NIMBYs, shills and liars: ancient woodland, highspeed rail and the legibility of justifications

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MacDonald, Richard. 2025. NIMBYs, shills and liars: ancient woodland, highspeed rail and the legibility of justifications. Environmental Politics, ISSN 0964-4016 [Article] (In Press)

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Official URL: https://doi.org/10.1080/09644016.2025.2557060

Abstract or Description

This article examines the environmental controversy around the planning and construction of high-speed rail in the UK (HS2) to analyse the changing dynamics and mediation of intra-green contention. The study situates a protracted episode of contention staged on Twitter, focused on the damage and destruction of 108 ancient woodlands by the construction of HS2, in a longer event history initiated by the first UK public consultation on high-speed rail. The article argues that platform-mediated interaction that delegitimises opponents as bad-faith actors, NIMBYs, shills and liars, also has the detrimental effect of obscuring the justifying arguments of critics of purportedly green infrastructure like high-speed rail. The article argues that it is not so much polarisation, but delegitimization that constitutes the greater risk of platform-mediated intra-green contention, an outcome that could be mitigated by discursive forums and iterative processes where trust can be built over time.

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Article

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https://doi.org/10.1080/09644016.2025.2557060