It may be a hunch, but I think we should co-opt the environmental movement

[CynicalIdealist]

Just watched The Corporation, and it provided me with this hunch:

Bad working conditions are not the only things that alienate the working class against capitalism. If people were to come to the concrete realization that capitalism has polluted our waters, destroyed our ecosystems, and threatens the very fabric of our planet and our species, I think we can present socialism and revolution as both a viable and a necessary alternative to the current system.

My suggestion is that we join local environmental movement chapters and try to get this dialogue going. I think we're capable of turning reformists into revolutionaries, thereby contributing to greater and more populous efforts at third world solidarity, class struggle, etc. Imagine what Greenpeace activists would do if they came to understand the corporate presence in the third world? I'm sure that many environmentalists are a). able to listen to reason and b). at the point of thinking that their current efforts to lobby scummy corporate America are a joke.

I'm a pretty big socialist/communist newbie, to be honest, but nonetheless I hope I've made a decent effort at theorizing socialism for the 21st century. This effort is obviously much easier said than done, but I think it's an effort worth making. Thoughts?

[Ned Kelly]

It is very much worth reaching out to these kind of movements, I've managed to turn a few of my greenie friends into fully fledged communists, but it wasn't easy...

[FreeFocus]

It's not a matter of "co-opting" the environmental movement (which implies some type of undermining), but rather fleshing out the theory and practice of socialist sustainability and stewardship that addresses the root cause of the current environmental crisis, capitalist abuse and exploitation of the environment.

[Technocrat]

You will probably be interested in this paper, which discusses sustainability and how it relates to capitalism and socialism:

"Beyond Growth or Beyond Capitalism?"
http://www.paecon.net/PAEReview/issue53/Smith53.pdf

[TC]

Socialists and anarchists have been trying to co-opt the environmental movement for decades - its not a new idea. The fact is that people attracted to to environmentalism tend to have different priorities and correctly realize that they can act as more effective pressure groups in the current political climate if they restrict their goals to environmentalism. Of course you can pick up some individuals from environmental movements and groups but thats true of any progressive movement.

[genstrike]

Heh, I remember going to a campus Green Party event at the university once. After me and a friend spent most of the time harping on ecosocialism and the unsustainability of capitalism, one of the liberals with composters said something which left me reeling at its sheer stupidity:

"You know, I actually believe in that whole 'not left nor right but forward' thing, because sometimes the right has good environmental ideas as well. Like when Margaret Thatcher shut down the coal mines."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Svwm_k9hYk

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

I try to give away at least fifteen copies of Introduction to The Apocalypse (http://translationcollective.wordpress.com/2010/11/03/introduction-to-the-apocalypse/) at every environmental-movement event in Halifax that I hear about.

I'm actually starting to make pretty good friends with some hippies - I went to a dubstep show a few nights ago.

[Kaze no Kae]

My impression is that environmentalism is already pretty interwoven with other left activism, at least in Britain. And I agree with other people that the last thing we want to do is 'co-opt' social movements. Participate in them, yes. Do your best to win other participants to socialist politics (when they're not already conscious socialists), yes.

[ed miliband]

My impression is that environmentalism is already pretty interwoven with other left activism, at least in Britain. And I agree with other people that the last thing we want to do is 'co-opt' social movements. Participate in them, yes. Do your best to win other participants to socialist politics (when they're not already conscious socialists), yes.


Yeah, but with no class basis. It's all very well for environmentalists to make statements against capitalism, but ultimately it seems that they desire not socialism as we see it, but capitalism reformed and made friendlier, with strict environmental regulations in place. Even those that are viruently anti-capitalist don't seem to be socialist, at least from my experience, rather they're against capitalism for being anthropocentric and wish to see humanity being governed by nature, as such.

The environment needs to become a class issue rather than simply a 'capitalist' issue. One of the primary problems with this is that the green movement as it is is almost entirely compromised of well-to-do (and often well-meaning) liberals, for whom class is at best unimportant, at worst highly controversial -- you can acknowledge that there are very rich people and very poor people, and that this 'isn't fair', but anything more is, at least from my experience (once again) treated as either personally insulting or outdated.

[bailey_187]

We have different goals though. We aim for a world of abundance and harnessing nature for human needs. They want a world of decreased consumption and "peace" with nature.

We shouldnt want anything to do with these reactionaries.

[Fabrizio]

We have different goals though. We aim for a world of abundance and harnessing nature for human needs. They want a world of decreased consumption and "peace" with nature.

We shouldnt want anything to do with these reactionaries.

All environmentalists want that? Really?

[FreeFocus]

We have different goals though. We aim for a world of abundance and harnessing nature for human needs. They want a world of decreased consumption and "peace" with nature.

We shouldnt want anything to do with these reactionaries.

The difference is that your definition of "harnessing" (and the people on here that agree with you) is very close to my definition of "abuse," going to any length necessary to get anything out of the Earth that we don't necessarily need, only want. I want "peace" with nature and a sense of good stewardship among any post-capitalist society. If our psychology doesn't change with the move from capitalism to communism, not much changes at all. You could see this world replicated and recreated in the future.

Humanity's problems right now aren't due to underconsumption. It's due to a problem of distribution. There's MORE than enough food to go around for everyone, but capitalism/imperialism makes sure this doesn't happen. There could easily be enough shelter with better planning. Everyone can have clothes to wear. Everyone can have clean drinking water (maybe not anymore considering the environmental crisis with regards to water pollution and decrease in supplies). Hell, everyone can and should have books, computers, accessories and facilities to keep them fit, etc. We already have an abundance of a lot of this stuff. The problem? It's sitting on store shelves because capitalism prevents people from affording them.

[Technocrat]

The difference is that your definition of "harnessing" (and the people on here that agree with you) is very close to my definition of "abuse," going to any length necessary to get anything out of the Earth that we don't necessarily need, only want. I want "peace" with nature and a sense of good stewardship among any post-capitalist society. If our psychology doesn't change with the move from capitalism to communism, not much changes at all. You could see this world replicated and recreated in the future.

Humanity's problems right now aren't due to underconsumption. It's due to a problem of distribution. There's MORE than enough food to go around for everyone, but capitalism/imperialism makes sure this doesn't happen. There could easily be enough shelter with better planning. Everyone can have clothes to wear. Everyone can have clean drinking water (maybe not anymore considering the environmental crisis with regards to water pollution and decrease in supplies). Hell, everyone can and should have books, computers, accessories and facilities to keep them fit, etc. We already have an abundance of a lot of this stuff. The problem? It's sitting on store shelves because capitalism prevents people from affording them.

Actually, our food system is unsustainable and we can probably only sustainably support 1-2 billion people with a comfortable standard of living, with "comfortable standard of living" defined as enough food, clean water, shelter, etc. for everyone. The population of the planet was 2 billion maximum prior to the "Green Revolution" (agricultural), and it was around 1 billion prior to the Industrial Revolution.

America consumes 25% of the world's resources and has 5% of the world's population. If the rest of the world were to adopt the American standard of living, we would need 5 planet earths just to maintain the current rate of resource depletion, which is itself unsustainable since we are drawing on stocks of natural capital faster than they can be replenished.

Every major resource is being depleted at a rate faster than it is replenished by natural systems. Water, soil, energy, rare earth - you name it. Despite this, population growth continues to explode in the developing countries. Death rides on a pale horse towards 2050...

I think the only solution is an end to the capitalist system and the endless growth (i.e. ever-increasing consumption of resources) which is inherent to it.

Rather than having growth as the goal of society, we should be asking "how much do we need to consume to be happy?" If we measure happiness as "physical and mental health," we at least have a starting point for determining what should be produced and what shouldn't, based on the cost to human health of producing something and the contribution to health by consuming it. This logic of "needs and limits" must be actively applied by experts in their respective fields, working for the common good. This has to be achieved through government control over the producers, and this entails an end to the free-market system (aka capitalism).

The only way to humanely reduce population is with a heavy tax on families that exceed the mandated limit on births. Increasing access to birth control and improving standards of living is also essential. If we don't actively plan to reduce our population our numbers will be reduced anyway through famine and war.

I suggest the work of David Pimentel and Bill Rees on "ecological footprint" for those unfamiliar with the topic.

[FreeFocus]

Actually, our food system is unsustainable and we can probably only sustainably support 1-2 billion people with a comfortable standard of living, with "comfortable standard of living" defined as enough food, clean water, shelter, etc. for everyone.

America consumes 25% of the world's resources and has 5% of the world's population. If the rest of the world were to adopt the American standard of living, we would need 5 planet earths just to maintain the current rate of resource depletion, which is itself unsustainable since we are drawing on stocks of natural capital faster than they can be replenished.

Every major resource is being depleted at a rate faster than it is replenished by natural systems. Water, soil, energy, rare earth - you name it. Despite this, population growth continues to explode in the developing countries. Death rides on a pale horse towards 2050...

I think the only solution is an end to the capitalist system and the endless growth (i.e. ever-increasing consumption of resources) which is inherent to it.

Rather than having growth as the goal of society, we should be asking "how much do we need to consume to be happy?" If we measure happiness as "physical and mental health," we at least have a starting point for determining what should be produced and what shouldn't, based on the cost to human health of producing something and the contribution to health by consuming it.

Can you provide stats for the claim? I know that markets make the food supply unstable, but rational use of what is currently available would eliminate hunger. For example, animals in captivity and used for factory farming take up substantial water and vegetation resources. Pound-for-pound, wheat requires much less water than meat, and land used for factory farming could be used for actual farming to feed greater numbers of people.

Moreover, all of the food just sitting on supermarket shelves around the world? What about that? I will be the first to say that America overconsumes (the acquisition of more resources is enabled by imperialism), although so much food is wasted in the US it's ridiculous. I don't want people to "adopt the American standard of living," I want a fair standard of living, where people are guaranteed 2,000-3,000 calories a day to stay healthy, where people have enough water to drink to stay healthy, etc.

And I agree. We need rational use of what's available, not infinite growth (that's what capitalism is all about, why should we seek to replicate that).

[Technocrat]

Can you provide stats for the claim? I know that markets make the food supply unstable, but rational use of what is currently available would eliminate hunger. For example, animals in captivity and used for factory farming take up substantial water and vegetation resources. Pound-for-pound, wheat requires much less water than meat, and land used for factory farming could be used for actual farming to feed greater numbers of people.

For the claim "America has 5% of the world's population and consumes 25% of its [energy] resources":

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_policy_of_the_United_States#Energy_independ ence

For the claim "we can probably only sustainably support 2 billion people":

http://dieoff.org/page99.htm
http://www.populationpress.org/essays/essay-pimentel.html
http://www.iere.org/ILEA/leaf/richard2002.html

There is more but the last link contains a table with various estimates - 2 billion is about the average discounting outliers.

Also, footprint analysis shows that the % of energy consumed matches up pretty well with the total % of resources (non-energy) that are consumed. So, if America consumes around 25% of the world's energy, it also consumes around 25% of the available resources, total.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecological_footprint


Moreover, all of the food just sitting on supermarket shelves around the world? What about that? I will be the first to say that America overconsumes (the acquisition of more resources is enabled by imperialism), although so much food is wasted in the US it's ridiculous. I don't want people to "adopt the American standard of living," I want a fair standard of living, where people are guaranteed 2,000-3,000 calories a day to stay healthy, where people have enough water to drink to stay healthy, etc. I agree that we don't need to increase everyone's consumption to the current American level - that would be completely unnecessary if the goal is to provide everyone with enough of what they need to be happy and prosperous. To clarify, we can only support around 1-2 billion people at a comfortable standard of living. "Comfortable standard of living" is defined as enough food, water, shelter, medicine, etc for everyone. It's worth noting that many of the higher estimates are based around food as the limiting factor and do not consider energy, which is ridiculous since food production is utterly dependent on energy, as this essay explains:

http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/100303_eating_oil.html