Erik Isberg, PhD-student at the division within the SPHERE-project, has published a new article with the title “A new Earth rises. How did the planet replace the nation-state to become the prime political object of the 21st century?”.

Profile picture of Erik Isberg

You can read and even listen to the full text on the Aeon-Website. Here is a small extract from Erik’s piece:

The recently resurfaced planet, I argue, can be traced back to fantasies like Richardson’s. Contemporary planetary governance relies on a specific trajectory of planetary monitoring. Even though efforts to map and measure global space have a far longer history – not least as a primary vehicle of Western colonialism and imperialism – the efforts to monitor and govern planetary dynamics have also relied on a particular history of knowing, seeing and measuring the planet. Thinking of the planet as an interconnected system required quantified and centralised approaches as well as a wide set of scientific instruments and technologies. A specific kind of planet was able to emerge, not by itself, but through the interconnected histories of geopolitics, technology and grand visions of planetary monitoring.