A guest post by Leigh Price (University of Inland Norway, leigh.price@inn.no), Andreas Vavvos (University of
Crete, Greece & University of Saint Andrews, UK), and Jan Zumoberhaus (University of Fribourg,
Switzerland).
Submission Deadline: 28 February 2025
The Journal of Critical Realism is calling for papers for a special issue on critical realism and
human-nature relations, to be prepared for publication in 2026 under the guest-editorship of
Leigh Price, Andreas Vavvos, and Jan Zumoberhaus.
This special issue seeks to examine the potential of critical realism to deepen our
understanding of human-nature relations and enhance our collective capacity to address the
environmental crisis. It aims to contribute to the critical realist-inspired body of work that seeks
to move beyond simple dualisms (nature vs. society, material vs. discursive) to build more
integrated, non-anthropocentric, realist, and ethically informed approaches to environmental
and ecological questions. It also seeks to continue the cross-fertilization processes between
critical realism and other metatheoretical approaches relevant to the question of the
complexity of human-nature relations, such as posthumanism, new materialism, integral
theory, systems/complexity theory, postcolonial and indigenous approaches, certain strands of
Marxist environmentalism, and studies on environmental justice and techno-political regimes –
deeply implicated in extractive economies – that reinforce global inequalities.
We invite scholars, artists, and activists to contribute to a special issue on critical realism and
human-nature relations. We welcome papers from environmental philosophy and ethics,
anthropology, sociology, geography, political ecology, science and technology studies,
environmental education, and related fields. In particular, we seek contributions that move
beyond hegemonic approaches to sustainability, resilience, and conservation. We aim to
explore the emancipatory potential of critical realism for understanding and transforming the
causal dynamics that shape socio-ecological systems and human-nature relations.
Possible themes include (but are not limited to):
- Analyses that foster dialogue between critical realism and other (meta)theories – such as
social constructivism, posthumanism, new materialism, feminism, and historical materialism
in response to the ecological crisis. - Further elaboration of critical realist interdisciplinarity, dialectical critical realism and
metaReality to better understand ecological degradation and its amelioration. - Analysis of critical realist morality – grounded in ontological realism and epistemological
relativism – and its contribution to achieving an axiology that potentially leads to
sustainability. - Exploration of the heuristic potential of key critical realist concepts (e.g., epistemic fallacy,
eudaimonia, Archer’s analytic dualism, identity-in-difference, morphogenesis/stasis,
constellational containment) for ecological theory and ecosystem thinking. - Development of critical realism in conversation with ecological thinkers, environmental
movements, and ecological artists. - Exploration of the synergies between critical realism and decolonial
methodologies/indigenous perspectives on human-nature relations.
Deadline for submissions and other information:
- Submission of full papers should be made to the Journal of Critical Realism by 28 February 2026.
- Abstracts (350 words max.) can be sent to Leigh Price at leigh.price@inn.no before submission of the full paper for an initial assessment of relevance.
- All papers will be subject to double anonymous peer review.
- Submission guidelines and further information on JCR can be found at the journal’s web page: https://www.tandfonline.com/journals/yjcr20.
The full call for papers is also available at https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14767430.2025.2569990?src=