The ‘Bolsonaro bridge

Violence, visibility, and the 2019 Amazon fires

Bibliographic Data

ID8100337
AuthorsSteven Deutsch (0000-0002-6659-6092, University of Zurich, corresponding author), Ronald Fletcher (0000-0002-5365-1697, Wageningen University & Research), R S G Fletcher (0000-0002-5893-0572)
Year2022
Volume132
Pages60-68
Publication date2022-02-19
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueEnvironmental Science & Policy (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1462-9011 • E-ISSN: 1873-6416
PublisherElsevier BV (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1016/j.envsci.2022.02.012
OpenAlexW4212902790
LanguageEN
Citations received11
References cited44

News coverage of noteworthy environmental events is often fleeting, moving from one spectacle to another and rarely retaining global attention. But in August 2019, news of Amazon rainforest fires spread seemingly as quickly as the fires themselves, with sustained global coverage and funding pouring into environmental organizations. Yet Amazon fires regularly occur and fires were simultaneously burning in other important Brazilian biomes, with some causing worse damage. What was it about the 2019 Amazon fires that elicited such a strong and persistent global response? In this paper, we draw on distinctions between slow/immediate (Nixon, 2011) and structural/direct violence (Galtung, 1969) to answer this question. We argue that the Amazon’s reputation as a global treasure and its association with climate change and biodiversity through ‘giantness’ (Slater, 2002) meant that the fires’ local spectacular violence became felt as an instant global threat, shifting perceptions of violence from slow to immediate. Moreover, as the identified instigator of the violence, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro became a sort of ‘bridge’ between structural and direct dimensions of violence, thus making the violence personal. These three dynamics combined to enhance visibility of the Amazon’s destruction and its connection to planetary stability, thereby inspiring the 2019 fires’ extraordinary reactions. Through this analysis, the paper contributes to psychological literature on perceptions of ecological crises and to discussions in political ecology/geography concerning violent environments by demonstrating how and why both the slow and structural violence of the global climate and biodiversity crises can be rendered more visible via localized effects

Amazon rainforest · Bridge (graph theory · Business · Geography · Meteorology · Visibility · Anthropological Studies and Insights · Geographies of human-animal interactions · Medicine

Tools

Open DOIOpen Access