Care for the Family and the Environment in China's Coal Country

Abstract In the “coal province” of Shanxi, residents grapple with tensions between caring for their families and caring about their environment. In creating ethical pathways through care, residents must navigate the paradox of livelihoods dependent on forms of development that endanger lives and pollute environments. This dilemma has crystallized over time, as the personal and particular demands of the present have become enmeshed with long-standing concerns over environmental degradation. Rather than characterizing family care as concrete and environmental care as abstract, acts of care in Shanxi link the reproductive crisis of the family with the reproductive crisis of the environment: the article presents instances under which the attention, empathy and recognition of care for concrete others are scaled up to the levels of ecology and planetary crisis.