Introduction

The particular challenge Friends of the Earth International (FoEI) activists face is how to develop joint policies for FoEI, a federation that not only includes very diverse forms of environmentalism and understandings of 'the environment' and 'the world' but, as a matter of principle, also promotes that diversity. The central notions employed both by Thomas Hylland. Eriksen and in FoEI's mission statement—global, transnational, environmentalist and organisation—rather than simply being adjectives, are invitations for ethnographic exploration and analysis. To adopt Mario Blaser's terminology, the stories FoEI activists tell about the global environment participate in the ontological conflicts, and in making globalization itself, in a very tangible way. Practices and relationships within FoEI have become increasingly institutional and bureaucratic. Unlike the question of scale in relation to emplacement, a classical question in anthropology concerns the difference between small-scale and large-scale societies. The chapter also presents some of the key concepts discussed in this book.