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Wild Democracy: a Biodiversity of Resistance and Renewal www.ecologicalcitizen.net LONG ARTICLE Wild democracy: A biodiversity of resistance and renewal Might the theory and practice of liberal representative democracy need to be rethought Samuel in and for the ‘Anthropocene’? What resources are available when trying to orientate oneself in radical political space today? In this paper, the authors draw on varieties of Alexander and anarchism and Marxism to develop a new, ecocentric political sensibility and practice, Peter Burdon which they call ‘wild democracy’. Calling for a ‘biodiversity of resistance and renewal’, this signifies an eco-egalitarian politics that privileges grassroots participation over About the authors parliamentary representation, with the aim of transcending capitalism and initiating Samuel is a lecturer a degrowth process of planned economic contraction. Focusing attention beyond the with the Office for Environmental Programs, ballot box, this analysis attempts to rethink the meaning of political participation in University of Melbourne, an age of ecological crisis and deepen the understanding of what it means to be an Melbourne, VIC, Australia. ecological citizen today. He is also Co-Director of the Simplicity Institute. he great American philosopher John apathy at our own peril. It is government of Peter is Associate Professor Dewey once wrote: “Every generation the people, certainly, but not government at the Adelaide Law School has to accomplish democracy over by the people and increasingly not for the and Deputy Chair of the T International Union for the again for itself” (Dewey, 1981–90: 299). His people. Accordingly, with a deferential Conservation of Nature’s point was that at each moment in history nod to Dewey, below we offer an outline Ethics Specialist Group. citizens and nations inevitably face unique of a new political orientation, sensibility challenges and problems, so we should not and practice – a position we call ‘wild Citation assume the democratic institutions and democracy’. In a global tide that seems to be Alexander S and Burdon P practices inherited from the past will be drifting enthusiastically towards ecocide (2017) Wild democracy: A adequate for the conditions of today. Our and fascism, wild democracy signifies a biodiversity of resistance and ongoing political challenge, therefore, is radical and participatory eco-egalitarian renewal. The Ecological Citizen 1: 45–54. to ‘accomplish’ democracy anew, every politics that seeks to take root beyond the generation. tired parliamentary distinctions of left Keywords It seems we have forgotten Dewey’s and right. This is an attempt to rethink Anarchism; eco-anarchism; the meaning of political participation in lesson. Too often we assume instead that eco-socialism; Marxism; democracy is something that has been an age of ecological crisis and deepen the societal change achieved already, once and for all. Why do understanding of what it means to be an we need to reinvent it? Indeed, in the wake ecological citizen. of every election, it is easy to be seduced During the course of this preliminary back to the comfortable unfreedom of statement, we intend to show how wild the shopping mall or withdraw into the democracy can be enriched by drawing existential numbness of social media or on the resources of both anarchism and television, believing that, having voted, our political work is done. The task of Wild democracy in a nutshell. governing is now in the hands of our so-called ‘representatives’. That’s what Opposed to the conventional ‘top-down’ politics and economics of growth, political participation means in a market wild democracy recognizes that we are living in an age of gross ecological overshoot and seeks to establish an ecocentric, decentralized democratic capitalist society, doesn’t it? culture by privileging ‘grass-roots’ participation over parliamentary This is, of course, an impoverished, representation with the aim of transcending capitalism and initiating a even dangerous, conception of democracy, degrowth process of planned economic contraction. which we propagate by way of casual The Ecological Citizen Vol 1 No 1 2017 45 Wild democracy: A biodiversity of resistance and renewal www.ecologicalcitizen.net Marxism. For us, this involves living in So what are our options? What resources the utopian spirit of creative resistance and do we have to draw on when trying to renewal – prefiguring alternative, post- orientate ourselves in radical political capitalist modes of existence – even if space today? at first they are always and necessarily partial, compromised, temporary and Marxism small-scale. Whether engaging in acts of Marxism represents the most prominent resistance or renewal, we argue that the alternative to the capitalist mode of Today it is widely “ wild imagination is the most potent force economy and representative democracy, so assumed that it at the disposal of post-capitalist social it’s an obvious place to begin considering would be ‘illiberal’ to movements. The path beyond is, as yet, what a radical politics might mean, and a govern in such a way unimagined. This is the democracy “to useful point of departure for understanding come” (Derrida, 2010: 73–83). the politics of wild democracy. that would curtail What are we to make of Marx’s works ecocide.” Resources for wild democracy today? First, his critique of capitalism In recent years, the term ‘Anthropocene’ remains as relevant as ever, even if it has entered the vocabulary of scientists needs updating for the 21st century (Hardt and philosophers, and is slowly filtering and Negri, 2000). Marx fiercely objected into public discourse more broadly. In a to the concentrations of wealth and power sentence, this notion reflects the idea that produced within capitalist economies and human activity is now so fundamentally argued that this was not a conditional degrading the ecosystems of Earth that but an inherent feature of them. Recent this constitutes nothing less than a new evidence seems to support this (Piketty, geological era – the first geological era 2014). Indeed, today the richest eight ‘caused’ by humans. Like reckless gods, people now own more than the poorest we are transforming the face of the half of humanity (Hardoon, 2017). No fancy planet, a licence apparently granted to theorizing by liberal ‘free marketeers’ can humanity (or parts of humanity) under possibly justify this indigestible disparity the name of ‘freedom’, by the philosophy of wealth. It demands a political response, of political liberalism. Today it is widely driven by the citizenry. assumed that it would be ‘illiberal’ to Furthermore, a strong (though not govern in such a way that would curtail absolutist) case can be made that the ecocide. Such governance would interfere ‘superstructure’ of democracy and culture illegitimately with our so-called freedoms under capitalism is insidiously shaped – our apparent human right to commit by the ‘economic base’ of privatized, ecocide. “Freedom for whom?” we might corporate interests, in ways that entrench fairly ask. the underlying policy aim of profit- Is it not reasonable to believe that we maximization in undemocratic ways. For might need to rethink politics, especially these reasons, among others, we contend liberal democratic politics, in and for that Marx was right to reject capitalism the Anthropocene (Purdy, 2015)? This as unjust and undemocratic, and the is especially so, we argue, to the extent position of wild democracy expounded and that the nations making the heaviest defended in later sections rests, in part, and most unsustainable demands on the upon this Marxian critique of capitalism. planet are the hyper-consuming capitalist What of Marx’s theory of social change? economies of the democratic West. From While Marx is sometimes interpreted as a this perspective, the ecological reality can staunch materialist who was fixated on the become a political imperative, leading to laws of history, another reading is available collective environmental decision-making which is more helpful for the current project. where for now there is only collective As David Harvey (2005: 1) notes, Marx was vulnerability to ecological change as a deeply influenced by Saint-Simon and his consequence of collective inertia. suggestion that “[n]o social order could 46 The Ecological Citizen Vol 1 No 1 2017 www.ecologicalcitizen.net Wild democracy: A biodiversity of resistance and renewal achieve changes that are not already latent evolution from the perspective of one of the within its existing conditions.” Put another moments or examine interactions among way, a society cannot make a radical break them; for example, we might consider how from its past and every significant social our relationship with the rest of nature change must first build the conditions for changes in light of new technology. its emergence in the present society. This This brief description highlights was true in the transition from feudalism something of crucial importance to the to capitalism and Marx recognized realization of projects seeking to reinvent “In practice, that it would be necessary for whatever democracy for present conditions. Often major social came next. social theorists focus on one or two ideas transformations are Marx offers his most complete and position them as determinants of elaboration of this idea in Capital – A all others. For example, it is common for far more complex Critique of Political Economy: Volume 1.1 In environmental philosophers to ground and produce all Chapter 15, Marx provides an example
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