Ecologism
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Ecosocialism This is the socialist strand within the green movement, which has been particularly pronounced among the German Greens, many of whose leaders have been former members of far-left groups. Ecosocialism has drawn from the pastoral socialism of thinkers such asWilliamMorris, who extolled the virtues of small-scale craft communities living close to nature. However, it has more usually been associated with Marxism. For example, Rudolph Bahro (1982) argued that the root cause of the environmental crisis is capitalism. The natural world has been despoiled by industrialization, but this is merely a consequence of capitalism’s relentless search for profit. In this view, capitalism’s anti- ecological bias derives from a number of sources. These include that private property encourages the belief that humans are dominant over nature; that the market economy ‘commodifies’ nature, in the sense that it turns it into something that only has exchange- value and so can be bought and sold; and that the capitalist system breeds materialism and consumerism, and so leads to relentless growth. From this perspective, ‘green capitalism’ is a contradiction in terms. The core theme of ecosocialism is thus the idea that capitalism is the enemy of the environment, while socialism is its friend. However, as with socialist feminism, such a formula embodies tension between two elements, this time between ‘red’ and ‘green’ priorities. If environmental catastrophe is nothing more than a by-product of capitalism, environmental problems are best tackled by abolishing capitalism, or at least taming it. Therefore, ecologists should not form separate green parties or set up narrow environmental organizations, but work within the larger socialist movement and address the real issue: the economic system. On the other hand, socialism has also been seen as another ‘pro-production’ political creed: it can be seen to espouse exploiting the wealth of the planet, albeit for the good of humanity, rather than just the capitalist class. Nevertheless, although socialist parties continue to base their electoral appeal primarily on the promise of economic growth, and are therefore reluctant to subordinate the green to the red, few of them now fail to treat ecological issues as a mainstream concern. Eco-anarchism Perhaps the ideology that has the best claim to being environmentally sensitive is anarchism. Some months before the publication of Rachel Carson’s The Silent Spring , Murray Bookchin brought out Our Synthetic Environment ([1962] 1975). Many in the green movement also acknowledge a debt to nineteenth-century anarcho-communists, particularly Peter Kropotkin. Bookchin (1977) suggested that there is a clear correspondence between the ideas of anarchism and the principles of ecology, articulated in the idea of social ecology, based on the belief that ecological balance is the surest foundation for social stability. Anarchists believe in a stateless society, in which harmony develops out of mutual respect and social solidarity among human beings. The richness of such a society is founded on its variety and diversity. Green thinkers also believe that balance or harmony develops spontaneously within nature, in the form of ecosystems, and that these, like anarchist communities, require no external authority or control. The anarchist rejection of government within human society thus parallels the green thinkers’ warnings about human ‘rule’ within the natural world. Bookchin therefore likened an anarchist community to an ecosystem, and suggested that both are distinguished by respect for the principles of diversity, balance and harmony.
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