Satya AMBASTA

Réseau : 

linkedin.com/in/satya-ambasta-a53b9b238/

Thème partagé secondaire : Mondes vécus

Présentation

Satya Ambasta is a PhD candidate in Anthropology at the Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle (MNHN) and Sorbonne Université, Paris, in the PALOC lab where her research examines India’s evolving role in global carbon value chains. She holds a master’s degree in environmental studies from Sciences Po, where her research explored market-based mechanisms for conservation such as ecotourism in Panna Tiger Reserve, India. Her broader research interests focus on the political economy of conservation and market-based environmental governance. She has presented her research at international conferences, including POLLEN, and is also a filmmaker. She co-directed A Flaming Forest (2024), an award-winning documentary on conservation-induced dispossession that has been screened at several international film festivals and universities. She was also an associate member of the ANR Ruling on Nature project. 

Titre de la thèse : 

Capturer l’insaisissable : une ethnographie de l’insertion de l’Inde dans les chaînes de valeur globales du carbone

Capturing the elusive : an ethnography of India’s insertion into global carbon value chains

• Résumé de la thèse :

This thesis project focuses on carbon as a synecdoche for the global social, economic and ecological dynamics generated by policies to combat climate change, with a particular emphasis on India, one of the world’s major forested countries. In the global climate crisis, carbon is becoming a total social object, embodying both the uncertainty of an imminent civilisational collapse, whether economic or ecological, and the desire to control these uncertainties through market regulation. 

In this context, the Indian government is committed to making the country a carbon sink capable of absorbing 2.5 to 3 billion tonnes of CO2 per year by 2030. This project is based on the restoration of degraded forests and the planting of new ones, financed in large part by India’s participation in the global carbon credit market. The aim of this thesis will be to explore the cultural, social, political, economic and legal dynamics surrounding this aspiration to turn India’s forests into carbon sinks, and to analyse how they are transforming the country’s society and landscapes. 

Avoiding the pitfalls of a linear and homogenous vision of production chains (Tsing, 2009) as well as the ‘win-win’ discourse propagated by carbon markets, the objective will be to trace the carbon value chains from its capture in the forests to its sale as carbon credits to companies wishing to offset their environmental impact. The analysis will focus on the trajectory of ‘green’ carbon through time, space, lives and imaginations. This research will probe into how carbon circulates in the fragments of the global economy of land, labour and resource extraction, and how it is appropriated by actors placed unequally throughout its value chain.
 

• Directeur ou directrice de la thèse : Daniela Berti
• Co direction : Sarah Benabou, Laurent Gayer
• Université : Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle et Sorbonne Université
• Date de début de la thèse : October 2025