Sun, wind, and the rebirth of extractive economies: renewable energy investment and metanarratives of crisis in Greece

Argenti, N.; Knight, D.M.

doi:10.1111/1467-9655.12287

Sun, wind, and the rebirth of extractive economies: renewable energy investment and metanarratives of crisis in Greece

Argenti, N.; Knight, D.M.

Authors

N. Argenti

D.M. Knight

Abstract

In the midst of economic crisis, the Greek state has taken the unprecedented step of opening many of the nation's closed business sectors to international investors. Opportunities for multinational investment have been most prolific in the arena of renewable energy, where foreign prospecting in solar and wind energy is soaring. This article discusses two renewable energy initiatives: photovoltaic parks on agricultural land in Thessaly, central mainland Greece, and a planned wind farm development on the Aegean island of Chios. Among the people of Thessaly and Chios, the renewable energy initiatives are widely seen in terms of conquest and occupation akin to the Ottoman era and the Second World War. Harnessing natural resources is perceived to be a colonial programme of economic extraction associated with the global South as much as a sustainable energy initiative, heralding a return to a time of foreign occupation. This article examines the dialectical relationship emerging between narratives of renewable energy extraction and broader, long-standing conceptions of Greek identity.

Citation

Argenti, N., & Knight, D. (2015). Sun, wind, and the rebirth of extractive economies: renewable energy investment and metanarratives of crisis in Greece. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, 21(4), 781-802. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9655.12287

Journal Article Type	Article
Publication Date	Dec 1, 2015
Deposit Date	Jan 21, 2015
Publicly Available Date	Jun 26, 2015
Journal	Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute
Print ISSN	1359-0987
Electronic ISSN	1467-9655
Publisher	Wiley
Peer Reviewed	Peer Reviewed
Volume	21
Issue	4
Pages	781-802
DOI	https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9655.12287

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© 2015 The Authors. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of the Royal Anthropological Institute. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.