Jacob Bolton
About
Jacob works around the political ecology of logistics. His PhD research looks at speculation and planning for future shipping routes as a result of climate breakdown. He is focusing on the Transpolar Sea Route: a speculative shipping lane cutting across the North Pole that may soon open up as a result of rapidly melting sea ice. This route would remap the world’s commodity flows, allowing cargo between China, Europe and the US to bypass key chokepoints like the Suez Canal.
Drawing on critical approaches to logistics, security and risk, he is studying the process by which versions of the future are produced through logistical planning and economic forecasting, and the role of these futures in materialising the nuts and bolts of the world economy and global division of labour.
Prior to joining LSE, Jacob was a researcher for an NGO working on labour exploitation, looking into experiences of migrant farm workers in the UK. Whilst here, he carried out fieldwork in Kyrgyzstan and presented the organisation’s research in UK Parliament.
He used to teach at the Royal College of Art, and at the Critical Practice Studio in Dheisheh, Palestine. He holds an MA from the Centre for Research Architecture, where he also studied and worked with the investigative agency Forensic Architecture. He is also part of the research and arts duo Liquid Time, writing and making films around shipping, finance and the temporalities of the maritime world.
Provisional thesis title
Forecasting at the end of the world: logistical futures in a melting arctic
Research interests
- Logistics and shipping
- Political ecology
- Arctic politics
- Critical minerals
- Climate infrastructure
Publications
Bolton, J. (2024), Supply Nets: The Logistics of Seafarer Abandonment. Antipode, 56: 1172-1190. Read article.
Media
- After the Thaw, The Break-Down Shipping
- Doesn’t Do What Everyone Says it Does, Weird Economies
- Britain’s seasonal worker scheme leaves many migrants in debt, research finds, Financial Times
- Liquid Time interview Charmaine Chua, Sonic Acts
- Retailers, Consumers, Farmers: Where does Power Lie within the Food Supply Chain?, UK Parliament Session
Conference papers
Dead Ends, Lost Means: The Supply Chain of Abandonment, Dimensions of Political Ecology Conference, 2022
Affiliations
Future Matters Network
Positions Held
- Graduate Teaching Assistant, LSE
- Associate Lecturer, Royal College of Art
Teaching Assistant, Critical Practice Studio (Al-Quds Bard College) - Teaching Assistant, Critical Practice Studio (Al-Quds Bard College)
Awards
LSE Studentship Award
Goldsmiths Masters Scholarship
Software
Nvivo, QGIS, Adobe Suite, Blender
Supervisors
Dr Kasia Paprocki
Dr Austin Zeiderman