This special issue of Culture, Theory and Critique recognises the growing centrality of the environment as a theme that cuts across and weaves through multiple disciplines. Scholars working within the fields of anthropology, history and literature have come together to present research on invisible harm, a term used here to capture the broad effects of increasing environmental toxicity and contamination in specific late capitalist contexts. Taken together, the articles suggest that it is the unseen nature of toxicity that enables the state to authorise its existence, whether the nuclear-era waste in a remote area of Kazakhstan that can be seen only with a Geiger counter (Stawkowski), the toxic oil pits hidden throughout Ecuador’s Amazonian jungle (Ofrias), the lead seeping into the soil from a metals smelter plant in Uruguay (Renfrew), or the radio waves that emanate from a secret US military facility (Jacobs). Secrecy, too, is a theme that emerges in these cases. Our authors each demonstrate the ways that the invisibility of toxicity is deceptive, outlining very real material effects that include not just damage to life and to the environment, but also the formation of new subjectivities organised around toxic harm. These effects, as enabled by invisibility, are the focus of this special issue. A temporal dimension permeates the things we cannot see. Toxicity may be invisible now but it will not be so tomorrow. For example, most scientists now agree that while exposure to chronic low-dose ionising radiation may not produce immediate health effects in a given population, this exposure will over time contribute to an increase in the number of cancers. But the temporal gap between emission and harm secures the tabling of environmental concerns at both the local and national levels. State actors clearly have interest in taking on at least the appearance of combatting future harm for their populations but they may choose to ignore long-term issues and instead embrace the benefits that neoliberalising and other present-oriented developmentalist approaches promise. These articles therefore ask how approaches based in immediacy may speak to the potential for environmental damage and bodily harm. Neoliberalism, whether characterised as ‘roll-back’ in terms of health care or ‘roll-out’ in terms of authorising particular directions for scientific research (Peck and Tickell 2002), carries particular valuations of health and illness and thus of life and death (cf. Agamben 1998; Lemke 2001; Foucault 2008). Even if states are invested in curtailing future harm, the science that might enable this direction (and necessarily shake the status quo) often remains ‘undone’ (Frickel et al. 2010; Hess 2016), making it extremely difficult to link health effects to toxicity. States affect the direction of scientific inquiry through political and economic means,

中文翻译：

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看不见的伤害：科学、主观性和我们看不到的东西

这期《文化、理论和批判》特刊承认环境日益成为一个主题，它跨越和交织多个学科。在人类学、历史和文学领域工作的学者们齐聚一堂，对无形伤害进行了研究，这里使用这个术语来描述特定晚期资本主义背景下环境毒性和污染增加的广泛影响。总而言之，这些文章表明，正是毒性的不可见性质使国家能够授权其存在，是否只能用盖革计数器（Stawkowski）才能看到哈萨克斯坦偏远地区的核时代废物，有毒物质隐藏在厄瓜多尔亚马逊丛林中的油坑 (Ofrias)，铅从乌拉圭的金属冶炼厂 (Renfrew) 渗入土壤，或从美国秘密军事设施（雅各布斯）发出的无线电波。保密也是这些案例中出现的一个主题。我们的作者各自展示了毒性的不可见性具有欺骗性的方式，概述了非常真实的物质影响，不仅包括对生命和环境的损害，还包括围绕毒性危害组织的新主观性的形成。这些由隐形启用的效果是本期特刊的重点。时间维度渗透到我们看不见的事物中。毒性现在可能是看不见的，但明天就不会如此了。例如，大多数科学家现在同意，虽然长期暴露于低剂量电离辐射可能不会对特定人群产生直接的健康影响，但随着时间的推移，这种暴露会导致癌症数量增加。但是排放和危害之间的时间差距确保了地方和国家层面的环境问题。国家行为者显然有兴趣至少承担应对未来对其人民造成的伤害的外表，但他们可能选择忽视长期问题，转而接受新自由主义和其他面向当下的发展主义方法所承诺的好处。因此，这些文章询问基于即时性的方法如何说明潜在的环境破坏和身体伤害。新自由主义，无论是在医疗保健方面的“倒退”还是在授权特定科学研究方向方面的“推出”（Peck and Tickell 2002），都带有对健康和疾病以及生与死的特殊评价（参见阿甘本 1998 年；莱姆克 2001 年；福柯 2008 年）。即使各国投资于减少未来的伤害，可能促成这一方向（并必然动摇现状）的科学往往仍然“未完成”（Frickel 等人，2010 年；Hess 2016 年），这使得将健康影响与毒性。国家通过政治和经济手段影响科学探究的方向，