ecological processes and natural resources as catalysts for conflict and as a means to resolve insecurity (2018:2-5).

Here, Gemenne et al. criticize that the focus of research on climate change and security has been mostly on the causes of conflict, ignoring the factors of peace and cooperation in understanding the climate-security nexus (2014:6). According to Kostic, Krampe and Swain, who understand environmental security as freedom from environmental dangers, one needs to distinguish between environmental conflict, as state-centered, traditional ‘hard’ security concerns, and environmental security, as ‘the broad human security aspect and thus [laying] beyond state borders’ (2012:46).

Consequently, a focus on national security and military agencies might not be the accurate framework in which to consider environmental matters (Dalby, 2013:322). Similarly, Mason and Zeiton (2013:294) criticize the securitization of environmental processes for creating apocalyptical visions that are then used to justify urgent, even emergency measures by the state to prevent or diminish serious dangers to protect core institutions (see also Gemenne et al., 2014:2). This reflects the Realist perspective that problematizes linking ‘security’ with the environment, referring to the concern that traditional means of securitization are inapplicable to environmental degradation or climate change without militarizing it (Trombetta, 2008:587). Another concern is that the integration of the environment into the conception of security might be problematic ‘as it allows for a quasi-limitless enlargement of the field of security studies to every issue that can affect individuals and their quality of life’ (Leboeuf, Broughton, 2008:7). However, while there exist various understandings of the threat of environmental change and its potential inclusion into the international security agenda within academic literature, for the

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most part they agree that environmental concerns are global, therefore requiring a shared responsibility of actors on international level (O’Brien, Barnett, 2013:376).

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4. Analytical Framework

The following chapter provides the theoretical foundation for the present research building up directly on the pervious section. Firstly, the Copenhagen School’s theory of securitization is discussed as analytical lens to understand and interpret the discourses surrounding the resistance and occupation of the Hambach Forest. Secondly, this theoretical model is evaluated and challenged in relation to environmental securitization. Consequently, a broadened analytical framework will be provided, which will guide and structure the analysis.

4.1.

The Copenhagen School’s Theory of Securitization

The theoretical conceptualization on which the present study is built derives from the Copenhagen School, an academic school of thought originating from Barry Buzan’s book ‘People, States and Fear: The National Security Problem in International Relations’ published in 1983. In the 1990s, a series of collaborative work emerged, concerned with security in world politics, concluding in the 1998 text ‘Security: A New Framework for Analysis’, co-authored by Barry Buzan, Ole Wæver and Jaap de Wilde (McDonald, 2008:71-72). This work attempted to address the demands for a broadened concept of security beyond the military, which materialized after the Cold War to include newly arisen concerns into the international security agenda (ibid.:72). For widening traditional materialist security studies towards these new fields, a significant role is played by the concepts of ‘sectors’(military/state, political, economic, societal, environmental) entailing specific types of security interactions , and ‘regional security complexes’, meaning interlinked sets of units of security processes and dynamics within a particular geographical area that need to be considered together (Buzan et al., 1998:7-8). Regarding the environment as security issue, the concept of regional security complex must be reconsidered due to the environment’s all-embracing importance for any geographical location around the world, admittedly in varying degrees.

The school’s most prominent achievement was a new conceptual framework for analysis. It is pointing to the discursive construction of particular concerns as security threats (Buzan et al., 1998:24-27), focusing on how security is given meaning and the political effects stemming from these security constructions (McDonald, 2008:68,72). This concept of ‘securitization’, developed within the tradition of social constructivism, suggests that ‘there are no objective threats, waiting to be discovered’ (Trombetta, 2008:587,588), claiming instead that threats are socially created within an intersubjective process taking shape as retrospective constructions (Tilly, 2001:36; quoted in Robinson, 2017:508). Consequently, the understanding of

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securitization as social process, through which any issue, dynamic or actor is presented as an existential threat to a particular referent object, requiring emergency measures and justifying actions outside the normal bounds of political procedures, derived (Buzan et al, 1998:23-24). Thereby, the Copenhagen School strictly divides between ‘politicization’ or ‘normal politics’ defined by liberal democracy, the rule of law and open political deliberation; and exceptional ‘security practices’, defined by a certain urgency leading to political prioritization (Williams, 2015:117; McDonald, 2008:74). Accordingly, in theory, any public issue can potentially be located anywhere on the spectrum of non-politized, politicized and possibly securitized if a political community constructs them as such through a successful speech act altering the way of dealing with them (Trombetta, 2008:588). To avoid the ‘everything becomes security’ trap, however, the need arrived to develop some kind of fixed form which still leaves the possibility to ‘throw the net across all sectors and all actors’ (Wæver, 2011:469). Balzacq, Léonard and Ruzicka have clarified their understanding by stating that:

‘the core concepts of the theory are arguably the securitizing actor (i.e. the agent who presents an issue as a threat through a securitizing move), the referent subject (i.e. the entity that is threatening), the referent object (i.e. the entity that is threatened), the audience (the agreement of which is necessary to confer an intersubjective status to the threat), the context and the adoption of distinctive policies (‘exceptional’ or not)’(2015:49).

- which I consider the working definition of the present study. Taken together, the ‘mainstream’ securitization process thus includes five main components: 1. securitizing actor/agent, 2. existential threat/referent, 3. referent object, 4. audience and 5. the application of extraordinary measures presented as solution within the given context.

The securitizing move describes the attempt of an actor with socio-political credibility to construct an issue/actor as existential threat to a particular group or shared value through the articulation of a successful ‘speech act’ (Hayes, Know-Hayes, 2014:84), defined by the CS as ‘a combination of language and society, of both intrinsic features of speech and the group that authorizes and recognizes that speech’ (Buzan et al., 1998:32). Buzan et al. (1998:31-33) define three “facilitating conditions” for a successful security speech act:

1. Internal condition: the form of the speech act following the ‘grammar’ of the security (‘a point of no return’ followed by ‘a possible way out’)

2. Social condition: the social position of the securitizing actor

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Successful securitization tends to articulate threat through the language of security ‘only from a specific place, in an institutional voice, by elites’ (Wæver, 1995:57), meaning that state-representatives are the primary driving force behind this development. Thus, security can be understood as negotiation between speakers and audiences, conditioned by the speaker’s level of authority within a community (McDonald, 2013:72).

Consequently, whether ‘saying security’ becomes successful does not depend on objective features, but rather on the interaction between the securitizing actor and audience, meaning that an audience must accept securitization and thus consent to exceptional procedures to protect shared values (Balzacq, Léonard and Ruzicka, 2015:496,499). Although there can be a ‘multiplicity of audiences’, it is crucial to identify the ‘enabling audience’ that ultimately empowers the securitizing actor to act (Balzacq, Léonard and Ruzicka, 2015:500).

The next step is to clarify ‘whose security we are talking about’, since any discussion about security becomes meaningless without a referent object (Williams, 2013:7). Survival, urgency and emergency lead to ‘the breaking of otherwise blinding rules and governance by decrees rather than by democratic decisions’ through ‘extraordinary measures’, i.e. whatever means are deemed appropriate the curb the threat (Trombetta, 2008:588).

As stated by Wæver, securitization becomes attractive for various actors through the causal mechanism between ‘doing security’ and it’s social and political effects, making securitization an exceptional change of state within a social system structured by power relations among stakeholders (2011:476). Consequently, securitization has become a ‘powerful political tool in claiming attention for priority items in the competition for government attention’ (Buzan, 1991:370)

4.2.

Challenging CS Within the Context of This Study

Securitization has become a fruitful analytical approach to study the growing number of various security issues (Balzacq, Léonard and Ruzicka, 2015:507). Applying the Copenhagen School’s theory of securitization, ‘subtle differences in emphasis and scope of the conceptual framework are evident even among its chief architects’ (McDonald, 2008:567). Most empirical accounts reflect upon particular empirical material and specific components of securitization theory, rather than simply applying existing concepts. These works further refine existing understandings of the theory, contributing to and criticizing its development (Balzacq, Léonard and Ruzicka, 2015:508). Here, only critique relevant to this study is outlined, while acknowledging that the CS’s securitization framework has previously been challenged, e.g. for

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its ‘narrowness’ (McDonald, 2008) or the lack of explicit definitions regarding e.g. the audience’s role (Robinson, 2017:507)

The first criticism concerns the automatic assumption of security as a negative and normatively regressive development, a classification suggested by the CS itself. Its initial framework depicts securitization as ‘a failure to deal with issues as normal politics’ (Buzan et al., 1998:29) and being associated with ‘panic politics’(ibid.:34). This adds to further silencing calls for an alternative vision of security towards progressive ends (McDonald, 2008:580). However, especially within the context of global environmental change, security must be acknowledged as a site of contestation and thus for (emancipatory) change (ibid.:566), suggesting that environmental securitization might be the most efficient way of conveying the urgency to address climate change.

Another powerful and relevant critique is aimed at the exclusive focus on speech acts as securitizing moves (McDonald, 2008:566). Wæver himself located securitization within Austin’s articulation of the speech act, thereby arguing that particular spoken or written accounts of language itself constitute security (1995:55). This reliance on language becomes problematic, firstly, because it is only one means of communicating meaning and, secondly, because ‘it can exclude forms of bureaucratic practices or physical action that […] are part of the process through which meanings of security are communicated and security itself constructed’ (McDonald, 2008:569). Consequently, various authors emphasize the role of images and audiovisual representations as communicating meaning and constructing security (ibid.:569). This argument is in line with the present study, which analyses and interprets security discourses in a combination of textual (speech acts), visual and audiovisual material. Additionally, the potential for security to be constructed over an extended period of time through various interrelated processes, speech acts and representations, thereby becoming institutionalized without drastic ‘securitizing moments’ of intervention, is often left out (McDonald, 2008:564,576). Moreover, recognizing the importance of everyday physical actions becomes interesting regarding this study’s side emphasis on resistance and occupation as physical acts of civil disobedience.

Another point of criticism is the state-centered nature of CS’s securitization theory (Mason, Zeiton, 2013:295). Shifting the understanding of referent objects from nation states to human beings and social relationships needing protection from environmental threats has only partially broadened the framework of securitization. Seeing the environment as essential support system

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for human life, most academic literature still lacks an identification of the environment’s inherent value as autonomous referent object, while suggesting the primacy of humans over nature (Williams, 2013:8).

The objection perhaps most relevant regarding this research refers to the CS’s preoccupation with traditional powerholders as sole securitizing actors being able to ‘speak’ security, consequently making the issue worthy of concentrated political attention within a social space. Political leaders, government representatives, military officials, lobbyists and other typical ‘elites’ are regarded as primary drivers of securitization. This choice to limit the attention to dominant actors can be criticized for giving voice only to those already privileged and powerful, thereby reinforcing pre-existing power structures and further silencing those already marginalized in global politics (McDonald, 2008:565).

4.3.

A Broadened Framework for Analysis

Despite its shortcomings, securitization nevertheless implies a comprehensive, multilevel approach towards global environmental change, therefore justifying the redefinition of the security concept towards including environmental issues. Following the abovementioned critique while focusing on environmental securitization, I argue for applying a broadened framework of analysis, based in most aspects on the CS as outlined above, however extended and refined in four significant points. I aim to strengthen the ‘mainstream’ framework for analysis and overcome some of its strongest criticism points, while recognizing the complexity of security constructions in global politics.

1. The environment and its inherent value as referent object

While weighing the potential risks of applying security logic to environmental issues against the possible advantages of focus, attention and mobilization (Waever, 1995:56), this study emphasizes placing the environment itself as referent object within the process of securitization. Although few appeals to environmental security have mobilized exceptional measures in the past (Trombetta, 2008:589), I strongly argue for a focus on the natural environment and its inherent value as being threatened by risks generated through human activities (Græger, 1996:110).

2. Combining textual sources (speech act), images and (audio-)visual material as securitizing moves developed over a period of time

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As stated above, this study suggests the power of including images and audiovisual representations as potential forms of securitization. Thereby, I do not replace verbal speech acts as securitizing moves, but rather amend the framework to account for numerous ways of communicating meaning and constructing security not instantaneously but over time.

3. Beyond dominant voices - providing a bottom-up account of environmental securitization through local civil society actors (securitizing actor)

My most significant modification of the framework is incorporating alternative securitizing actors, which moves beyond the exclusionary, statist focus on dominant, top-down voices. Thus, I aim to show how security discourses can gain widespread attention leading to local and global mobilization, while finally winning out over contesting dominant discourses, although stemming from a marginalized, non-elite’s perspective. This exceptional focus on a bottom-up perspective on securitization takes away the sole power from ‘big actors’, while simultaneously enabling non-powerholding voices to be heard – thereby creating more space for civil society actors within both academia and external and internal processes of decision-making. Especially in the context of global environmental change as all-encompassing issue of unprecedented dimensions, the interplay of state and non-state actors alike plays a major role in the fight for global environmental justice, environmental security and climate action.

4. Restructuring the order – Extraordinary measures to win the audience?

Since its original formulation, the audience’s role has been further developed. While most accounts of securitization highlight the audience’s necessary consent to framing a threat and gaining political legitimacy, this study restructures the ‘traditional’ process of securitization through the application of extraordinary measures as a way of articulating demands. In the example of the Hambach Forest, the audience came into play only in response to the use of exceptional actions such as resistance, occupation and civil disobedience. Within securitization, non-powerholding actors need to attract the attention of various kinds of audiences before being able to spread a security discourse – an obstacle that most traditional securitizing actors do not have due to their powerful status in society. Consequently, the extraordinary measures in this specific case are a form of direct action and gaining widespread attention at the same time, (Balzacq, Léonard and Ruzicka, 2015:512). According to Williams, this focus on

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extraordinary politics both emphasizes and activates the creative potential of securitization as a process of emancipation, openness and self-determination (2015:15-18).

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5. Methodological Framework

The following chapter encompasses a portrayal of the research design followed by an in-depth discussion of the chosen method of analysis within the analytical framework of a broadened understanding of securitization. After the chosen material will be accounted for, the choice of method and research design will be reflected on, followed by the researcher’s own positioning within the study.

5.1.

Research Design

In order to conduct an in-depth, detailed examination of a phenomenon within its real-life context (Yin, 1981:59), I will make use of a single instrumental case study (Stake, 1995; quoted in Creswell, 2007:73) as comprehensive research strategy, while taking into account the theory-driven character of this research. Thereby, the following working-definition of a case study will be applied:

‘Case study research is a qualitative approach in which the investigator explores a bounded system (a case) or multiple bounded systems (cases) over time, through detailed, in-depth data collection involving multiple sources of information […], and reports a case description and case-based themes’ (Creswell, 2007:73).

Following Stake (1994), one can identify three types of case studies, namely intrinsic case study, multiple case study and single instrumental case study, whereby the third type (aimed at illustrating an issue or concern through one bounded case) fits the study at hand best. Thus, understanding the case’s complexities is secondary (ibid.).

The phenomenon being studied is the process of securitizing the environment through the group of environmental activists participating in the resistance movement aimed at protecting the Hambach Forest from being cleared, while the overall protest for and occupation of the forest constitutes a bounded system (Creswell, 2007:74). Due to the focus on a specific aspect of the case (Yin, 2003; quoted in Creswell, 2007:75), the type of analysis can be described as an embedded analysis. To set the boundaries (timeframe + setting) that adequately surround the case, the study is focused on the cutting season 2017/2018 and connected events until May 2019, which will be investigated using multiple sources of information and methods of qualitative data collection concerning texts, visual artifacts and audio material in order to understand the multifaceted nature of the case. The material is then analyzed thematically in accordance with the analytical framework of securitization provided earlier in order to ‘report

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the meaning of the case [resulting from] learning about the issue of the case’ (Creswell, 2007:75) in the final interpretive phase.

5.2.

Method

For the academic field of social and political sciences also embracing peace and conflict studies, studying the linkages between language, discourses and power has come to play a special role. As stated by Graham (2005:2), ‘Discourse analysis is a flexible term’, which in turn lead to a variety of approaches to discourse analysis often lacking a clear articulation of concrete strategies used for the analysis (Jørgensen, Phillips, 2002:147). In order to create some form of internal validity as well as replicability for this study, I will lay out a detailed description of discourse analysis I (test, intertextuality, context) accounted for by Gillian Rose (2001) as one way, among others, of interpreting visual material.

To enhance the transparency of this research, I will apply the definition of discourse as ‘a group of statements which structure the way a thing is thought, and the way we act based on this thinking’ (Rose, 2001:136), linked to the idea of discourse as a particular form of knowledge that shapes the way we describe and understand the world (Foucault, 1972; quoted in Jørgensen, Phillips, 2002). As stated by Foucault, human subjects, just the same as relations, objects or places, are not simply born into this world, but rather produced through the immense power of discourses to discipline ‘subjects into certain ways of thinking and acting’ (Rose, 2001:137) through which particular relations of power are realized (Luke, 1991; quoted in Graham, 2005:4). Accordingly, all perceptions are influenced by the discourses one is exposed to every day, which in turn creates and shapes human behavior. It is particularly this interpretative and constructing function of discourses which makes discourse analysis relevant – both in order to understand social phenomena in general (Rose, 2001:162), but also for the purpose of this particular thesis.

Informed by Foucault’s work, Rose aims to carve out the most important steps necessary to undertake a discourse analysis in Foucauldian tradition. Foucault’s emphasis on the importance of power plays a crucial role. According to him, power is assumed to produce knowledge, and power and knowledge directly imply one another. Thus, every kind of knowledge is understood as discursive while all discourses are saturated with power. Consequently, ‘the most powerful discourses, in terms of the productiveness of their social effects, depend on assumptions and claims that their knowledge is true’ (Foucault, 1977:27; quoted in Rose, 2001:138). What is even more important within the context of the present study having its focus on marginalized

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discourses by civil society actors, Foucault understands power not simply as imposed top down from the elite to the oppressed, but rather as being omnipresent, just the same as discourse too is everywhere at all times (Rose, 2001:137). However, some discourses dominate over others, whereby

‘the dominance of certain discourses occurred not only because they were located in socially powerful institutions - those given coercive powers by the state, for example, such as the police, prisons and workhouses - but also because their discourses claimed absolute truth’ (ibid.:138). Following Foucault then, wherever there exists power, there also exists resistance; various kinds of resistance in the form of discourses competing in their effects (ibid.).

To gain an overarching picture of a particular discourse, it becomes crucial to account for the intertextuality of discourses, referring to the diversity of visual and verbal images and texts as well as audio material through which discourses are articulated (ibid.:136). Consequently, to grasp the meaning of any discursive element, the meaning communicated through other forms of material needs to be studied - making the use of a case study comprising the analysis of various sources a fitting framework for this interpretive discourse analysis.

Rose separates Foucault’s arguments into two forms of discourse analysis, called discourse analysis I and discourse analysis II (2001:40). While discourse analysis II is focused on the practices of institutions, discourse analysis I pays special attention to the notion of discourse as verbalized through ‘all forms of talk and texts’ (Gill, 1996:143; quoted in Rose, 2001:140), referring to the rhetorical organization and social production of spoken, written and visual materials (Rose, 2001:162).

Particularly this first type of analysis is heavily concerned with language as discourse together with the space it occupies and the knowledge being produced by it (Nead, 1988:4; quoted in Rose, 2001:136). For the purpose of the present study, not only the persuasive power of language but also the ways particular accounts of the social world are constructed through images and truth regimes, is of interest (Rose, 2001:40,140). Especially with visual technology playing a huge part in our contemporary times, these various forms of visual material offer a particular view on the world. Following from that, images can never be ‘innocent’ due to their interpretive and discursive character, displaying the world in very specific ways (ibid.:6). There is a need to distinguish between vision and visuality. While vision refers to what our eyes can physically see, visuality means the way ‘how we see, how we are able, allowed, or made to

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see, and how we see this seeing and the unseeing therein’ (Foster,1988a:ix; quoted in Rose, 2001:6). Thus, the way we interpret visual material depends heavily on our own standpoint. Since the present study is mainly concerned with the way environmental activists make use of the power of language and images to construct their worldview, and only secondarily focused on the social institutions that ‘produced, archived, displayed or sold them’ as well as the social effects, I decided to make use of discourse analysis I. However, due to my focus on civil society actors instead of elite power holders, the social production as well as the construction of social difference within the discourse through discursive claims of truth cannot be neglected downright (Rose, 2001:150,163). Below, the seven steps of discourse analysis I presented by Rose are elaborated:

The first step asks to leave behind all preconceptions and pre-existing categories one might have about the chosen material and looking at it with ‘fresh eyes’ to gain insights that might otherwise been overlooked (Rose, 2001:150).

The second step involves immersing oneself into the material and studying both images and verbal/textual sources multiple times with close attention in order to clasp as many details as possible (ibid.).

In the third step, a coding process is applied by carving out the key themes (reoccurring words of images) within the material (ibid.). One needs to keep in mind that the most important themes might not always be the ones being found the most. During this process, key themes in all sources used are coded and put into clusters , after which linkages between and among these key words and images should be considered in relation to securitization (ibid.:151).

In the following forth step, the more analytical process starts, focusing on the ways in which the discourse works to persuade, how it produces its ‘effects of truth’ (ibid.:154). This involves paying attention to ‘claims to truth, or to scientific certainty, or to the natural way of things’ as well as to how the discourse counters alternative or contradicting discourses.

Additionally, the power of complexity and internal contradictions embedded in the discourse needs to be considered (step five) (ibid.).

The sixth step inspects what is left unspoken or invisible, since what is being silenced, left out or covered up can be as powerful as what is highlighted (ibid.:157-158).

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As the seventh step, Rose points out the importance of paying great attention to details in order to efficiently grasp the discourse’s claims, and from that grasp deduct the most precise analytical depiction of the particular discourse (ibid.:15).

Furthermore, by citing Gill, Rose explains how ‘all discourse is occasioned’ (Gill, 1996:124; quoted in Rose, 2001:159), meaning that all discourses play out in particular social circumstances or contexts. From that arrives ‘the need to locate the social site from which particular statements are made, and to position the speaker of a statement in terms of their social authority’ (Foucault, 1972:50-52; quoted in Rose, 2001:158). In the case of securitization theory, any announcement stemming from a source of social authority is most likely to be more productive than one coming from a more marginalized social position, making the focus on environmental civil activists as the agents of discourse production especially exceptional in this context. Equally significant for securitization is identifying a discourse’s intended audience, which in turn sheds new light on the social effects created (Rose, 2001:159).

The three major shortcomings of discourse analysis I are linked to all Foucauldian discourse analysis. Firstly, they are often criticized for their vagueness, which leads Potter to describe them as ‘craft skill’ only properly learned by going through this diffuse and complex process repeatedly (1996:140; quoted in Rose, 2001:139). Secondly, practical analytical problems derive from the difficulty to know where to stop making intertextual connections within the ‘free-floating web of meaning unconnected to any social practices’ (Rose, 2001:162).

Finally, the refusal to ascribe causality has been mentioned as problematic, leading often to a blurred relation between discourses and their contexts (ibid.).

On the other hand, a clear strength of Foucauldian discourse analysis is its specific approach to the material while leaving open space for the material’s details to guide the analysis, which in turn creates some sort of flexibility and creativity compared to other methods such as content analysis (ibid.:145).

5.3.

Material

Based on the broadened framework of securitization developed above (combining textual sources, images, and audiovisual material as securitizing move developed over time), linked to a case study incorporating multiple sources of information and methods of qualitative data collection, the material analyzed in chapter 6 consists of various different sources representing the Hambach Forest within the context of securitization as comprehensively as possible.

‘Hambi bleibt!’ - Securitizing the Environment - A case study of discursive threat-construction surrounding the Hambach Forest