Mies, kone ja metsä

Luonto metsäkoneyrittäjien työkäytännöissä

Abstrakti

This article explores masculine action space in
transition: changes in forest work and industrial
utilization of nature. The aim is to understand how
the rising importance of environmental issues, such
as renewable energy production, change the ways
how nature is encountered in forest work. The
article is based on interviews of logging contractors
who have recently started bioenergy business. The
key analytical concept is affordance which addresses
the constraints and possibilities of actors in their
social, material and natural working environments.
The concept allows us to conceptualise the changing
relationship between social practices, gender and
nature. Affordances, enacted through the material
and social practices of forest work, make visible the
distinctions in the working cultures and agency of
forest workers. These distinctions, and the related
tensions between masculinities, are important from
the viewpoint of environmental justice because
they reveal the politics of forest work, and help
to re-establish the connection between social and
environmental issues.