Counter-modelling the Plantationocene

Abstract

This article takes the Plantationocene concept as a departure point to question Earth System Models (ESMs). The term emphasises the formative role of plantation ecologies and colonialism as drivers of planetary change. Taking the tension between the need to document the Plantationocene’s planetary impact and the inability of models to fully grasp and articulate its violent ramifications, the paper interrogates how modelling limits what stories about planetary change can be told. This includes the limited kinds of political interventions modelling enables, the colonial legacy of data collection, as well as more recent acts of data extraction and dispossession. The paper proposes that the Plantationocene can be counter-modelled in a way that integrates friction, communal counter-mapping, and climate fiction. This effort could form part of a broader reparative and radical response to the ongoing planetary catastrophe.