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 […]
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The Long Stagnation and the Class Struggle
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 condi- tion has persisted so long and shows no signs of abating despite the current cyclical upswing, it seems appropriate to […]
Erde (Earth)
”Erde (Earth),” in Historisch-Kritisches Wörterbuch Des Marximus, Band 3 (Ebene-Extremisis) (Berlin: Argument-Verlag, 1997), pp. 669-710. [HTML] Reprints English language version published in Historical Materialism, no. 15, 2007, pp. 255-62.
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?
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 […]
Market Fetishism and the Attack on Social Reason
By on December 1, 1995 in Comments-Short Articles-Introductions to Archival Reprints, Short Articles
In an age when the rationalist tradition of the Enlightenment is under attack, it is perhaps worth recalling that the arch-conservative economist, Friedrich Hayek, the leading intellectual figure of the free market right, made one of the sharpest attacks ever to be directed at the idea that reason can play a useful role in shaping […]
Ecology and Human Freedom
We live at a time when it is reasonable to speak of the possibility of complete ecological destruction, in virtually the same sense that critics of nuclear armaments have often referred to the possibility of complete nuclear destruction. Both human society and the survival of the planet as we know it are now at risk.
Rationality and Nature
The emergence in the 1980s and ’90s of an increasingly global approach to ecological problems-marked by the ascendance of such issues as the destruction of the ozone layer, global warming, tropical deforestation, and an annual loss of species possibly in the tens of thousands-has altered forever the relation of ecology to the social sciences. Recognizing […]
Marx and the Environment
It has become fashionable in recent years, in the words of one critic, to identify the growth of ecological consciousness with “the current postmodernist interrogation of the metanarrative of the Enlightenment.” Green thinking, we are frequently told, is distinguished by its postmodern, post-Enlightenment perspective. Nowhere is this fashion more evident than in certain criticisms directed […]
Global Ecology and the Common Good
Over the course of the twentieth century human population has increased more than threefold and gross world product perhaps twentyfold. Such expansion has placed increasing pressure on the ecology of the planet. Everywhere we look—in the atmosphere, oceans, watersheds, forests, soil, etc.—it is now clear that rapid ecological decline is setting in.
