My academic work is located at the crossroads of social theory, political theory, political sociology and environmental sociology. Thematically it centres on

• the project of New Politics that had been articulated and promoted by the new social movements from the late 1960s to the mid-1980s;
• the recasting of progressive politics in advanced modern consumer democracies from the 1990s to the present; and
• the incremental transformation of the normative foundations on the basis of which political concerns are being framed, articulated and processed (value change).

My particular areas of interest are

• eco-politics and eco-political discourses in advanced liberal consumer democracies (environmental values, environmental movements, Green Parties, environmental policy debates, eco-political thought);
• political participation and the late-modern transformation of democracy (modes of political articulation and participation, emancipatory social movements, mobilisation of protest, political apathy and anti-politics, theory of democracy);
• changing notions of modernisation and progress (value change, agendas of social, economic and technological reform, democratic renewal, theories of modernity and modernisation).

Key concepts shaping the specific way in which my work describes, conceptualises and analyses these political cum sociological issues are:

• the silent counter-revolution (see e.g. Blühdorn 2002, 2003, 2007a);
• the post-ecologist turn (see e.g. Blühdorn 1997, 2000, 2004a, 2007b);
• the post-democratic turn (see e.g. Blühdorn 2004b, 2006, 2007c, 2008a).

These concepts are aiming to capture the fundamental transformation of social values and political agendas in advanced consumer societies since the 1970s and 1980s when the new social movements forged their agenda of New Politics. My work on social movements, Green Parties, environmental politics and democratic change is widely associated with the theories of:

• post-ecologist politics (see e.g. Blühdorn 1997, 2000, 2004a, 2007b);
• the politics of unsustainability (see e.g. Blühdorn 2002, 2007b, 2007d, 2008b);
• the politics of simulation (see e.g. Blühdorn 2003, 2004a, 2005, 2006, 2007b).

The first of these, i.e. the theory of post-ecologist politics, focuses narrowly on the analysis of contemporary eco-politics. The theory of the politics of unsustainability has a much wider remit covering, beyond the ecological, also the economic, social, political and cultural dimensions of (un)sustainability in advanced modern societies. The theory of the politics of simulation finally captures a range of societal practices helping to manage the crises of unsustainability which capitalist consumer democracies have to cope with.

Department of Politics, Languages and International Studies, University of Bath, Bath BA2 7AY
Tel: +44 (0) 1225 385028· Fax: +44 (0) 1225 386099
E-mail:I.Bluehdorn@bath.ac.uk

Last updated: January 21, 2008
Copyright © 2007 University of Bath · Disclaimer · Privacy Statement