This forthcoming book chapter, which is being included in an edited volume on energy democracy, describes the MICARES framework and highlights its relevance for promoting energy democracy.
Abstract
Energy democracy refers to an emergent social movement aimed at restructuring socio-technological system regimes and reimagining energy politics in a more socially just and economically equitable way. A key aspect of this movement is the pursuit of energy sovereignty, or the rights of communities and individuals to make their own choices regarding the forms, scales, and sources of energy as well as the patterning and organization of energy production and consumption. Current energy policy in the US not only fails to prioritize energy sovereignty, but often works against it, as energy systems are principally designed and deployed by experts at federal, state, and regional levels with little opportunity for household or community-level input or concern for protecting local level energy decision-making capacity. Community-owned renewable energy projects are rare in North America and little research considers the trade-offs between utility- versus community-owned projects or the potential for hybridized combinations of systems. In this chapter, we discuss a recent collaborative initiative, Michigan Community Anishinaabe and Rural Energy Sovereignty, or MICARES, intended to inform and facilitate the development of Tribal Nation and rural Michigan community-owned renewable projects, energy sovereignty and energy-focused socio-technological system transitions. Following a description of the conceptual and methodological foundations of MICARES, we then critically examine the current state of energy democracy and sovereignty in four case-study communities.