John Bellamy Foster

Tag: PDF

  • The Scale of Our Ecological Crisis

    “The Scale of Our Ecological Crisis,” Monthly Review vol. 49, no. 11 (April 1998), pp. 5-16. DOI: 10.14452/MR-049-11-1998-04_2

    One of the problems that has most troubled analysts of global ecological crisis is the question of scale. How momentous is the ecological crisis? Is the survival of the human species in question? What about life in general? Are the basic biogeochemical cycles of the planet vulnerable? Although few now deny that there is such a thing as an environmental crisis, or that it is in some sense global in character, some rational scientists insist that it is wrong to say that life itself, much less the planet, is seriously threatened. Even the mass extinction of species, it is pointed out, has previously occurred in evolutionary history. Critics of environmentalism (often themselves claiming to be environmentalists) have frequently used these rational reservations on the part of scientists to brand the environmental movement as “apocalyptic.”

    Translations:
    • Serbian translation, 2012 by Goran Stankovic for collection on Modern  Apocalypse, Službeni Glasnik, Belgrade.

     

  • ‘William Morris’ Letters on Epping Forest: An Introduction

    “William Morris’ Letters on Epping Forest: An Introduction,” [PDF], Organization and Environment, vol. 11, no. 1 (March 1998), pp. 82-84. DOI: 10.1177/0921810698111005

    In the initial entry for this section, we are publishing “Three Letters on Epping Forest” written by William Morris (1834-1896). Morris was an English artist, master craftsperson, designer, poet, socialist, and forerunner of modern ecological thought. His designs for furniture, wallpaper, fabrics, stained glass, and other decorative arts revolutionized Victorian sensibilities and spawned the late nineteenth century arts and crafts movement. Hence, he earned a reputation as one of the outstanding figures of his century.

  • 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 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.

  • 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:

  • Virtual Capitalism

    “Virtual Capitalism: The Political Economy of the Information Highway,” (co-authored with Michael Dawson, Foster listed second), Monthly Review vol. 48, no. 3 (July 1996), pp. 40-58. DOI: 10.14452/MR-048-03-1996-07_3

    One of the great technological myths of our time is that the entire system of organized capitalism dating back to the Industrial Revolution (and even earlier), is being displaced by a new age of “the electronic republic” rooted in the technology of the Information Revolution.

    Translations:
    • Translated and published in German as “Virtueller Kapitalismus: Die Politische Ökonomie der Datenautobahn,” Supplement der Zeitschrift Sozialismus, December 1996, pp. 12-20.