Domain Leader: Dr. Gareth Powells

Nexus thinking in human geography has emphasised the interconnections between environment, political economy, society and culture. In collaboration with diverse organisations in the city of Newcastle and beyond, this Domain pursues nexus thinking through themes of energy, waste, food and water.  The Domain will advance our research activity in two ways:

• by re-theorising gradualist notions of sustainable transitions in resource networks toward more radical ideas of transformation – including sustainable degrowth and ‘slow growth’, and
• by critiquing white, masculinist, neoliberal and technology-led framings of resource provision to (and by) communities, towards more socially inclusive forms of provision.

In the wake of the 2008/10 economic down turn, the marketization of resource networks has intensified, thereby increasing the uneven economic geographies of resource infrastructure.

What are the geographical possibilities for (and constraints on) food, waste, water and energy services to be planned and managed in coordinated ways?
In what ways can these resource networks be re-bundled in different places to perform more optimally for communities and the environment?
What do ‘more optimal’ resource nexus structures look like/mean for different groups of stakeholders?