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Books > Earth & environment > The environment > Environmentalist thought & ideology
no adequate handbook on ecosocialism of this kind exists reflects the diversity of ideas that can be combined under ecosocialism a resource that is as comprehensive as possible with respect not only to theorisation or ideological framework, but also to existing projects, practices, and movements
This pathfinding collection shows how the health of the planet is inextricably linked to the psychological health of humanity, individually and collectively. As such, it is sure to become a definitive work for the burgeoning ecopsychology movement, which is both a new beginning for environmentalism and a revolution in modern psychology. Collected here are writings from the premier psychotherapists, thinkers, and eco-activists working in the field, including: James Hillman, world-renowned Jungian analyst, relating the "one core issue for all psychology" - the nature and limits of human identity - to the condition of the planet Chellis Glendinning, author of My Name Is Chellis and I'm in Recovery from Western Civilization, alerting us to "the link between the psychological process of addiction and the technological system" Carl Anthony, former president of Earth Island Institute, arguing for a "genuinely multicultural self and a global civil society without racism" Ralph Metzner, president of the Green Earth Foundation and author of Maps of Consciousness, decrying our loss of "respect for the mysterious, and humility in relationship to the infinite complexities of the natural world" Joanna Macy, writer, therapist, and Buddhist, noting that "we all need to unblock our feelings about our threatened planet" if we are to work through out "environmental despair"
Music and the Environment in Dystopian Narrative: Sounding the Disaster investigates the active role of music in film and fiction portraying climate crisis. From contemporary science fiction and environmental film to "Anthropocene opera," the most arresting eco-narratives draw less on background music than on the power of sound to move fictional action and those who receive it. Beginning with a reflection on a Mozart recording on the 1970s' Voyager Golden Record, this book explores links between music and violence in Lidia Yuknavitch's 2017 novel The Book of Joan, songless speech in the opera Persephone in the Late Anthropocene, interrupted lyricism in the eco-documentary Expedition to the End of the World, and dread-inducing hurricane music in the Brecht-Weill opera Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny. In all of these works, music allows for a state of critical vulnerability in its hearers, communicating planetary crisis in an embodied way.
This volume explores questions which emerge from considering the relationship between nature and ethics through philosophical, theological, ethical and environmental lenses. It will examine the nature (understood as essence or character) of ethics itself and whether nature (understood as natural world) has embedded in it a moral code, as well as examining how particular ethical/theological worldviews influence our treatment of nature. Is there an abstract, objective moral code in nature? If so, how do we gain access to this code of ethics? Is it only accessible through revelation, as in some religious traditions, or is this code of ethics more generally accessible to humanity? Indeed, does such an objective notion of ethics exist; could it be that ethics are a natural and subjective development? Is ethics a feature of nature, or have we invented it? There is, this volume might suggest, no consensus on these questions, as they at times divide and at times unite both the contributors to this volume and the bodies of scholarly work with which they engage. As time moves forward, investigations into ethics in the context of the relationship between humanity and nature have become more complex, taking account of advances in the natural sciences and a growing appreciation of nature. How are we to understand our relationship with nature, and how does this have implications for our understandings of ethics? Are we now realising the repercussions of our failure to take seriously our experience of climate change? This volume offers the reader a unique and underrepresented interdisciplinary perspective, from philosophers, theologians and environmentalists on the dynamic relationship between nature and ethics. It offers breadth in terms of the range of theoretical, cultural, philosophical and theological frameworks, but balances this with chapters providing an in-depth treatment of particular lenses, e.g. the work of Hegel, or the work of Gordon Kauffman. Through philosophical and theological investigation, these collected essays deepen and problematize the scientific and pragmatic discourses on nature, offering scholars solid resources to engage with some of the most pressing issues of our time in light of ongoing debates at many levels on dealing with climate change.
It is already clear that climate engineering raises numerous troubling ethical issues. The pertinent question yet to be addressed is how the ethical issues raised by climate engineering compare to those raised by alternative proposals for tackling climate change. This volume is the first to put the ethical issues raised by climate engineering into a comprehensive, comparative context so that the key ethical challenges of these technologies can be better measured against those of alternative climate policies . Addressing the topic specifically through the lens of justice, contributors include both advocates of climate intervention research and its sceptics. The volume includes a helpful blend of the theoretical and the practical, with contributions from authors in philosophy, engineering, public policy, social science, geography, sustainable development studies, economics, and climate studies. This cross-disciplinary collection provides the start of an important and more contextualized "second generation" analysis of climate engineering and the difficult public policy decisions that lie ahead.
Environmental Ethics and Sustainability: A Casebook for Environmental Professionals introduces a decision-making model constructed from the viewpoint that ethics are not about the way things are, but about the way things should be. The first part of the book covers natural human instincts, human attitude, treatment of other species and the natural world, and fundamental concepts in environmental decision making in the public policy arena. It also provides insight and specifics on how to develop an ethics culture in an organization as well as conduct an environmental ethics education program that trains leaders, professionals, and students. The second part of the book identifies and deals with numerous dilemmas in a case-study format, offers options, tests ethical values, and offers practice to the environmental professionals in making the right choice and evaluating the justification for those decisions. The authors of this book explore the notion that doing the right thing is not a natural human instinct, and that the techniques needed for resolving an ethical dilemma require training. The book defines ethics as "the difference between what a person has the right to do and the right thing to do!" It details a framework for understanding and resolving various ethical claims and concentrates on providing hands-on practical training for environmental practitioners and students aspiring to become environmental leaders and professionals.
Understanding how rhetoric, and environmental rhetoric in particular, informs and is informed by local and global ecologies contributes to our conversations about sustainability and resilience - the preservation and conservation of the earth and the future of human society. This book explores some of the complex relationships, collaborations, compromises, and contradictions between human endeavor and situated discourses, identities and landscapes, social justice and natural resources, movement and geographies, unpacking and grappling with the complexities of rhetoric of presence. Making a significant contribution to exploring the complex discursive constructions of environmental rhetorics and place-based rhetorics, this collection considers discourses, actions, and adaptations concerning environmental regulations and development, sustainability, exploitation, and conservation of energy resources. Essays visit arguments on cultural values, social justice, environmental advocacy, and identity as political constructions of rhetorical place and space. Rural and urban case studies contribute to discussions of the ethics and identities of environment, and the rhetorics of environmental cartography and glocalization. Contributors represent a range of specialization across a variety of scholarly research in such fields as communication studies, rhetorical theory, social/cultural geography, technical/professional communication, cartography, anthropology, linguistics, comparative literature/ecocriticism, literacy studies, digital rhetoric/media studies, and discourse analysis. Thus, this book goes beyond the assumption that rhetorics are situated, and challenges us to consider not only how and why they are situated, but what we mean when we theorize notions of situated, place-based rhetorics.
The environment has long been the undisputed territory of the political Left, which has seen the principal threats to the earth as issuing from international capitalism, consumerism and the over-exploitation of natural resources. In Green Philosophy, Scruton argues that conservatism is far better suited to tackle environmental problems than either liberalism or socialism. He shows that rather than entrusting the environment to unwieldy NGOs and international committees, we must assume personal responsibility and foster local sovereignty. People must be empowered to take charge of their environment, to care for it as a home, and to affirm themselves through the kind of local associations that have been the traditional goal of conservative politics. Our common future is by no means assured, but as Roger Scruton clearly demonstrates in this important book, there is a path that we can take which could ensure the future safety of our planet and our species.
It has always been thought that some level of pollution and waste is unavoidable in development projects. But no one has made much effort to quantify and assess the extent of this sort of damage. In this book a group of analysts from the Asian Development Bank and from the East West Center propose a means of constructing useful economic evaluations of the impacts of development projects on the environments in which they are constructed. This study demands the systematic evaluation of all the intentional and unintentional consequences of development initiatives before they are determined upon. It is essential reading for development economists, analysts and bankers. Originally published in 1986
It is already clear that climate engineering raises numerous troubling ethical issues. The pertinent question yet to be addressed is how the ethical issues raised by climate engineering compare to those raised by alternative proposals for tackling climate change. This volume is the first to put the ethical issues raised by climate engineering into a comprehensive, comparative context so that the key ethical challenges of these technologies can be better measured against those of alternative climate policies . Addressing the topic specifically through the lens of justice, contributors include both advocates of climate intervention research and its sceptics. The volume includes a helpful blend of the theoretical and the practical, with contributions from authors in philosophy, engineering, public policy, social science, geography, sustainable development studies, economics, and climate studies. This cross-disciplinary collection provides the start of an important and more contextualized "second generation" analysis of climate engineering and the difficult public policy decisions that lie ahead.
Never before have people been so aware of the importance of sound environmental law, as every week stories of controversial planning developments and prosecutions for the release of toxic substances feature in the news. Environmental Law and Citizen Action sets out and explains the ways that ordinary citizens can use the law to ensure the environment is protected. There are a number of existing UK laws which require local authorities to control pollution and protect the environments and many more which can be used to tackle environmental offenders, yet often local government officers themselves are unaware of the full scope of their powers. Writing in a clear, accessible style, Alan Murdie explains how to get access to the relevant information, participate in public enquiries, use the courts to challenge public and government bodies and prosecute polluters. This book maps a path through the intricate legal maze to show what rights every citizen has, and how those rights can be enforced. Alan Murdie is a barrister with long-standing interest and involvement in local government issues, and a lecturer at Thames Valley University. He is co-author of To Pay or Not To Pay, a best-selling analysis of the poll tax debate, and has contributed to a wide range of legal and government periodicals. Originally published in 1993
There is a broad consensus that climate change presents the international community with a formidable challenge. Yet progress on all fronts--prevention, mitigation, and adaptation--has been slow. Ved P. Nanda finds an explanation for this disparity in the sharp divide between the developed and developing countries. Developing countries demand that major industrialized nations provide the necessary resources and technology to address climate change, while many developed countries seek firm commitments and timetables on action from the developing countries. The result is a stalemate. "Climate Change and Environmental Ethics" contains first-rate research and thinking from scholars from multiple disciplines--ethics, ecology, philosophy, economics, political science, history, and international law. What distinguishes this volume from recent work on climate change are two of its special features. One is the multi-disciplinary backgrounds of the scholars, their stellar experiences, and the wisdom with which they express not simply their philosophy and theory but also their suggestions for concrete, specific action in practical terms. The second is the special niche this volume fills in its overarching theme of the need for a renewed environmental ethic that can bring together these disparate but interconnected views. This volume explores alternative ways of conceiving our relation to the natural world. A spirit of international cooperation and collaboration is needed to meet the challenge. The reader is compelled to think anew about our understanding of the scientific and technical issues, as well as our values and ethical responsibilities regarding climate change.
"This inspiring, well illustrated survey, provided with a useful index...opens up, for the first time, for the non-German reader possibilities for fascinating international perspectives." . Vierteljahrschrift fur Sozial- und Wirtschaftsgeschichte Published in Association with the German Historical Institute, Washington, D.C. Germany is a key test case for the burgeoning field of environmental history; in no other country has the landscape been so thoroughly politicized throughout its past as in Germany, and in no other country have ideas of 'nature' figured so centrally in notions of national identity. The essays collected in this volume - the first collection on the subject in either English or German - place discussions of nature and the human relationship with nature in their political co texts. Taken together, they trace the gradual shift from a confident belief in humanity 's ability to tame and manipulate the natural realm to the "Umweltbewusstsein" driving the contemporary conservation movement. "Nature in German History" also documents efforts to reshape the natural realm in keeping with ideological beliefs - such as the Romantic exultation of 'the wild' and the Nazis' attempts to eliminate 'foreign' flora and fauna - as well as the ways in which political issues have repeatedly been transformed into discussions of the environment in Germany. Christof Mauch is presently Director of the Rachel Carson Center in Munich, Germany and since 2007 Professor of American Cultural History and Transatlantic Relations at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitat Munchen. From 1999 to 2007, he was the director of the German Historical Institute in Washington D.C
Presenting a novel and needed theoretical model for interpreting shipwrecks and other drowned fragments-the histories they tell, and the futures they presage-as junctures of artefact and ecofact, human remains and emergent ecologies, this book puts the environmental humanities, and particularly multispecies studies, in close conversation with literary studies, history, and aesthetic theory. Earth's oceans hold the remains of as many as three million shipwrecks, some thousands of years old. Instead of approaching shipwrecks as either artefacts or "ecofacts," this book presents a third frame for understanding, one inspired by the material dynamism of sea-floor stuff. As they become encrusted by oceanic matter-some of it living, some inanimate-anthropic fragments participate in a distinctively submarine form of material relation. That relation comprises a wide, and sometimes incalculable, array of things, lives, times, and stories. Drawing from several centuries of literary, philosophical, and scientific encounters with encrustations-as well as from some of the innumerable encrusted "art-forms" that inhabit the sea floor- this book serves anyone in search of better ways to perceive, describe, and imagine submarine matters.
Humanity is dependent on Nature to survive, yet our society largely acts as if this is not the case. The energy that powers our very cells, the nutrients that make up our bodies, the ecosystem services that clean our water and air; these are all provided by the Nature from which we have evolved and of which we are a part. This book examines why we deny or ignore this dependence and what we can do differently to help solve the environmental crisis. Written in an accessible and engaging style, Haydn Washington provides an excellent overview of humanity's relationship with Nature. The book looks at energy flow, nutrient cycling, ecosystem services, ecosystem collapse as well as exploring our psychological and spiritual dependency on nature. It also examines anthropocentrism and denial as causes of our unwillingness to respect our inherent dependence on the natural environment. The book concludes by bringing these issues together and providing a framework for solutions to the environmental crisis.
Ecocinema Theory and Practice is the first collection of its kind-an anthology that offers a comprehensive introduction to the rapidly growing field of eco-film criticism, a branch of critical scholarship that investigates cinema's intersections with environmental understandings. It references seminal readings through cutting edge research and is designed as an introduction to the field as well as a sourcebook. It defines ecocinema studies, sketches its development over the past twenty years, provides theoretical frameworks for moving forward, and presents eloquent examples of the practice of eco-film criticism through essays written by the field's leading and emerging scholars. From explicitly environmental films such as Werner Herzong's Grizzly Man and Roland Emmerich's The Day After Tomorrow to less obvious examples like Errol Morris's Fast, Cheap & Out of Control and Christopher Nolan's Inception, the pieces in this collection comprehensively interrogate the breadth of ecocinema. Ecocinema Theory and Practice also directs readers to further study through lists of recommended readings, professional organizations, and relevant periodicals.
Ecocinema Theory and Practice is the first collection of its kind-an anthology that offers a comprehensive introduction to the rapidly growing field of eco-film criticism, a branch of critical scholarship that investigates cinema's intersections with environmental understandings. It references seminal readings through cutting edge research and is designed as an introduction to the field as well as a sourcebook. It defines ecocinema studies, sketches its development over the past twenty years, provides theoretical frameworks for moving forward, and presents eloquent examples of the practice of eco-film criticism through essays written by the field's leading and emerging scholars. From explicitly environmental films such as Werner Herzong's Grizzly Man and Roland Emmerich's The Day After Tomorrow to less obvious examples like Errol Morris's Fast, Cheap & Out of Control and Christopher Nolan's Inception, the pieces in this collection comprehensively interrogate the breadth of ecocinema. Ecocinema Theory and Practice also directs readers to further study through lists of recommended readings, professional organizations, and relevant periodicals.
A sense of urgency pervades global environmentalism, and the degrowth movement is bursting into the mainstream. As climate catastrophe looms closer, people are eager to learn what degrowth is about, and whether we can save the planet by changing how we live. This book is an introduction to the movement. As politicians and corporations obsess over growth objectives, the degrowth movement demands that we must slow down the economy by transforming our economies, our politics and our cultures to live within the Earth's limits. This book navigates the practice and strategies of the movement, looking at its strengths and weaknesses. Covering horizontal democracy, local economies and the reduction of work, it shows us why degrowth is a compelling and realistic project.
Environment: Why Read the Classics? presents six important essays by some of the world's leading environmental thinkers on six of the most emblematic books ever written on the environment. The books - Walden; A Sand County Almanac; Small is Beautiful; Silent Spring; The Limits to Growth; and Our Common Future - taken together have been hugely important in the development of global environmental awareness, activism and policy. The essayists - Viriato Soromenho-Marques, J. Baird Callicott, Jose Lima Santos, Tim O'Riordan, Satish Kumar and Marina Silva - invite readers to reflect on these ground-breaking works and examine their historical importance, as well as what they should mean to us today and what relevance they will have to future generations. More than just books about the environment, these are also philosophical treatises, in that they increase our understanding of the natural world and of ourselves, calling us "to weigh and consider", as Bacon put it. In particular, they make us reflect on the need to constantly redefine the purposes of progress, the economy and society. How we relate to nature is a crucial aspect in the plans we make as a species, and as individuals; and every one of these books inspires a more respectful relationship, both with nature and humanity, and consequently with ourselves. The six essays in this book are the result of a series of conferences organised in Lisbon by the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation with the support of the American Embassy in Portugal. Its *raison d'etre* was to revisit the ideas that have shaped the environmental movement, seeking inspiration to deal with what looks like a very challenging future. The significance of such timeless concepts is now more apparent than ever; and these evergreen books are full of ideas that retain their spark even in our difficult times. This is what makes them classics. Environment: Why Read the Classics? is a provocative book and will be essential reading for all those concerned about the state of the world.
This book examines the roots of contemporary environmental consciousness and action in terms of both popular experience and tradition. A wide range of geographical and thematic case-studies explore the myth, tradition and collective memory that shape our environmental thought. Containing a wealth of empirical source material, this book will be invaluable for sociologists and historians alike.
The emergence of modern sciences in the seventeenth century profoundly renewed our understanding of Nature. For the last three centuries new ideas of Nature have been continuously developed by theology, politics, economics, and science, especially the sciences of the material world. The situation is even more unstable today, now that we have entered an ecological mutation of unprecedented scale. Some call it the Anthropocene, but it is best described as a new climatic regime. And a new regime it certainly is, since the many unexpected connections between human activity and the natural world oblige every one of us to reopen the earlier notions of Nature and redistribute what had been packed inside. So the question now arises: what will replace the old ways of looking at Nature? This book explores a potential candidate proposed by James Lovelock when he chose the name "Gaia" for the fragile, complex system through which living phenomena modify the Earth. The fact that he was immediately misunderstood proves simply that his readers have tried to fit this new notion into an older frame, transforming Gaia into a single organism, a kind of giant thermostat, some sort of New Age goddess, or even divine Providence. In this series of lectures on "natural religion" Bruno Latour argues that the complex and ambiguous figure of Gaia offers, on the contrary, an ideal way to disentangle the ethical, political, theological, and scientific aspects of the now obsolete notion of Nature. He lays the groundwork for a future collaboration among scientists, theologians, activists, and artists as they, and we, begin to adjust to the new climatic regime.
Darrell A. Posey, who died in 2001, was internationally known for his support of indigenous peoples and their natural habitats, and particularly for his pioneering work with the Kayapo people of Brazil. He was an organiser of the First International Congress of Ethnobiology which resulted in the Declaration of Belem: the first instance of an international scientific organisation recognizing an obligation to compensate native peoples for use of their knowledge and biological resources. In 1993, Posey received the United Nations Global 500 Award for Outstanding Achievement in Service to the Environment. Indigenous Knowledge and Ethics presents seventeen of his articles on the topics of environment, indigenous knowledge and intellectual property rights. Demonstrating his belief in the validity of indigenous knowledge systems, and his insistence that indigenous rights must be recognised and protected, it is an ideal introduction to his thought and work.
In today's world - despite the dramatic anthropogenic environmental changes - a proper understanding of the relationship between humanity and nature requires a certain detachment. The pressing problems in their whole extent will only be fully understood and solved with comprehensive and patient analysis. Accordingly, this book develops new perspectives on fundamental questions of biology, ecology, and the economy, integrated within a framework of a terminology specially devised by the authors. By illuminating the epistemological backgrounds of ecological-economic research, the authors lay foundations for interdisciplinary environmental research and offer guidelines for practical action. In close contact to the findings of present-day biology and economics, they demonstrate the fruitfulness as well as the shortcomings of modern science for the understanding of the proper place of humankind in nature.. Frequently, current problems in the fields of economics, ecology, politics, philosophy and biology are discussed in a kind of "dialogue" with thinkers and poets like Bacon, Quesnay, Kant, Goethe and Novalis. On the other hand, the book offers traits of the Anglo-Saxon tradition of thought: a precise, analytical approach to theory and a pragmatic approach to action. Both approaches are used by the authors complementarily. Thus the authors lay the foundations for an ecological economical and political practice which is able to tackle concrete environmental problems on an encompassing and long-term basis. This translated volume will be of great use and interest to students of ecology, economics and in particular environmental education, sustainable development and environmental ethics.
Ecoambiguity, Community, and Development takes stock of cultural and environmental contexts in many different regions of the world by exploring literature and film. Artists and scholars working in the social ecology, environmental justice, and postcolonial arenas have long recognized that as soon as we tug on a thread of "ecodegradation," we generally find it linked to some form of cultural oppression. The reverse is also often true. In the spirit of postcolonial ecocriticism, the studies collected by Scott Slovic, R. Swarnalatha, and Vidya Sarveswaran emphasize the impossibility of disentangling environmental and cultural problems. While not all the authors explicitly invoke Karen Thornber's term "ecoambiguity" or the concepts and terminology of postcolonial ecocriticism, their articles frequently bring to light various ironies. For example, the fact that Ukrainian environmental experience in the twenty-first century is defined by one of the world's most infamous industrial disasters, the Chernobyl nuclear accident of 1986, yet Ukrainian culture, like many throughout the world, actually cherishes a profound, even animistic, attachment to the wonders of nature. The repetition of this and other paradoxes in human cultural responses to the more-than-human world reinforces our sense of the congruities and idiosyncrasies of human culture. Every human culture, regardless of its condition of economic and industrial development, has produced its own version of "environmental literature and art"-but the nuances of this work reflect that culture's precise social and geophysical circumstances. In various ways, these stories of community and development from across the planet converge and diverge, as told and explained by distinguished scholars, many of whom come from the cultures represented in these articles.
Building on its origins at a seminar in Oslo organized by two of the editors, this book combines classic texts of Nordic ecophilosophy and the original contributions of those influenced by this tradition to present the view that critical realism is indeed a worthy intellectual tradition to carry forward and further develop the work of the founders of Nordic ecophilosophy. It was clear at the seminar that there was a promising convergence of interests and themes in the two approaches; while at the same time, within the Nordic ecophilosophical tradition, there was appreciation of the capacity of critical realism, with its provision of a robust philosophical ontology and generation of totalizing immanent critiques of Western philosophy, to provide an expansive and secure home for the development of ecophilosophical work generally. If there is a single overarching theme of critical realist philosophy, it surely must be that of the unity of theory and practice, which Bhaskar, following Hegel, has also called "seriousness." This makes the applicability, relevance and actionability of critical realism key considerations for critical realists. There can be no doubt that this concern was shared fully by the Nordic ecophilosophers; and this quality of "seriousness" is a striking feature of the Nordic contributions presented in this book. |
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