Seismic Shifts: Recentering Geology and Politics in the Anthropocene

Abstract

A strident focus on atmospheric carbons and on climate change as its distinguishing feature has seen much debate and research surrounding the Anthropocene stray from its conceptual grounding in geology. Yet new research argues that hallmarks of the Anthropocene such as sea-level rise, melting ice sheets, and environmental engineering projects designed to mitigate chronic shortages of potable water all increase the potential of seismic activity, placing geological forces back at the center of conversations on planetary futures. Following calls to consider the political dimensions of environmental change in the Anthropocene, this article examines the multiple layerings of natural hazards, political crises and transformations, and mega-urbanization through the lens of catastrophic geological events, drawing evidence from an ongoing longitudinal study of the devastating Mexico City earthquakes of 1985 and 2017. This case suggests that such events intersect with contemporary political economy in a variety of ways, from the disruption of urban investment patterns and the initiation of processes of mass abandonment or of creative destruction and gentrification to the exacerbation of political crises at scales from the submunicipal to the supranational, the facilitation of social movement formation, and the acceleration of political revolutions such as Mexico’s democratic transition of 2000. These insights offer productive avenues for engaging with the political economies of geological events and processes and the prescriptive powers of geology as a field of knowledge production and political power that increasingly demand attention across an urbanizing planet.