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Chapter Five: Social Ecology CHAPTER FIVE: SOCIAL ECOLOGY 1. Introduction 134 2. Legitimating narratives 135 2.1 Philosophy and political philosophy 135 2.1.1 The western dialectical tradition 135 2.1.2 Marxism, and the neo Marxist Frankfurt School 135 2.1.3 The New Left, counter-cultural and eco-utopian ideas 136 2.1.4 Bookchin’s eco-anarchism 137 2.1.4.1 The left-libertarian tradition: Anarchism 137 2.1.4.2 Radical ecology 138 2.1.4.2.1 Radical ecology, not mystical ecology, or environmentalism 139 2.1.5 The need for a “left green perspective” 140 2.2 Key thesis on environmental crisis 140 2.3 The rhetoric 140 2.3.1 Preconditions for, and conditions of, freedom 140 3. Epistemology 141 3.1 Affirmation of Enlightenment ideal of reason 141 3.2 The critique of instrumental rationalism 141 3.3 Dialectical reasoning 142 3.4 Dialectical naturalism as epistemology 143 4. Ontology 144 4.1 “First nature” 144 4.1.1 Nature as a developmental graded continuum 144 4.1.2 Cosmos as organism with immanent mind 145 4.1.3 Cosmos as organism, displaying nisus 145 4.1.3.1 The emergence of subjectivity [self-identity] 145 4.1.3.2 Self-transformation and self-development 146 4.1.3.3 Increasing self-determination as “potentiality for freedom” 146 4.1.3.4 “Rational” and “irrational” development 146 4.2 “Second nature” 147 4.2.1 Relation of “second” to “first nature” 147 4.2.1.1. Human beings, and their societies, are as “natural” as nature 147 4.2.1.2 But human beings have a unique place in evolution 148 4.2.2 Second nature gone wrong 148 4.2.2.1 Social egalitarianism in early second nature 148 4.2.2.2 The evolution of social hierarchy 148 4.2.2.3 The idea of dominating nature 150 4.2.2.4 Integrating second nature with first nature 151 4.3 “Free” nature 152 4.3.1 View of the rational free, human being 153 131 5. The ethic 154 5.1 The theory of motivation to ethical behaviour 155 5.2 The theory of value 155 5.2.1 The special status of diversity as value 156 5.2.1.1 Diversity and stability 156 5.2.1.2. Diversity and freedom 156 5.2.1.3 Diversity and social progress 156 5.3 The scope 157 5.4 The moral obligation: an ethic of complementarity 157 5.4.1 Clarification of acceptable human intervention into first nature 158 5.4.2 Is the ethic of complementarity, anthropocentric? 158 5.4.2.1 Dualistic? 159 5.4.2.2 Transcendent? 159 5.4.2.3 Steering the direction of evolution? 159 5.4.2.4 Not the more familiar kind of anthropocentrism 160 5.4.2.5 But a rather interfering kind of stewardship, nonetheless 160 5.4.3 The animal welfare issue 161 6. View of society 161 6.1 The critique of existing society 162 6.1.1 Power 162 6.1.1.1 and the nation-state 162 6.1.2 Capitalism as economy and culture 163 6.2 Scarcity, technology, and post-scarcity 164 6.3 The ecological rational [free] society 166 6.3.1 Decentralization as human scale, communitarian, eco-communities 166 6.3.1.1 Understanding the “flight to the suburbs” 166 6.3.1.2 “Real” communities 167 6.3.1.3 Human scale: industry and agriculture as examples 167 6.3.1.4 The eco-community 167 6.3.1.5 Direct democracy 168 6.3.1.6 New dimensions in self-development 168 6.3.2 Decentralization as comprehensive local self-management 168 6.3.2.1 The community’s “neighbourhood assembly” 169 6.3.2.1.1. Citizenship 169 6.3.2.2 The municipalization of the economy 170 6.3.2.3 Confederalism 170 6.3.2.4 The transition from statism to libertarian municipalism 170 7. Praxis 171 7.1 Political restructuring, not personal change 171 7.2 Avoid statist political practices 172 7.3 Create neighbourhood assemblies 172 8. Critique 172 8.1 The deep ecology/social ecology debate 172 132 8.2 The idea of hierarchy and domination is insufficient to explain “ecocide” 173 8.3 Insufficient attention to language 174 9. Summary 175 133 1. Introduction “The way human beings deal with each other as social beings is crucial to addressing the ecological crisis” (Murray Bookchin, social ecologist, 1993, in Zimmerman et al., 1993, p. 354) Social ecology is amongst the earliest of the three radical eco-philosophies, formulated over five decades1 from the 1950s onwards, by its founder, and most influential proponent (Clark, 1993, p. 345, in Zimmerman et al., 1993; Gruen, 1997, p. 357; Wall, 1994, p. 251), American left libertarian socialist and political philosopher Murray Bookchin (Biehl, 1997a). His critique of chemicals in agriculture appeared in 1952 under the pseudonym Lewis Herber (Bookchin, 1990d, p. 258, footnote 17), and his environmental critique Our Synthetic Environment (1962) briefly predated Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring critique of the USA chemical industry, usually taken as the beginning of the “ecological revolution”. In 19712, he co-founded the Institute for Social Ecology (http://www.social-ecology.org) in Vermont, USA. Apart from being a philosopher of nature, Bookchin is also steeped in the communitarian anarchist and utopian traditions (Clark, 1993, p. 351). His philosophical writings are by no means easily understandable3. Bookchin (1991, in VanDeVeer& Pierce, 1994, pp. 236-237, his italics) has provided a helpful synopsis of the social ecology position [which included a jibe at deep ecologists generally as well]: Social ecology is neither “deep”, “tall”, “fat” nor “thick”. It is social. It does not fall back on incantations, sutras, flow diagrams or spiritual vagaries. It is avowedly rational. It does not try to regale metaphorical forms of spiritual mechanism and crude biologism with Taoist, Buddhist, Christian, or shamanistic eco- babble. It is a coherent form of naturalism that looks to evolution and the biosphere, not to deities in the sky or under the earth for quasi-religious and supernaturalistic explanations of natural and social phenomena. Philosophically, social ecology stems from a solid organismic tradition in Western philosophy, beginning with Heraclitus, the near-evolutionary dialectic of Aristotle and Hegel, and the critical approach of the famous Frankfurt School… Socially, it is revolutionary, not merely ‘radical’. It critically unmasks the entire evolution of hierarchy in all its forms, … It is rooted in the profound eco-anarchistic analyses of Peter Kropotkin, the radical economic insights of Karl Marx, the emancipatory promise of the revolutionary Enlightenment ... ,… revolutionary feminist ideals ... , ... communitarian visions4 ... , and the various eco-revolutionary manifestoes of the early 1960s5. Politically, it is green – radically green. It takes its stand with the left-wing tendencies in the German Greens and extra-parliamentary street movements of European cities; with the American radical ecofeminist movement.... Morally, it is humanistic in the high Renaissance meaning of the term…Humanism from its inception has 1 The volume of Bookchin’s writing is considerable. “A thorough understanding of ... [Bookchin’s] project would require a reading of his most important books” writes Biehl (1997a, p. 11). These she lists as inter alia, Post-Scarcity Anarchism (1971), The Ecology of Freedom (1982), Remaking Society (1989), The Philosophy of Social Ecology (especially the revised 1995 edition), and Re-enchanting Humanity (1995). Major excerpts from many of these are available in the Biehl (1997) reader on Bookchin. Some of Bookchin’s writings are also available in the Institute of Social Ecology’s online library at http://www.social-ecology.org 2 According to Tokar (2006), it was 1974 3 As he says himself “The ontological complexities that my assertions involve require a careful ... reading of my work ...” (Bookchin, 1990d, p. 269). In discussing an ontological approach to ethics, Bookchin noted that: “If understanding this is too much to ask of people, then I simply do not know what to say. Admittedly, I ask for a great deal but I do not ask for what is impossible or unachievable”. (Bookchin, 1992, in Fotopoulos, 1992). My struggle to understand Bookchin is not solely due to lack of philosophical training. Simon (1990) also has to resort to phrases such as “I take this to mean...” (p. 222), and “This passage has proven to be very difficult to interpret...” (p. 223). Bookchin accuses those finding him difficult to understand, of not doing “the difficult intellectual work needed to understand his formulations” (Simon, 1990, p. 223) 4 In this citation Bookchin mentions Paul Goodman and E.A. Gutkind . In his 1991 debate with deep ecologist Dave Foreman, Bookchin adds Lewis Mumford (Bookchin, in Chase, 1991, in VanDeVeer & Pierce, 1994, p. 245) 5 One of these was his own Ecology and revolutionary thought, 1964, under the pseudonym Lewis Herber, republished in his Post-scarcity anarchism (1974, pp. 55-82) 134 meant a shift in vision from the skies to the earth, from superstition to reason, from deities to people…Social ecology accepts neither a ‘biocentricity’ that essentially denies or degrades the uniqueness of human beings, human subjectivity, rationality, aesthetic sensibility, and the ethical potentiality of humanity, nor an ‘anthropocentricity’ that confers on the privileged few the right to plunder the world of life, including human life..... The discussion which follows, adheres to the standard form set out in Chapter Two. Section 2 is an introduction to Bookchin’s political philosophical background as legitimating narrative; 3, his epistemology; 4, ontology; 5, ethic; 6, view of society; and 7, praxis advocated. Section 8 contains critique from green sample partners, and 9, a summary of social ecology’s ideas as presented in this chapter.
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