The Necessity of Dialectical Naturalism: Marcuse,Bookchin, and Dialectics in the Midst of Ecological Crises

In the wake of ecological crises, there has been a resurgence of interest in the relation between dialectical thought and nature. The work of Herbert Marcuse and Murray Bookchin offers unique approaches to this question that remain highly relevant. In the first half of the article, we engage with Marcuse's application of the dialectical method in which he gestured to the “vital need” to push beyond the appearance of “the real” and yet lamented the loss of the ability for negative thinking to pierce the dominance of the “technical apparatus” that tied humanity to this “radical falsity”. Here, we suggest the need for a more holistic dialectical understanding of the social totality—one that is directly located within, and takes as foundational, the environmental conditions of human society. In the second half, we examine Murray Bookchin's conception of “dialectical naturalism” as a more thorough engagement with the human/nature relation that surpasses Marcuse's late engagements with ecologism. In particular, we offer critical reflections on the concept of “nature” in the contemporary ecology movement and illustrate how dialectical naturalism is capable of not only transcending dualistic conceptions of “man/nature” but in expanding our awareness of the potentialities of history along what Bookchin terms the “libertory pathways” to a restorative relation between human “second nature” and biological “first nature”. We posit that systemic, interconnected and accelerating ecological crises (climatic, biospheric and oceanic) form the objective and absolute contradiction of contemporary global social life that compels an awareness of the potentialities of an ecological society. Only through this awareness can we break through the reified “solutions” that have often plagued the ecology movement, bringing about the urgent social and ecological transformation that our species requires for its liberation and long‐term survival.     

Foreign direct investment and renewal of industries: framing the reciprocity between materiality and discourse

ABSTRACT

Informed by the evolutionary literature on economic geography, this paper develops a conceptual framework for analysing the complexity between foreign direct investment (FDI) and renewal of industries. Present contributions tend to explain the impact of FDI on regional industry evolution as a static, output-oriented phenomenon, that is, informed by an instrumental rationale in which the dynamism of FDI and regional industry development is linked to polarization of stagnation/decline vs. growth/development. Opposing this, we argue for an epistemological shift in approach to the reciprocity between FDI and renewal of industries as dynamism between material outcomes and discursive processes. To accomplish this, we build on key concepts and understandings from evolutionary economic geography; review the regional effects of FDI literature and build a framework sensitive to contextual dimensions of FDI. We focus on multinational companies’ practices and material outcomes in terms of regional spillovers and the discursive processes in terms of FDI narratives. This framework is exemplified by data from the salmon farming industry and the subsea industry in Hordaland and the oil and gas industry and the mining industry in Finnmark.     

The tragedy of the commodity and the farce of AquAdvantage Salmon

The US Food and Drug Administration is expected to approve AquAdvantage Salmon as the first genetically modified animal for human consumption. The genetic modifications allow the proprietary fish to grow at a rate twice as fast as a wild salmon, leading to greater ‘efficiency’ in terms of reduced costs and reduced time to market. This article provides an analysis of the ways in which AquAdvantage Salmon exemplifies capitalist market forces controlling and guiding the terms of salmon recovery and conservation. The authors trace historical developments within the salmon industry to demonstrate how capitalist commodity production has impacted fishing communities. They reject the oft-cited ‘tragedy of the commons’ hypothesis offered to explain fisheries crises. In its place, they offer the conceptual framework of the ‘tragedy of the commodity’ to explore how capitalist market forces and complicit state regulations amplify rather than resolve global environmental problems.     

Rethinking Justice: Struggles For Environmental Commons and the Notion of Socio‐Ecological Justice

This article introduces a notion of socio‐ecological justice based on theoretically informed empirical research on community struggles against run‐of‐river hydropower plants in Turkey. Framing this particular case as representative of a broader movement for environmental commons, and adopting an action‐theoretical perspective, it translates the emergent justice claims produced by grassroots environmental movements to the conceptual vocabulary of the theory of justice. Using Fraser's tripartite model as a starting point, it explores possibilities of expanding the borders of justice as a concept. Maintaining the intrinsic relationship between social and ecological phenomena, it calls for rethinking “sociality” and “social justice” in the light of a relational ontology of human and non‐human worlds. The notion of socio‐ecological justice, thus, extends the community of justice, framing the relational existence of human and non‐human ecologies as a matter of justice.     

Another Dating Revolution for Prehistoric Archaeology?

Transitions to the Howiesons Poort Industry and other early modern human cultural phases have conventionally been explained as direct or indirect responses to major climatic and ecological fluctuations. Advances in optically stimulated luminescence dating have now provided the time resolution necessary to refute these explanations. However, for improvements in dating methods to have a revolutionary impact on the archaeology of early modern human evolution, the correction of these flawed narratives can only be regarded as a first step. What is more important is that the discipline now embraces the opportunity to analyse cultural entities in terms of their internal temporal structure, and hence to realign praxis with contemporary evolutionary theory.     

Geographical Variation of Subsistence Strategies in Early Mediaeval Populations of Southwestern Germany

The investigation is based on bone element data of early Mediaeval human skeletal samples from eight differing environmental conditions in lowland and mountain range localities of southern Germany. Reconstruction of plausible subsistence strategies revealed close correlations with the respective ecological potentials of the localities as indicated by proxy data on geomorphology, climate, and soil quality. In general, lowland situations showed mixed dietary patterns with a prevalence of agricultural farming, whereas in mountainous areas the emphasis was on dairy farming production and horticulture. This points to subsistence activities during the early Middle Ages that are closely adjusted to differing environmental conditions. An obvious deviation from this pattern in one locality (Kirchheim unter Teck) is explained in terms of successful socio-cultural buffering of limited but effective exploitation of the natural setting.     

ADDITIVE-RATIO MEASURES OF INTERACTMTY IN INPUT-OUTPUT SYSTEMS

ABSTRACT. A general axiomatic framework is developed for analyzing alternative measures of interactivity between the sectors of a given activity system (such as the industrial sectors of an economy). Within this overall framework, we analyze an ordinal class of additive-ratio measures which has been applied to a wide variety of systems, including both economic and ecological systems of activities. Our main result is to show that such measures can be characterized by four interactivity axioms. In addition, a wide variety of alternative measures are compared to additive-ratio measures in terms of this axiom system.     

On the current absence and future improbability of political Catholicism in Italy

Clerical ‘non-negotiable values’ were actively promoted by right-wing governments in the 2000s, the Monti government that replaced them was strongly supported by the Vatican and the Italian bishops, and the current left-wing government is led by a former member of the Catholic popolari who attends Mass every Sunday. But this article argues that, rather than a new golden age of political Catholicism, the return of Catholicism to Italian politics has taken a ‘low intensity’ form which lacks the robust combination of ideas, leaders, organizations, and interests that informed earlier, genuinely political forms of Catholic engagement. The article demonstrates this by focusing on the ‘Todi movement’, which played a crucial role in the Monti government, and on Matteo Renzi’s current leadership of the Partito democratico and the national government. It also proposes a theoretical framework to explain the apparent contradiction between the high visibility and the low political relevance of Catholicism in Italian politics.     

An Introduction to IAD and the Language of the Ostrom Workshop: A Simple Guide to a Complex Framework

This guide provides definitions or brief explanations of all the major terms and concepts used in the Institutional Analysis and Development (IAD) framework. Also included are terms from the closely related frameworks on local public economies, public service industries, grammar of institutions, and social‐ecological systems (SES).     

论生态文化与生态文明

文章分析了生态文化和生态文明产生的背景,指出技术文明经历的物理过程、化学过程、生命过程成就和所带来的环境危机。论述了生态文化和生态文明的内涵和区别。生态文明是人类最普遍、最重要的进步。指出个性原则具有永恒的价值,克服现代西方文化冲击下的文化多样性危机是人类文化发展的迫切任务。论述了生态文化与生态文明研究的方法论,认为文明过程的环境影响、地域生态文化资源的保护与开发、生态文明建设,是生态文化与生态文明研究的主要课题。     

A Data Science Framework for Movement

Movement is the driving force behind the form and function of many ecological and human systems. Identification and analysis of movement patterns that may relate to the behavior of individuals and their interactions is a fundamental first step in understanding these systems. With advances in IoT and the ubiquity of smart connected sensors to collect movement and contextual data, we now have access to a wealth of geo‐enriched high‐resolution tracking data. These data promise new forms of knowledge and insight into movement of humans, animals, and goods, and hence can increase our understanding of complex spatiotemporal processes such as disease outbreak, urban mobility, migration, and human‐species interaction. To take advantage of the evolution in our data, we need a revolution in how we visualize, model, and analyze movement as a multidimensional process that involves space, time, and context. This paper introduces a data science paradigm with the aim of advancing research on movement.     

A political economy approach to the allocation of health care resources: the case of remote areas of Queensland

This article describes and accounts for the existing distribution of medical services in remote areas. In contrast to traditional geographical approaches which have sought to explain problems associated with service provision in remote areas in terms of high costs of overcoming vast distances and low population thresholds, it is argued that such geographical and economic factors alone are an insufficient basis for explanation. Rather, it is necessary to view this issue in the broader context of existing ideology that underpins the procedures relating to the allocation of society's scarce resources, and the role of political and bureaucratic processes that are responsible for health care inequities. The adoption of apolitical economy framework recognises the problem of resource allocation as essentially a political matter requiring an analysis of power relations.     

One for the master and one for the dame: stable isotope investigations of Iron Age animal husbandry in the Danebury Environs

Stevens et al. (Oxford J Archaeol 29: 407–428, 2010) speculated that the extensive faunal intra-population isotopic variability at Danebury hillfort was due to the animals being husbanded within various ecological isozones (i.e. microenvironments with distinct natural or anthropogenic isotopic baselines) within the Danebury Environs, and subsequently brought to the hillfort. We test this hypothesis through isotopic analysis of 357 animals from five sites in the Danebury Environs (Suddern Farm, Nettlebank Copse, Houghton Down, New Buildings, Bury Hill). Our results demonstrate that the hypothesis is incorrect as the Environs animals also exhibited extensive intra-site isotopic variability. The observed patterns require considerable human management of herds and flocks, either through animal droving over long distances, or movement restriction through personal attendance or penning/corralling within a landscape containing a mosaic of isozones. Large-scale importation of animals to the Danebury sites from distant regions that have different isotopic baseline values is possible. However, the practical requirements of this model (i.e. long distance trade networks maintained in terms of frequency, proportion and source of animals over 500 years) make this improbable. Rather, we propose a model that includes distinct ecological isozones within the Danebury Environs landscape, with some animals from each of the sites consuming foodstuff from different isozones for most of their lives. This likely involves control of the landscape on a communal probably kinship basis, with individuals having access to certain parts of the landscape at certain times. The landscape could be seen as being made up of numerous interlocking activity-territories, defined in both space and time, remembered and inherited. Irrespective of which model proves to be the most accurate, these results paint a picture of complex land management during the Iron Age.     

Historical geography and the society/nature “problematic”: the perspective of J. F. Schouw,G. P. Marsh and E. Reclus

The “retreat” of the recent past within geography to a conception of the discipline as an ahistoric science which is either spatial or ecological is seen to be an atavism—a throwback to a disciplinary framework or “problematic” which dichotomizes human society and nature into fixed exclusive categories. This essay explores an alternative “problematic” which integrates society's spatial and ecological dimensions in a study of the historical process of “dialectical” interaction between society and its geographic environment, and the political and economic consequences of this interaction. The significance of this alternative approach is elucidated through an examination of its emergence, at the time of the origins of modern geography in the early nineteenth century. Its developing importance for the present-day position of the discipline is exemplified in the work of three prominent, socially engaged, nineteenth-century geographers. Although these geographers have tended to be either ignored or misunderstood in the recent literature, their approach has much to offer the field at a time when its division into ahistoric spatial and ecological disciplines is being questioned.     

Rethinking Easter Island's ecological catastrophe

Rapa Nui (Easter Island) has become a paragon for prehistoric human induced ecological catastrophe and cultural collapse. A popular narrative recounts an obsession for monumental statuary that led to the island's ecological devastation and the collapse of the ancient civilization. Scholars offer this story as a parable of today's global environmental problems. In this paper, I review new and emerging Rapa Nui evidence, compare ecological and recently acquired palaeo-environmental data from the Hawaiian and other Pacific Islands, and offer some perspectives for the island's prehistoric ecological transformation and its consequences. The evidence points to a complex historical ecology for the island; one best explained by a synergy of impacts, particularly the devastating effects of introduced rats (Rattus exulans). This perspective questions the simplistic notion of reckless over-exploitation by prehistoric Polynesians and points to the need for additional research.     

Chipko Legacies: Sustaining an Ecological Ethic in the Context of Agrarian Change

Abstract

During the 1970s, the Chipko movement mobilised popular opposition to commercial forestry in the Indian Himalaya. Today, the legacy of this movement remains contentious. For some, it was a successful environmental movement, which led to the protection of natural resources. For others, it has stalled development in the region, preventing the creation of much-needed employment opportunities. This article engages with this contentious legacy and evaluates the ongoing relevance of Chipko in the region. It does this by presenting a case study of a Chipko-inspired seed conservation movement, the Beej Bachao Andolan (Save the Seeds Movement, BBA), which has attempted to sustain Gandhian and ecological values in the region by promoting ecologically sensitive, bottom-up village development. While BBA has been effective in mobilising people against threats to subsistence agriculture, local people remain ambivalent about aspects of its core message, which are not seen to offer solutions to growing local challenges, such as climate change and out-migration. The successes and failures of BBA point to the complex and contradictory position of farmers in the Indian Himalaya and the extent to which Gandhian and ecological values remain relevant to them in the context of agrarian change.     

Investigating shellfish deposition and landscape history at the Natia Beach site,Fiji

The relationship between environmental variation and subsistence practices is a central point of discussion in much Oceanic archaeology. While human predation can significantly reduce prey populations, environmental variation also contributes to reductions in prey abundance, possibly leading to increased human competition and resource scarcity. At the Natia Beach site, Nacula Island, Fiji, geoarchaeological evidence suggests that coastal progradation began soon after initial occupation of the coastal plain. Additionally, at approximately 650 BP a marked increase in clay and silt deposition occurred. Changes in coastal geomorphology may be explained by landscape response to regional Mid-Holocene sea level fall combined with human induced soil erosion due to upland settlement. Smaller scale environmental changes associated with climate variability may have also played a role. Additionally, landscape change appears to have had a measurable impact on local nearshore mollusks that are sensitive to high levels of water turbidity. Minor evidence of human exploitation is observable in this shellfish assemblage, although changes in predation pressure may have allowed shellfish populations to recover. Increased ceramic diversity and fortified settlements also appear at approximately 650 BP on Nacula and other parts of Fiji. The suite of changes at Natia may be explained by processes of regional and local environmental changes, and human adaptation in terms of subsistence, spatial organization, and competition.     

In pursuit of independence: the political economy of Catalonia's secessionist movement

This article examines the fiscal dimensions of recent support for Catalan secession. Since the region is a cultural community distinct from the rest of Spain, much research has spotlighted national identity features in the calculus of Catalan political aspirations. This study supplements this work by contextualising support for Catalan independence in terms of the state's fiscal arrangements with the use of public opinion survey data. Even after controlling for self‐reported cultural identity and other relevant factors, it argues that support for independence is a function of grievances rooted in the desire for Catalonia to assume responsibility for taxation and spending policy. Meanwhile, it validates some observations about Catalonia's separatist movement, while bringing others into question, and offers support for the theoretical framework linking political economy to secessionism. The results suggest that Spain might be able to stave off Catalonia's separatist bid through some form of political and taxation policy reconfiguration, with the caveats that cultural identity factors and the existence of other separatist movements across the country complicate this strategy.     

法国早期象征派诗歌的生命意识

19世纪的法国象征派运动,给浪漫主义以来的欧洲诗坛带来一股清新的诗风。对于象征派诗歌的把握,有一个核心的精神,那就是寻求同万物生命的对话。从波德莱尔的“感应”,到兰波的“通灵”,再到马拉美的“无限”,法国象征派诗歌建立一种完全不同于人类中心论的全新的生命意识,对后世的后期象征主义文学甚至是生态文学都产生了深远的影响。     

A Deleuzian critique of resource-use management politics in Industria

In an era of increasingly well‐attended and violent protests around the world against globalisation, this commentary seeks to answer the crucial question: The globalisation of what? The answer proposed is that what is globalising is ‘Industria’, a multiplicitous, global system of power/knowledge, a vast ‘machinic assemblage’ recently accreted from diverse, competing world systems. After describing some of the most serious challenges facing human communities and the rest of the biosphere, the commentary enlists the aid of the philosopher Gilles Deleuze and his colleague Félix Guattari to expose the cognitive errors underlying political and environmental problems. Applying Deleuze's philosophy of difference to geopolitics and resource‐use management, it is shown that representational epistemologies and a negative ontology of identity obscure the myriad interconnections among human and non‐human beings, leading to conflict and ecological degradation. From there, the ‘Industria’ hypothesis is presented as a conceptual response to Deleuze and Guattari's critique of the ‘Urstaat’ and as a framework for scholars grappling with the need to achieve socioeconomic and ecological sustainability. Finally, the commentary briefly explores the potential of a differential, bioregional geopolitics as a civilised alternative to the predations of Industria.