Bioeconomy and Global Inequalities : Socio Ecological Perspectives on Biomass Sourcing and Production 1. Introduction. Contextualising the Bioeconomy in an Unequal World: Biomass Sourcing and Global Socio ecological Inequalities; Maria Backhouse Rosa Lehmann Kristina Lorenzen Janina Puder Fabricio Rodríguez Anne Tittor Part 1 Rethinking the Bioeconomy Energy and Value Production 2. Global Inequalities and Extractive Knowledge Production in the Bioeconomy; Maria Backhouse 3. Neoliberal Bioeconomies Co constructing Markets and Natures; Kean Birch 4. Tools of Extraction or Means of Speculation Making Sense of Patents in the Bioeconomy; Veit Braun 5. Bioenergy Thermodynamics and Inequalities; Larry Lohmann Part 2 Bioeconomy Policies and Agendas in Different Countries 6. Knowledge Research and Germany’s Bioeconomy: Inclusion and Exclusion in Bioenergy Funding Policies; Rosa Lehmann 7. A Player Bigger than its Size. Finnish Bioeconomy and Forest Policy in the Era of Global Climate Politics; Tero Toivanen 8. Sugar Cane Bioelectricity in Brazil: Reinforcing the Meta Discourses of Bioeconomy and Energy Transition; Selena Herrera John Wilkinson Part 3 Reconfigurations and Continuities of Social ecological Inequalities in Rural Areas 9. Buruh Siluman: The Making and Maintaining of Cheap and Disciplined Labour on Oil Palm Plantations in Indonesia; Hariati Sinaga 10. Superexploitation in Bio based Industries. The Case of Oil Palm and Labour Migration in Malaysia; Janina Puder 11. Sugarcane Industry Expansion and Changing Rural Labour Regimes in Mato Grosso do Sul (2000–2016); Kristina Lorenzen 12. Territorial Changes around Biodiesel. A Case Study of North western Argentina Virginia Toledo López Part 4 The Extractive Side of the Global Biomass Sourcing 13. Contested Resources and South South Inequalities. What Sino Brazilian Trade Means for the “Low Carbon” Bioeconomy; Fabricio Rodríguez 14. Sustaining the European Bioeconomy. The Material Base and Extractive Relations of a Bio based EU Economy; Malte Lühmann 15. Towards an Extractivist Bioeconomy The Risk of Deepening Agrarian Extractivism when Promoting Bioeconomy in Argentina; Anne Tittor. This open access book explores bioeconomy and bioenergy policies across South America Asia and Europe. It discusses how a transition away from a fossil and towards a bio based economic order alters reinforces and challenges socio ecological inequalities. A series of conceptual discussions and case studies with a multidisciplinary background in the social sciences illuminate how the deployment of biomass sources from the agricultural and forestry sectors affect societal changes concerning knowledge production land and labour relations political participation and international trade. How can a global perspective on socio ecological inequalities contribute to a critical understanding of bioeconomy Who participates in the negotiation of specific bioeconomy policies and who does not To what extent does the bioeconomy affect existing socio ecological inequalities in rural areas What are the implications of the bioeconomy for existing relations of extraction and inequalities across regions The volume is an invitation to reflect upon these questions and more at a time when the need for an ecological and socially just transition away from a carbon intensive economy is becoming increasingly pressing. The editors Maria Backhouse Rosa Lehmann Kristina Lorenzen Malte Lühmann Janina Puder Fabricio Rodríguez and Anne Tittor are all social scientists and members of the Junior Research Group “Bioeconomy and Inequalities. Transnational Entanglements and Interdependencies in the Bioenergy Sector” funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF).