Decolonising space: necro-ecological governance in Rojhelat (Iranian Kurdistan)

This article examines the racialised destruction of the Kurdish eco-world in Rojhelat (Iranian/Eastern Kurdistan) through the lens of necro-ecological governance, arguing that environmental devastation is a structural hallmark of colonial rule in a stateless territory. Moving beyond state-centred models of environmental racism and reformist environmental justice, it conceptualises water governance, mining extraction, landmines, wildfires and colonial tourism as interconnected technologies of domination to regulate Kurdish life through exposure to slow death and erosion. Situating Rojhelat in the broader history of Kurdish partition and internal colonialism, the study demonstrates how Persian–Shi’a nationalist ideology racialises Kurdish land and resources as disposable, transforming them into instruments of demographic control, economic extraction and securitised domination. Drawing on official data, human rights reports, Kurdish non-governmental organisations’ (NGOs’) archives and open-ended interviews with informed locals, the article redefines the ecological crisis as a form of stateless necropolitics. Furthermore, it foregrounds Kurdish ecological resistance, particularly women-led and community-based mobilisations, as decolonial practices that reclaim land, futurity and collective dignity. The article contributes to Indigenous studies, decolonial theory and critical environmental scholarship by theorising ecology as a central terrain of colonial violence and emancipatory struggle.