From Global to Anthropocenic Assemblages: Re-Thinking Territory, Authority and Rights in the New Climatic Regime

Abstract

In a widely read study, Saskia Sassen uses the territory, authority, rights (TAR) framework in order to analyse the transformation of social life in the West from ‘medieval’ to ‘global’ assemblages. In the context of rapid, planetary climatic change – with many claiming that we have entered a new and climatically uncertain epoch known as the Anthropocene – does the TAR framework provide the relevant conceptual resources required to understand the ‘Anthropocenic’ assemblages of the present? This article examines the limitations of Sassen’s TAR framework, arguing that alterative theoretical resources are required in order to grasp the changing dynamics of social life in the context of the new climatic regime.

Keywords: Anthropocene, Climate Change, Saskia Sassen, Territory Authority Rights, Earthly Life

JEL Classification: K00