Latest Module Specifications
Current Academic Year 2025 - 2026
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Description This module provides a theoretical and conceptual grounding in key environmental issues, as viewed through the lenses of political economy and critical environmental studies. The module takes a necessarily structural approach that considers scalar inequalities and contradictions in contexts of environmental crisis. The module introduces key political economy and structural approaches to the economy/society relationship, providing students with a grounding in contemporary critical approaches to sustainable societal development. The module further utilises the political economy approach to interrogate the nature/society relationship. Taking a structural approach addresses contemporary issues of planetary overshoot, unsustainable development, climate justice and debate on alternative economic models such as degrowth and the circular economy. It interrogates the consequences of spatial and temporal ‘fixes’, where crises are moved around in space and time rather than resolved, and analyses the uneven geographic impact of ‘fixes’ on the environment and populations. It considers the environmental ethics of media production, to include issues of ‘soft’ and ‘hard’ electronic waste. Case studies throughout the module help ground these macro-level concepts to practical examples, including soil, CFCs, trees, lawns, rivers, and artificial intelligence. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Learning Outcomes 1. Understand a range of theoretical perspectives pertaining to the economy/society relationship 2. Develop critical insights on contemporary economic growth models, and their alternatives 3. Understand the impacts of societal processes on the earth system 4. Understand the role of spatial and temporal fixes to crisis, and the impact of fixes on the environment and populations 5. Develop competencies in critical analysis of the environment/society relationship | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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All module information is indicative and subject to change. For further information,students are advised to refer to the University's Marks and Standards and Programme Specific Regulations at: http://www.dcu.ie/registry/examinations/index.shtml |
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Indicative Content and Learning Activities
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Indicative Reading List Books: None Articles: None | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Other Resources None | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||