John Bellamy Foster

Category: Articles

Articles

  • Introduction to the Archives of Organizational and Environmental Literature

    “Introduction to Archives of Organizational and Environmental Literature” [PDF], (co-authored with John M. Jermier, Foster listed first), Organization and Environment, vol. 11, no. 1 (March 1998), pp. 80-81. DOI: 10.1177/0921810698111004

    With this issue, we are introducing and new feature section of O&E entitled Archives of Organizational and Environmental Literature. Consciousness of environmental degradation stretches back over millennia; concern about ecological imperialism associated with the growth of the capitalist world economy dates back five centuries; and alarm arising from the environmental effects of machine capitalism can be traced back to the industrial revolution in England two centuries ago. Over the course of history, many inportant insights into organization and environment, often of a theoretical nature, have emerged—only to be forgotten later on. Once forgotten, these important contributions have also become in many cases inaccessible— so that it is difficult to rediscover what has been lost.

  • Hesitations Before Ecology: David Harvey’s Dilemma

    “Hesitations Before Ecology: David Harvey’s Dilemma,” [PDF], Capitalism, Nature, Socialism, vol. 9, no. 3 (1998), pp. 55-59. (Review essay on David Harvey’s, Nature, Justice, and the Geography of Difference.) DOI: 10.1080/10455759809358816

    Justice, Nature and the Geography of Difference is an ambitious work that considers everything from dialectics to globalization. It is a difficult book to assess because over the course of much if not most of the work Harvey deliberately avoids the closures – not just in concepts but in arguments and synthetic vision as well – that characterize most analytical work, almost as if he wants to preserve the kind of unresolved social, historical and ecological tensions that he so admires in Raymond William’s novels.

  • Free Market Democracy and Global Hegemony

    Free Market Democracy and Global Hegemony

    “Free Market Democracy and Global Hegemony,” (John Bellamy Foster) Monthly Review, vol. 49, no. 4 (September 1997), pp.51-64. DOI: 10.14452/MR-049-04-1997-08_5

    Review of Promoting Polyarchy: Globalization, U.S. Intervention, and Hegemony by William I. Robinson.

    Neoliberalism is usually thought of as a purely economic philosophy, stemming from the work of the arch-conservative economist Friedrich hayek and other twentieth century economist (particularly those associated with the University of Chicago), and involving an attempt to construct a much more complete justification for a pure, self-regulating market economy than could be found in the work of Adam Smith himself. Yet, neoliberalism—it is important to understand—also has its politcal component in the dominant model of liberal democracy, termed “polyarchy” by one of its leading proponents, Robert Dahl.

     

  • The Crisis of the Earth: Marx’s Theory of Ecological Sustainability as a Nature-Imposed Necessity for Human Production

    “The Crisis of the Earth: Marx’s Theory of Ecological Sustainability as a Nature-Imposed Necessity for Human Production” [PDF], Organization and Environment, vol. 10, no. 3 (September 1997), pp. 280-97. DOI: 10.1177/0921810697103003

    Any systematic, forward-looking ecological vision must include three elements: (a) a theory of ecological crisis and its relation to human production; (b) a concept of sustainability as a nature-imposed necessity for production; (c) a vision of the transcendence of ecological crisis that establishes sustainability as a core part of any future society. All three elements are to be found in the work of Karl Marx. Marx `s analysis of the crisis of the earth (or soil) in the mid-nineteenth century led him to a concept of sustainability that was central to his vision of communist society. Because this concept of sustainability was rooted both in a critique of capitalism and a vision of a future society, it has a richness and complexity all its own. A close examination of Marx `s concept of sustainability therefore offers important insights into the possibilities for the creation of a more sustainable social order.

    Reprints:

  • The Age of Planetary Crisis

    “The Age of Planetary Crisis: The Unsustainable Development of Capitalism” (in special issue on “The Future of Capitalism”),” [PDF], Review of Radical Political Economics, vol. 29, no. 4 (Fall 1997), pp. 113-42. DOI: 10.1177/048661349702900406

    The final years of the twentieth century have revealed three critical conditions likely to dominate the history of the coming century: (1) economic stagnation and globalization; (2) environmental decline; and (3) the weakness of antisystemic movements. As economic conditions stagnate and environmental conditions worsen, the material bases will emerge for a new, much broader movement of global resistance; one in which the struggle of labor vs. capital will be joined with the struggle of life vs. capital.

    Translations:
    • Spanish translation, “La Era de la Crisis Planetaria: El Desarrollo Insostenible del Capitalismo,” Economía Politica, no. 15 (September-October 1997), pp. 31-52.

  • The Greening of Marxism

    ”The Greening of Marxism,” [PDF], Environment, vol. 39, no. 6 (July/August 1997), pp. 31-32. (Book note on Ted Benton, ed. The Greening of Marxism.)

    Marxism and radical ecology are both critical of the capitalist commodity economy. Nevertheless, the two traditions often seem opposed. Marxism is often identified with the official Marxism of Soviet-type societies, in which (as in the capitalist world economy) nature was seen as an external object to be used and abused for economic ends. From the first, however, Marxism had a more ecologically sensitive side reflected in Marx’s personal concern over the destruction of the soil.

  • The Long Stagnation and the Class Struggle

    “The Long Stagnation and the Class Struggle” [PDF], Journal of Economic Issues, vol. 31, no. 2 (June 1997), pp. 445-51. (Included among select papers published from the Association of Evolutionary Economics, 1997 Annual Meeting.)

    For more than a quarter-century, the advanced capitalist economies have been mired in a condition of economic stagnation, characterized by slow growth, sluggish investment and high levels of unemployment and excess capacity. Since this condition has persisted so long and shows no signs of abating despite the current cyclical upswing, it seems appropriate to label it the “Long Stagnation,” thus distinguishing it from other periods of stagnation, most notably the “Great Depression” of the 1930s.

  • Erde (Earth)

    ”Erde (Earth),” in Historisch-Kritisches Wörterbuch Des Marximus, Band 3 (Ebene-Extremisis) (Berlin: Argument-Verlag, 1997), pp. 669-710. [HTML]

    Reprints

  • Logging the Globe

    ”Logging the Globe,” [PDF], Contemporary Sociology (Featured Essay), vol. 25, no. 5 (September 1996), pp. 598-99. (Review of Patricia Marchak, Logging the Globe.)

    Logging the Globe goes on to analyze the ecological implications of these changes. Marchak carefully documents the unsustainable exploitation of both temperate and tropical forests. In addition, she raises issues about the ecological consequences of plantation forestry, with its sterile monoculture, and highlights the toxic wastes associated with pulp and paper production.

  • Sustainable Development of What?

    “Sustainable Development of What?” [PDF], Capitalism, Nature, Socialism, vol. 7, no. 3 (September 1996), pp. 129-32.

    The 1992 Earth Summit in Rio marked a turning point in world history. Faced with the reality of a planetary ecological crisis, all the countries of the world joined in declaring their support for “sustainable development” — or the goal of striking a balance between present development and the potential for future development, the latter requiring some degree of protection of the earth’s resources.

    Translation: