From the Bog to the Cloud: Dependency and Eco-Modernity in Ireland

About

The green digital transition is underway. But what does this transition look like when dictated by the energy and resource demands of monopoly tech? How has this situation come to be? And where is it being resisted? From the Bog to the Cloud uncovers the hidden intersections of land, resource extraction and climate policy in the transition to “greener” and “smarter” economies. Challenging eco-modern and techno-solutionist approaches, the book links narratives of sustainability with colonial histories and uneven development, arguing that tech-driven transitions replicate exploitative patterns of imperial capitalism. Using Ireland as a focal point, we show how the history and depth of the country’s postcolonial dependency on multinational investment, especially US technology companies, comes into friction with disparate land-based struggles. This talk will articulate these histories within their present expression in Ireland’s twin transition and AI industrial policy, offering a critique of dependent models of development and proposing an anti-imperialist approach to environmental politics.

Patrick Brodie is an Assistant Professor and Ad Astra Fellow in the School of Information and Communication Studies at University College Dublin. His research focuses on the political ecology of digital media infrastructure. He is the co-author with Patrick Bresnihan of From the Bog to the Cloud: Dependency and Eco-Modernity in Ireland (with Patrick Bresnihan, Bristol UP, 2025), the co-editor of Media Rurality (with Darin Barney, Duke UP, 2026), and the author of Wild Tides: Media Infrastructure and Financial Crisis in Ireland (Duke UP, 2026).