University of Tennessee, Knoxville TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange Doctoral Dissertations Graduate School 8-2013 Sociobiophysicality, Cold War, and Critical Theory: Human- Ecological Transformation and Contemporary Ecological Subjectivity Alexander Stoner University of Tennessee - Knoxville, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://trace.tennessee.edu/utk_graddiss Part of the Earth Sciences Commons, Environmental Sciences Commons, Other Sociology Commons, Social Psychology and Interaction Commons, and the Theory, Knowledge and Science Commons Recommended Citation Stoner, Alexander, "Sociobiophysicality, Cold War, and Critical Theory: Human-Ecological Transformation and Contemporary Ecological Subjectivity. " PhD diss., University of Tennessee, 2013. https://trace.tennessee.edu/utk_graddiss/2488 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange. It has been accepted for inclusion in Doctoral Dissertations by an authorized administrator of TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange. For more information, please contact [email protected]. To the Graduate Council: I am submitting herewith a dissertation written by Alexander Stoner entitled "Sociobiophysicality, Cold War, and Critical Theory: Human-Ecological Transformation and Contemporary Ecological Subjectivity." I have examined the final electronic copy of this dissertation for form and content and recommend that it be accepted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, with a major in Sociology. Harry F. Dahms, Major Professor We have read this dissertation and recommend its acceptance: Damayanti Banerjee, Steven P. Dandaneau, Allen Dunn, R. Scott Frey, Paul Gellert Accepted for the Council: Carolyn R. Hodges Vice Provost and Dean of the Graduate School (Original signatures are on file with official studentecor r ds.) Sociobiophysicality, Cold War, and Critical Theory: Human-Ecological Transformation and Contemporary Ecological Subjectivity A Dissertation Presented for the Doctor of Philosophy Degree The University of Tennessee, Knoxville Alexander Stoner August 2013 Copyright © 2013 by Alexander Stoner All rights reserved ii DEDICATION This dissertation is dedicated to my supervisor, Harry F. Dahms, who taught me sociology as a vocation. iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This dissertation has benefited from ongoing dialogue with friends, family, students, and colleagues. First and foremost, I would like to thank my wife, Katrina. This dissertation would not have been possible without her love and support. I would also like to express my gratitude to Dr. Harry F. Dahms, who, in addition to providing invaluable mentorship, has been a source of open-minded assistance and encouragement. Additionally, I would like to thank my dissertation committee members. Dr. R. Scott Frey played a key role in my intellectual development, introducing me to the rigor of environmental sociology some six years ago. I also thank Dr. Frey for emphasizing some of the connections between my dissertation and recent research on the treadmill of destruction. I would like to thank Dr. Allen Dunn, who pressed me to articulate and specify issues of contextualization and class. I thank Dr. Steven P. Dandaneau for his critical remarks, which were central in the refinement of the dissertation. Dr. Damayanti Banerjee directed my attention to a number of alternative perspectives on the nature- society relationship and provided related insight into future research. Finally, I would like to thank Dr. Paul Gellert whose comments and criticism forced me to reconsider the complexity of science and environmental degradation. Obviously none of these individuals are responsible for any errors in this dissertation, which are the sole responsibility of the author. My framing of the Anthropocene and its relation to modern capitalist society at the beginning of the introduction was developed in collaboration with Andony Melathapolous for a series panel discussions entitled, “Anthropocene and Freedom,” hosted by the Platypus Affiliated Society. Many of the arguments and formulations developed in the dissertation, particularly in the second section of chapter one, have been published elsewhere in the following paper: “Sociobiophysicality and the Necessity of Critical Theory: Moving beyond Prevailing Conceptions of Environmental Sociology in the USA”, Critical Sociology , published online before March 19, 2013 by Sage iv Publications, Ltd, All rights reserved. © SAGE Publications, Ltd, 2013. It is available at: online.sagepub.com/ v ABSTRACT The United States is an important global player in resource depletion, energy use, waste production, and other indicators that contribute to economic threats to humanity’s ecological future. Critical theory provides conceptual tools that are uniquely well-suited to more fully comprehend the links between economic progress and ecological deterioration. In key regards, the present situation is the continuation as well as amplification of political-economic, social and cultural features that took hold during the Cold War, and which demand rigorous sociological focus, scrutiny and analysis. To date, however, sociology has barely begun to assess the consequences that resulted from the Cold War for the condition in which modern societies find themselves in the early twenty-first century, and for their ability to meet both persistent and new challenges. The purpose of this dissertation is to elucidate the present predicament, especially with regard to the link between modern society and natural environment, by introducing the concept of “sociobiophysicality” as a promising tool to address related issues in ways that highlight the importance of sociology today. To do so, however, the specific importance of the tradition of critical theory—especially as represented in the writings of Lukàcs, Adorno, and Postone—for sociology in general, and with regard to the link between human-ecological transformation and contemporary ecological subjectivity in particular—must be reconstructed and made explicit. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION: THE PATTERN OF PROGRESS IN MODERN SOCIETY AND THE PROGRESSIVE DESTRUCTION OF NATURE .......................................1 The Environment-Society Problematic ............................................................................2 Chapter Breakdown ..........................................................................................................4 PART I. HUMAN-ECOLOGICAL TRANSFORMATION: CONCEPTUALIZING “SOCIOBIOPHYSICALITY” CHAPTER 1 : Aspects of Environmental Sociology ..........................................................8 1. “Critical” and Affirmative Approaches ........................................................................9 2. Moving beyong Prevailing Conceptions of Environmental Sociology in the USA ...39 3. The Environment-Society Problematic Reconsidered ...............................................51 CHAPTER 2 : Methodology of Critique ...........................................................................53 1. Methodology within Critical Theory ..........................................................................55 2. Prolegomena to Dialectical Methodology: The Methodological Function of Mediation ..................................................................60 3. Immanent Critique ......................................................................................................72 4. The Necessity of Critical Theory ...............................................................................76 CHAPTER 3: Toward a Critical Theory of the Environment ..........................................77 1. Georg Lukács: Critique of Reification .......................................................................79 2. Theodor W. Adorno: Critique of Identity Thinking ...................................................89 3. Moishe Postone: Critique of Traditional Marxism ..................................................111 4. Critique of (Modernist) Sociobiophysicality ............................................................152 PART II. CONTEMPORARY ECOLOGICAL SUBJECTIVITY: CONTEXTUALIZING SOCIOBIOPHYSICALITY CHAPTER 4: Cold War Origins of Contemporary Ecological Subjectivity .................158 Introduction ..................................................................................................................159 Research Aims ..............................................................................................................159 Chapter Organization ...................................................................................................160 Delimitations ............................................................................................................... 161 Assumptions ................................................................................................................ 163 1. The Post-World War II Configuration .....................................................................163 2. The Cold War Regime of Critique Containment: Cold War Infrastructure and Capitalist Democracy in Social Structure and Subjectivity .........................................181 3. Critique Containment Penetration as Sedimentation: “American Society” after the “Golden Age” ...............................................................................................................202 4. Cold War Origins of Contemporary Ecological