{"id":193256,"date":"2020-02-02T20:53:23","date_gmt":"2020-02-02T20:53:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/spgb\/?page_id=193256"},"modified":"2020-02-02T21:13:32","modified_gmt":"2020-02-02T21:13:32","slug":"ecology-and-socialism","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/spgb\/ecology-and-socialism\/","title":{"rendered":"ECOLOGY AND SOCIALISM"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Available as a PDF<\/a> file<\/p>\n\n\n\n

ECOLOGY AND SOCIALISM
<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\nA\nSocialist View of Environmental Issues<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\tContents<\/strong>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t
\n\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t1. The biosphere \n\t\t\t 3<\/a><\/strong>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t
\n\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t2. Human intervention \n\t\t\t 7<\/a><\/strong>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t
\n\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t3. Nature and Society \n\t\t\t 11<\/a><\/strong>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t
\n\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t4. Capitalism and the\n\t\t\tenvironment 16<\/a><\/strong>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t
\n\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t5. The ecological\n\t\t\timperative 21<\/a><\/strong>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t
\n\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t6. Production for human\n\t\t\tneeds 26<\/a><\/strong>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t
\n\n\t\t\t\n\t\t<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table>\n\n\n\n

\nPREFACE<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u0007\b<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nWhy\necology is important<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nIn recent years the environment\nhas become a major political issue. And rightly so, because a\nserious environmental crisis really does exist. The air we breathe,\nthe water we drink, the food we eat have all been contaminated and\npolluted to a greater or lesser extent. Ecology – the branch of\nbiology that studies the relationships of living organisms to their\nenvironment – is important in this respect, as it can provide an\nexplanation of what exactly has been happening and the extent of the\nproblem.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nEcology teaches that the mineral\nand chemical constituents of natural matter are continually being\nused and transformed by the activities of living organisms; under\nnatural conditions these materials get transformed back into what\nthey originally were, so that the whole process can begin again. \nThis is why ecologists speak of natural cycles and the balance of\nnature. In doing so they are not expressing a personal preference\nbut are describing laws of nature.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nBut these laws have been, and are\nbeing, ignored. Natural materials are being transformed into\nsubstances (including waste) which nature cannot decompose, or such\nsubstances are being created at too fast a pace for nature’s\ndecomposing processes to be able to keep up with them. The result is\nthe current environmental crisis – or, more accurately, the\necological crisis, since what is involved is much more than unsightly\nskylines in cities or ugly factories in rural areas. Substances\nwhich are poisonous or cannot be decomposed are being released into\nnature – for instance lead and the pesticide DDT and also the other\nheavy metals and a host of chemicals. These substances eventually\nfind their way back to us through the air we breathe, the water we\ndrink and the food we eat. Ecology is not just about protecting\nnature – animal rights, saving the whale and other moral issues. It\nis about human beings too – the way we live and the quality of our\nlife.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nSince\necological research has revealed that the present mode of production\nis damaging to nature – and so to humans as part of nature – it is\nunderstandable that those who have an ecological awareness should\nwant to organise to do something about this. Hence the appearance of\norganisations such as Greenpeace and the Friends of the Earth and, on\nthe political field, parties such as Die Gr\u00fcnen in Germany and the\nGreen Party in Britain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nEcology has a very definite\npolitical message: the urgent need for humans to take action to\nchange the way they relate to the rest of nature. We in the\nSocialist Party agree that capitalism has devastating consequences\nfor the environment, which will continue to be damaged unless action\nis taken to protect and repair it. In our view, nature and the\nenvironment are being damaged today because productive activity is\noriented towards the accumulation of profits rather than towards the\ndirect satisfaction of human needs. Not only does the economic\nmechanism of the profit system function in this way but it can\nfunction in no other way. Profits always take priority both over\nmeeting needs and over protecting the environment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nWhere we differ from the various\nGreen parties and movements which share this ecological perspective\nis over what should be done. In this as in other cases, to find an\neffective solution, awareness and indignation must be accompanied by\nan understanding of the cause of the problem. This pamphlet,\nbeginning with an account of the laws of ecology and of the place of\nhumans in nature, argues in more detail the case that the profit\nsystem is the prime cause of the present environmental crisis and\nthat a society based on common ownership and democratic control, with\nproduction solely for use not sale and profit, alone provides the\nframework within which humans can meet their material needs in an\necologically acceptable way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nTHE SOCIALIST PARTY<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nApril 1990<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/a>

\nCHAPTER 1<\/p><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u0007\b<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe\nbiosphere<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe\ninvention of the term ecology is generally attributed to the German\nbiologist Ernst Haeckel who used it in 1866 to describe the study of\nthe relationships of living organisms to each other and to their\nnon-living environment. The idea however was generally around at the\ntime and Darwin himself in The\nOrigin of Species<\/em>\nwhich had appeared seven years previously, had written of a study of\nthe place of organisms in what he called “the economy of nature”\nrevealing “how infinitely complex and close-fitting are the\nmutual relations of all organic beings to each other and to their\nphysical conditions of life”. This was to be a key concept,\nindeed a basic principle, of the branch of biology that came to be\ncalled ecology.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nMUTUAL INTERDEPENDENCE<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe biosphere is that part of the\nplanet where life-forms (plants, animals, bacteria, fungi) exist. It\ncomprises the whole land surface of the globe and the ground\nunderneath (but nowhere to a depth of more than a few metres), lakes,\nrivers, some underground cavities, the oceans and the sea-bed. It\nalso includes, in most definitions, the atmosphere, which is\nessential to life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe atmosphere before life\nappeared on Earth is believed to have been composed mainly of\nhydrogen and its compounds, methane, ammonia and water vapour. As\nthe Earth cooled the water vapour began to condense and the seas,\ncomposed of water and various salts and carbon compounds, were\nformed. Life is essentially a chemical process. The theory is that\nthis process was originally set off (whether once or continuously\nover a period of time is still a matter of speculation) as a result\nof the effect of the rays of the Sun acting on the so-called\n“primeval soup” formed by the original seas, aided perhaps\nby electrical charges from the thunderstorms resulting from the\neffect of the heat of the Sun on the Earth’s atmosphere.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nIn any event, once the chemical\nprocess of growth and reproduction we call life had been set in\nmotion, it never stopped. Over a period of hundreds of millions of\nyears it spread from the seas to colonise the whole land surface of\nthe globe with a great variety of life-forms – bacterial, plant and\nanimal. In the course of doing so, through the oxygen breathed out\nby plants and the nitrogen released by bacteria, it changed the\ncomposition of the atmosphere from hydrogen and its compounds to\npredominantly nitrogen and oxygen. At the same time it created the\nprotective layer of ozone (a form of oxygen) that prevents the more\ndangerous of the Sun’s ultra-violet rays reaching the Earth’s surface\nand destroying life here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nIt is not only the Earth’s\npresent atmosphere that is a direct product of the activity of\nlife-forms. So is the soil and much of the solid rock underneath us.\n Sedimentary rocks, as their name implies, were formed as a result of\nthe bodies of plants and animals accumulating and decomposing at the\nbottom of the oceans and lakes. Many minerals such as the oxides of\niron and aluminium can also be attributed to the existence and\nactivity of life on Earth. So can coal and petrol, formed as they\nwere from decayed vegetable matter in lakes and lagoons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nLife\nwas not just initiated by the action of the Sun’s rays, it is also\nsustained by them. The Sun can be seen as a huge nuclear fusion\nreactor in which atoms of hydrogen are fused into helium, releasing\nenergy in the form of rays of different sorts. Those which sustain\nlife on Earth are the light rays, which are converted by plants,\nthrough the process of photosynthesis, into a form of chemical\nenergy. All other life-forms depend on this as food to live. \nInsects and other animals eat parts of the plant – its leaves, its\nroots, its fruit and seeds – and are in turn eaten by other animals\nwhich in their turn may be eaten by yet other animals. Their\ndroppings and their bodies when they die, as well as those of plants,\nare decomposed by other insects and by bacteria and fungi. These\nbacteria and fungi play a fundamental role in that they release into\nthe soil the various minerals which plants must have to exist and\ngrow. So the circuit is completed; all life-forms ultimately depend\non each other in order to live.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThis mutual interdependence of\nall living things is not just a food chain or a food web. Plants and\nanimals are complementary in another respect. Plants breathe out\noxygen, which is precisely the gas animals must breathe in to stay\nalive. Animals breathe out carbon dioxide, which plants need to\ncarry out the process of photosynthesis. Although carbon dioxide is\nbeing continually released into the atmosphere, and not just by the\nbreathing of animals, in percentage terms it exists there only in\nminimal amounts because most of it is reabsorbed by plants. Since it\nis opaque to heat rays too much carbon dioxide in the atmosphere\nwould lead to the same greenhouse effect being produced on Earth as\nmakes Venus a veritable hell in which life (as it has developed on\nEarth) would be quite impossible. The fact that plants keep carbon\ndioxide in the atmosphere to a minimum is yet another example of how\nlife itself helps sustain the conditions for its continuation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nIn fact so interrelated and\ninterdependent on each other are all life-forms that, from one point\nof view, it could be said that the biosphere itself is a single\nliving organism of which individual life-forms, including human\nbeings, are merely parts. In other words, only the biosphere is\nalive, with the various life-forms that exist within it having the\nsame status that we attribute to the cells in our bodies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nECOLOGICAL SUB-SYSTEMS<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nAlthough the biosphere is one big\necosystem, it is still possible to distinguish various sub-systems\nwithin it on the basis of the different climatic and physical\nconditions that exist in different parts of the world. For the land\narea of the globe, ecologists have distinguished a number of such\n“biomes” as they call them. These range from the tundra of\nthe Arctic through the coniferous and deciduous forests and steppes\nto the savannah and tropical rain forests of the regions near the\nequator.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nTo each of these physical and\nclimatic conditions there corresponds a stable ecosystem which\nevolves to its “climax” through a series of successive\nstages. This stable climax will be the situation where the amount of\nfood produced by the plant life is sufficient, after taking account\nof the plants’ own respiration needs, to meet on a sustainable basis\nthe food energy requirements of all the animal life-forms within the\nsystem. It will be in fact the situation which makes optimum use, in\nterms of sustaining all the life-forms within the system, of the\nSun’s light rays falling on the area.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nUnder present climatic\nconditions, for most of Europe this stable climax, in the absence of\nhuman intervention, would be the deciduous forest which developed\nafter the last Ice Age and which existed in Britain in untouched form\ntill about 4500 years ago. If humans were to withdraw from the\nBritish Isles it is this forest that would tend to develop again\nwithin a few centuries. For other parts of the world, the climax is\nthe tundra, steppe, savannah and coniferous or tropical rain forests\nmentioned above.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nAn ecological climax is defined\nin terms of the existing physical and climatic conditions. It is\nclear that if these latter change, as they have done relatively\nfrequently in the course of the thousands of millions of years life\nhas existed on Earth – through such things as volcanic eruptions and\nearth movements, the lowering and raising of the sea-level, and the\ncoming and going of ice ages – then the previously existing balance\nwill be upset and a new one will tend to develop in accordance with\nthe new physical and climatic conditions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe break-up of the old ecosystem\nwould have plunged the different species and varieties of life-forms\ninto a state of competition. In the case of plants, the competition\nwould be to capture the Sun’s light rays. In the case of animals, it\nwould be to recover the food energy produced by plants. It would\nhave been both the species and the individuals proving to be the best\nadapted to the new conditions (“the fittest”, as Darwin put\nit) who would have survived and flourished. Eventually a new stable\necosystem, with a different “climax”, appropriate to the\nnew geophysical conditions, would have evolved. At such times\nbiological evolution would have tended to speed up as whole species\ncould disappear leaving the ecological niche they occupied to be\nfilled by newcomers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nNatural selction<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nInitiative takes place through\ngenes, and normally when there is reproduction the new organism will\ninherit the features of its parents (or parent in some cases). But,\ndue to the action of normal background radiation coming from the\nEarth’s rocks as well as from space, in some cases a gene is changed,\nso that an organism can come into existence having a feature which\nneither of its parents (or other ancestors) had. In most cases this\nnew feature is neutral or harmful for survival in the environment,\nbut in some rare cases it can be useful. In this event the\ndescendants of the “mutant” concerned, being better adapted\nto the environment, will on average survive better than those of the\nnon-mutants, so that the average features of the life-form in\nquestion will begin to change. In time – and we are talking about\nmillions of years – the change may become so great as to render\ninter-breeding with the original form impossible; in which case a new\nspecies will have evolved, with the old form either becoming extinct\nor finding itself a different ecological niche.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nDarwin’s theory of the evolution\nof species by such “natural selection” can in fact be seen\nas an essentially ecological theory of evolution, in that it makes\nthe development of a new species depend on biological adaptation of\norganisms to their environment as made up by both its physical\nfeatures and its other life-forms. Darwin was able to show, from the\nevidence he collected, that the different species of life-forms, past\nand present, had evolved and disappeared through a process of natural\nselection. But he was not able to explain the exact mechanism of\nthis because, as he openly admitted, “we are profoundly ignorant\nof the causes producing slight and unimportant variations.” He\nwas prepared to accept that at least some acquired characteristics\ncould be inherited from one generation to another, which is now\ngenerally agreed not to be the case.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nIt was not until the 1930’s that\nthe theory of inheritance through genes and chance mutations due to\nbackground radiation was incorporated into the general theory of\nevolution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nEvolution\ntends towards the improvement of the organs of life-forms to fit\ntheir particular ecological environment. One of these organs is the\nbrain, which controls the reaction of the life-form to outside\nstimuli. This too has tended to evolve over time leading to the\nappearance of more and more intelligent animals (in terms of\ncontrolled responses to stimuli coming from the environment) and\nfinally to homo\nsapiens<\/em>:\na big-brained, two-legged primate, capable of speech and abstract\nthought and of making and using tools. This introduced a completely\nnew element into the biosphere – the conscious, deliberate planning\nof their actions by some living organisms. It was to prove to be of\nmonumental importance, indeed to represent a radical new departure\nfor life on Earth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/a>\nCHAPTER 2<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u0007\b<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nHuman\nintervention<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nIt\nhas been known for over a hundred years that earlier types of homo<\/em>\nevolved into homo\nsapiens <\/em>not\njust in response to externally-produced changes in their environment\nbut also in response to changes they themselves made when they\nintervened in nature to meet their needs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nSome existing non-human primates,\nchimpanzees for instance, can and do use sticks as a means of\nobtaining food. So it is easy to imagine how some pre-human primate,\nwhose hands had been freed from having to play any part in its\nlocomotion by the fact that it walked upright on two legs, would be\nin a particularly good position to use tools (sticks and stones) and\nthen, at a later stage, to make them. The concentration and\napplication needed to fashion tools would put a premium on those\nindividuals who had the brain capacity to do this. By the normal\nplay of natural selection this would lead, over a long period of\ntime, to the primates concerned coming to have on average bigger\nbrains.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nIt has been suggested that humans\nare descended from a species of apes which left the tropical forests\nto establish themselves on the plains where some of them became\nmeat-eaters as well as eaters of fruit, plants and insects which they\nhad been until then. The plains of East Africa, where this species\nof hominid apes is assumed to have lived, would have supported huge\nherds of grass-eating animals (such as today’s antelopes and zebras)\nand it is precisely these animals which would have provided the meat.\n But before they can be eaten they must be hunted, collectively, for\ninstance by being driven by some of the hunters towards others armed\nwith sticks and stones. To hunt collectively in this way requires\ncommunication and it is suggested that, once again through the normal\nplay of natural selection, this would lead to the evolution of\nadequate vocal organs and to the development of speech and language. \nSpeech and language, involving as they do memorising and using sounds\nas abstract symbols for objects and situations, requires an even\ngreater use of brain-power than tool-making and so once again would\nhave put a better survival value on bigger brain capacity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nFinally,\nwith language humans acquire the ability to transmit knowledge by\nteaching, so that the new generation can learn from the experience of\nprevious generations without having to go through the experience\nthemselves. This once again requires a large brain capacity. In\nfact, by the time this stage has been reached homo\nsapiens<\/em>\nhas evolved and human evolution ceases to be biological and becomes\nsocial and technological. Having acquired the capacity both to\ntransmit knowledge and to make tools, humans can adapt much more\nrapidly and flexibly to changes in their environment by changing and\ndeveloping these tools than by the infinitely slower process of the\nbiological adaptation of their bodily organs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nIt is through the interaction of\nall these factors – upright stance, free hands, tool using, tool\nmaking, collective hunting, speech, language, learning – that our\nape-like ancestors are most likely to have evolved into human beings.\n But what distinguished this particular process of biological\nevolution from previous ones was that those who were its object also\nplayed an active role in it through the non-biological mechanisms –\ntools and speech – which they developed and employed to help them\nobtain food from the rest of nature. This meant that literally\n“humans made themselves”, that the various species of\nhominid apes contributed by their own productive activities to their\nevolution into homo sapiens.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nPRODUCTIVE ACTIVITY<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThis adaptation of nature rather\nthan adaptation to nature is the main feature distinguishing human\nbehaviour from that of the other animals. Whereas other animals\nsatisfy their needs essentially by taking what nature spontaneously\nsupplies, humans actively intervene to change nature to satisfy their\nneeds. In one sense all life-forms “change” nature simply\nby being alive and breathing and consuming food. This is why the\nwhole biosphere is in a constant state of movement and how it\n“spontaneously” supplies life-forms with their needs. But\nwhat is involved in human activity is not simply taking from nature\nin the process of satisfying life-needs but changing nature to get it\nto provide for those needs. Indeed changing nature to provide for\nneeds is the basic definition of “production”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nOther animals too can be said to\nengage in production in some sense. Birds change nature to satisfy\ntheir need for shelter when they build nests, and beavers change\nnature when they construct dams, as do bees with their hives and ants\nwith their ant-hills. But nevertheless production remains an\noverwhelmingly human activity. It is not, as it is for other\nanimals, an inherited instinctive behaviour pattern but results from\nconscious, premeditated decisions. This in fact is the only way that\nhumans can react to their environment. All their actions (except for\ncertain basic bodily functions and reflexes) pass first through the\nmind and thus are both conscious and deliberate. Humans are\n“consciously-acting animals” and this includes when they\nintervene in the rest of nature to provide for their needs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nWhat humans are doing when they\nengage in productive activity is to apply their mental and physical\nenergies to materials that originally came from nature with a view to\nchanging their form so as to make them suitable for human use. Since\nhumans are part of nature, what is happening from an ecological point\nof view is that one part of nature is acting on another part to\nchange its form. This means that human work or labour is not the\nsole source of wealth. Useful things or “use-values” as\nthey are sometimes called are combinations of two elements, the\nmaterials provided by nature and labour.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThese materials fall into two\ncategories: those supplied by nature and raw materials. Typical\ndirectly-given materials are wild plants and animals, fish in the\nsea, coal, oil, mineral ores and the wood of unplanted forests. But\nif coal in the ground is a directly-given material, coal used in a\npower station is a raw material because it has been previously worked\non by labour, that of the miners who dug it up and of the transport\nworkers who moved it from the mine to the power station. All raw\nmaterials are of course made up of materials that originally came\nfrom nature, though no longer in the form in which nature originally\nsupplied them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe objects of labour, together\nwith the instruments of labour, make up the “means of\nproduction”. An instrument of labour is anything humans use to\nhelp them change the form of materials that originally came from\nnature. But an instrument of labour is not simply some implement or\nmachine. It includes literally any thing or process that humans use\nto produce useful things. Thus fire can be an instrument of labour. \nSo can the wind, rivers, waterfalls and other naturally-occurring\nphenomena. In fact in agriculture it is nature itself that becomes\nan instrument of labour as it is the natural process of plant growth\nthat is used as a means of producing the fruits, roots, leaves, etc,\nwhich humans use.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nHuman\nproductive activity, both by its massive scale and by its form (using\ninstruments of labour), clearly has immense implications for ecology.\n In fact the evolution of an animal having the capacity to make tools\nand use them to change nature to provide what it needs was bound,\nsooner or later, to have far-reaching effects on the biosphere\nitself. For it introduced into ecosystems another potentially\ndisturbing factor besides changes in climatic and physical\nconditions: the productive activity of this animal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nAGRICULTURE<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe most obvious way in which\nhuman productive activity affects the biosphere is through the\npractice of agriculture, which represents a direct interference in\nthe functioning of an ecosystem. But is this now almost universal\nhuman activity compatible with a harmonious relationship with the\nrest of nature? In other words can agriculture be fitted into a\nstable, sustainable ecosystem?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe short answer is yes, but not\nwithout changing the previously existing balance. For agriculture\ninvolves, by definition, a fundamental change in the existing\necosystem. We saw in the previous chapter that to each climatic and\nphysical condition there corresponds a stable ecological climax. In\nthe case of Britain and most of the rest of Europe this is the\ndeciduous forest. When agriculture was first introduced into Britain\nabout 4500 years ago, this involved cutting down the forests and\nusing the land to grow plants which humans found useful to the\ndetriment of both the trees and the other plants that had flourished\nin the forest. In other words, agriculture involves deliberately\npreventing an ecosystem from developing towards its climax.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nSome\nmight be tempted to say “towards its natural climax”, but\nthis would be to commit the mistake of seeing humans as something\noutside nature whereas humans are both a product and a part of\nnature. This being so, once the species homo\nsapiens<\/em>\nhas evolved, there is no reason to regard an ecosystem in which\nhumans, like other animals, live in limited numbers as\n“hunter-gatherers” in the forest as any more “natural”\nthan one in which there is a greater number of humans and the plants\nthey eat and a smaller number of trees and forest plants. There is\nno basis in ecology for saying that trees should be the main\nlife-form and that the natural human condition is hunting and\ngathering.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nHaving said this, for an\necosystem involving agriculture to be a stable one requires\ndeliberate action on the part of humans. Not just to plant the\nfields and keep them clear of the other plants which would otherwise\ntend to grow there (“weeds”), but also to maintain the\nfertility of the soil which, without agriculture, would spontaneously\nrenew itself. Things go wrong when humans, for whatever reason (and\nwe shall examine some in a later chapter), ignore the ecological\nconsequences of their actions, for instance, by permitting\novergrazing by their domesticated animals or by taking out of the\nsoil without restoring them the minerals and organic materials that\nare essential to normal plant growth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nBut if the humans involved in the\nsystem observe these rules, then, as a number of historical examples\ntestify, nothing prevents an ecosystem embracing humans practising\nagriculture from being as stable as one from which humans are absent\nor in which they practise only hunting and gathering. But it is not\njust food that humans need to extract from nature. They need to\nextract other means of subsistence, such as shelter and clothing. \nAbove all, as “tool-making animals” they need to extract\nmaterials either to work on or for use as instruments to work with.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe\nmaterials humans take from nature can be divided into two categories\naccording to whether they are renewable or non-renewable. Nearly\neverything of organic nature is renewable (since more of it can be\ngrown in a relatively short period of time) as are certain natural\nforces which humans use as instruments of labour (rivers, waterfalls,\nwind, the sun’s rays, etc). Non-renewable materials are those which\ncan be extracted from nature only once, such as mineral ores, sand,\nclay and some materials of organic origin such as coal, oil and the\nguano deposits of Chile. Some of these could from an abstract point\nof view be regarded as being renewable since they are the products of\nthe activity of life-forms (coal and oil, for instance) and are\nstill being created. However this is at so slow a rate as to make\nthem for all practical purposes non-renewable as far as their use by\nhumans is concerned. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/a>\nCHAPTER 3<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u0007\b<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nNature\nand society<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nSome animals associate together\nin structured, self-sufficient groups to survive in nature. Humans\nare among these social animals in that they too form groups and so\nface the rest of nature as members of a society rather than as\nisolated individuals. Indeed, as we have seen, it was only because\nthey -and the various species of hominid apes from which they evolved\n– lived in societies that they came to acquire the capacity to think\nabstractly and to make tools.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nTo the extent that human\nsocieties are groupings of animals organised to obtain from nature\nwhat they need to live, in particular food, they are no different\nfrom the societies formed by other animals. From an ecological point\nof view, a human society is a self-sufficient group of\nconsciously-acting, tool-making animals organised to obtain from\nnature food, shelter and materials to meet the needs of its members.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nAs social animals humans are\nmembers of a structured group in which different individuals perform\ndifferent functions. Some individual humans do interact directly\nwith the rest of nature – those, for instance, whose function it is\nto obtain directly-given materials – and so their actions do have an\nimpact on nature. But these individuals are acting not as isolated\nanimals trying to obtain a living on their own account, but as\nmembers of a structured group performing a role on behalf of the\ngroup as a whole. This is a relation between a particular human\nsociety and nature, not between particular individuals and nature.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nAs human societies are\nessentially associations of humans to survive in nature, the basic\nrelationships of any human society are those that its members enter\ninto with each other to ensure their survival. These consist of how\nits members organise to obtain the means of life (production) and how\nthey organise to share them out (distribution). So the basic social\nrelationships in any human society are those concerning the\nproduction and distribution of wealth, in other words the economic\nstructure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nHow the members of a particular\nsociety are organised to produce and distribute wealth is not,\nhowever, a matter of free choice. It depends on where, by what means\nand how abundantly they can produce wealth, i.e. on the material\nforces of production at their disposal. These forces are made up,\nfirstly, of the natural features and resources of the area in which\nthe society is operating: its geography and climate and the plants\nand other animals that live there. A second element is the\ninstruments of production at the society’s disposal, i.e. the\ntechnology and productive techniques it has inherited or developed. \nFinally, there are the productive skills of the members of the\nsociety themselves. It is the character and distribution of these\nthree material conditions of production – natural features and\nresources, instruments of production, and productive skills – which\ndetermine the particular economic structure of a human society.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThis relationship between\nproduction, nature and the structure of society forms the basis of\nthe “materialist conception of history” and was summed up\nby Karl Marx as follows:-<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cIn\nproduction, men not only act on nature but also on one another. They\nproduce only by cooperating in a certain way and mutually exchanging\ntheir activities. In order to produce, they enter into definite\nconnections and relations with one another and only within these\nsocial connections and relations does their action on nature, does\nproduction, take place. These social relations into which the\nproducers enter with one another, the conditions under which they\nexchange their activities and participate in the whole act of\nproduction, will naturally vary according to the character of the\nmeans of production\u201d (Wage\nLabour and Capital<\/em>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe material conditions of\nproduction lay down the various different kinds of productive\nactivity which a society has to engage in for its members to survive.\n One aspect of the economic structure of society is the social\narrangements that are made for deciding who does what in the context\nof this technical division of labour. Another equally important\naspect of a society’s economic structure is the arrangements that are\nmade for deciding who controls access to the means of production and\nwho distributes the products. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nEARLY SOCIETIES<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe earliest human societies – as\nself-sufficient producer groups – would have been composed of\nrelatively small numbers whose members survived in nature as nomadic\nbands capturing and killing wild animals and gathering wild plants,\nfruits and insects. The particular character of these material\nconditions of production demanded a certain division of labour\nbetween hunters, gatherers and those engaged in making the tools used\nin these activities, but they also demanded free access to nature,\nthe main means of production.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThus, in accordance with the\nmaterial conditions of production in which they operated,\nhunter-gatherer societies were societies which did not know private\nownership of the means of production; nor was there private ownership\nof what was produced. What was produced – whether by hunting or by\ngathering – was not the private property of the hunter or hunting\nparty nor of the gatherer or gatherers but was to be shared out\namongst all the members of the society on an equitable basis. \nHunting, gathering, tool-making were all regarded as essential\nactivities performed on behalf of society entitling those who\nperformed them to be maintained by society. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe practice of settled\nagriculture represented a major change in the material conditions of\nproduction. It meant an end to nomadism and the establishment of\nsettled communities. It also meant an increase in the amount of food\navailable, so permitting an increase in the size of human societies. \nBut it also involved a different division of labour which paved the\nway, as it developed, for the emergence of minority control over\naccess to the means of production.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe first settled agricultural\ncommunities would have been established by societies which had\npreviously practised hunting and gathering and so which had had a\ncommunistic economic structure, characterised by the absence of\nprivate ownership of the means of production and by the sharing of\nproducts according to need. After the adoption of agriculture, these\ncommunistic economic arrangements could have survived for a while,\nand no doubt did, but would have tended to break down in the long run\nas they no longer corresponded to the material conditions of\nproduction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe\nsocial arrangement for meeting the material requirements of early\nagriculture is most likely to have been the allocation to family\nunits of a plot of land to cultivate. This was not yet the\nestablishment of private ownership, but it would have represented the\nend of the free access to the means of production that had obtained\nin hunter-gatherer societies. For it ruled out any member of society\nsimply going and helping themselves to the products of any plot of\nland. Normally they would only have free access to the products of\nthe plot cultivated by the family unit to which they belonged. \nNevertheless, this is not incompatible with the continuation of some\ncommunistic practices. The actual cultivators could still be\nregarded by society as performing a function on its behalf and be\nrequired by social custom to contribute any surplus product from the\nland they cultivated to a common store on which any member of society\nin need (as a result, for instance, of their crops having failed or\nbeen destroyed by a storm) could draw as of right. Such social\narrangements have been discovered in societies at this stage of\ndevelopment which have survived into modern times.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe existence of a common store\nbecomes another aspect of the society’s material conditions of\nproduction and requires a social arrangement for managing this store\n– collecting and redistributing the surpluses. The usual arrangement\nseems to have been to confer this responsibility on a particular\nfamily. Arguments can go on as to whether being given this\nresponsibility made the head of the family concerned “the chief”\nor whether this responsibility was conferred on a family whose head\nhad already acquired this status for other reasons – perhaps military\nor religious. But the fact remains that this role of collecting and\nredistributing surpluses was one that had to be filled if all the\nmembers of the society were to be able to meet their basic needs as\nof right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nTHE EMERGENCE OF CLASS SOCIETY<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nIt is easy to imagine how over\ntime this coordinating role in distribution could become a source of\nprivileged consumption for the chief and his family. The duty to\ncontribute any surplus products to the common storehouse could become\na duty to contribute this to the chief, and the chief and his family\ncould come to consume an excessive amount of the stores at the\nexpense of redistributing them to those in need.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThis tendency for what was\noriginally a necessary technical function to evolve into a social\nprivilege would have been even more pronounced when the technical\ncoordinating role concerned production rather than simply\ndistribution, as was the case when large-scale irrigation works had\nto be managed so that agriculture could be practised. This was what\nhappened with the agriculture that was practised, for instance, in\nthe Nile, Euphrates and other river valleys. It was the main\nmaterial condition of production which gave rise to an economic\nstructure in which the cultivators were exploited by a class of\npriests who collectively controlled the key means of production which\nthe irrigation works represented.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe emergence of control over\nmeans of production by a section of society, or social class,\nrepresented a radical departure in human social arrangements, for\nproduction was no longer controlled by society as a whole. Such\nsocieties have in fact ceased to be communities with a common\ninterest and have become divided, with one class, on the basis of its\ncontrol over access to and the use of the material forces of\nproduction, exploiting the productive work of the other class and\nallocating itself a privileged consumption.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe emergence of class and\nproperty means that some humans acquire the power to exclude other\nhumans from access to the material forces of production, including\nnature, except on their terms. In these circumstances, humans come\nto face the rest of nature not as a united community seeking to\nsatisfy the needs of all its members, but as a class-divided society\nin which there is internal conflict over how the material forces of\nproduction should be used: to satisfy the needs of all or to\naccumulate wealth for the few.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThroughout history this conflict\nhas nearly always been settled in favour of the class that has\ncontrolled the means of production. There are two main reasons for\nthis. First, because the power of this class was based on a real\nfunctional role within the division of labour, at least originally. \nSecondly, because this class controlled armed bodies to enforce its\nwill, thus enabling it to hold on to power, at least for a while,\neven after its original function in organising production had\ndisappeared and been taken over by some other group as a result of\ntechnological change. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nHUMANS MAKE HISTORY<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nBecause class-divided societies\nare maintained, at least in part, by the use or threatened use of\nforce, class control of the means of production means that human\nsocieties acquire a political as well as an economic structure. \nHowever, since the function of the political structure is to maintain\nand enforce the social supremacy of the class that is economically\ndominant, it is the relationships that the members of society enter\ninto to produce and distribute wealth that remain the basic social\nrelationships of any society. In this sense the political – and\nlegal and religious – structure of a society can be seen as a\nsuperstructure resting on a base made up of that society’s economic\nstructure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nSimilarly, the social\nconsciousness of any society, i.e. the body of ideas its members draw\non when deciding how to act, can also be seen as a part of the\nsuperstructure resting on that society’s economic structure. Humans\ndo not have a completely free hand as to what they decide to do or\nthink. In philosophical terms, they do not possess what has been\ncalled “free will”. They do have a will, but how they\nexercise it depends on the material circumstances in which they find\nthemselves, circumstances which limit their choice of action.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThis may seem a deterministic\ntheory of human behaviour, but in fact it does not deny the role of\nhuman will. This would be absurd since, as we saw, the nature of the\nhuman brain and nervous system means that all human behaviour (above\nthe level of certain basic bodily functions and reflexes) is willed. \nConscious, willed action is a necessary feature of human behaviour. \nIn other words, humans make history, but out of conditions in which\nthey find themselves. As Marx put it:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cMen\nmake their own history, but they do not make it just as they please;\nthey do not make it under circumstances chosen by themselves, but\nunder circumstances directly encountered, given and transmitted from\nthe past\u201d (18th\nBrumaire of Louis Bonaparte<\/em>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThere is another broader sense in\nwhich humans make history, which is that the circumstances in which\nthey find themselves are to a large extent the product of past human\nactions. This does not make the circumstances any less constraining,\nbut it does once again distinguish humans from other animals. Unlike\nthem, humans have contributed to the environment which shapes their\nbehaviour. This happens largely through the technological\ndevelopment of the instruments and techniques they use in production.\n \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nJust\nas the economic structure of society is determined by the material\nconditions of production, so changes in these material conditions\nwill bring about a change in the economic structure. The main\nchanges that have taken place over the years have been the\ndevelopment of increasingly productive technology and the increasing\nskills and knowledge of its makers and users. It is technological\nevolution that has been the basis of social evolution and historical\nchange. But technological evolution has itself resulted from the\nactions of humans, and so it is ultimately human action that has\nbrought about social and historical change. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nFurther, it is human action that\nis instrumental in bringing about the actual changes in the economic\nand political structure of a society. There is nothing automatic\nabout social change: it has to be struggled for by real people,\npursuing some class interest. For, as we saw, the dominant class at\nany one time will be the class that originally had some key\norganising role in the productive methods employed by society. \nShould the character of these material productive forces change, as\nwith the development of a new method of production arising from\ntechnological change, then those who play the key organising role in\nthe new productive methods will tend to emerge as the new dominant\nclass.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nHowever, this dominant position\nwill not be handed to them on a plate by the old ruling class. On\nthe contrary, the old ruling class will seek to use its control of\npolitical power to prolong its rule. The new class has therefore to\nstruggle not only to extend the new productive methods which give it\nthe key organising role in production, but also to capture control of\npolitical power from the old ruling class. Ultimately the new class\nwill win, but the actual course and pace of events will depend, on\nthe one hand, on how determined the new class is in the pursuit of\nits interests and the tactics it pursues to further them and, on the\nother hand, on the resistance put up by the entrenched ruling class\nin defence of its own interests.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nFor example in the 18th and 19th\ncenturies in Europe, the spread of industrial methods of production\nbrought the entrepreneur class which organised factory production on\nthis basis to the fore, first economically and then politically. \nTheir descendants are still the ruling class in the West.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nSo, humans very definitely make\nhistory but they do so under circumstances which limit both their\nchoice of action and the ideas motivating this action. This means\nthat if we are to explain why a particular society, such as\npresent-day society, has an anti-ecological relationship with the\nrest of nature, we must seek this not in the attitudes of the\nindividual members of that society towards nature (their ignorance or\nshortsightedness or whatever) but in its economic structure since it\nis this that will have shaped those attitudes. Armed with this\nunderstanding, we can now proceed to examine the economic structure\nof present-day, capitalist society.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/a>\nCHAPTER 4<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u0007\b<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nCapitalism\nand the environment<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nIn present-day society the\nnatural aim of human productive activity to provide for the needs of\nhumans is subordinated to the accumulation of capital. All the\nelements needed to produce wealth – natural materials, raw materials,\ninstruments of production, productive skills – become objects of\ncommerce, items which are bought and sold, or “commodities”.\n \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nPRODUCTION FOR THE MARKET<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nProduction is not carried on\ndirectly for the purpose of meeting human needs but is geared towards\nrealising a monetary profit from market sales. Of course human needs\nare met – inadequately for the producers and more than sufficiently\nfor the members of the dominant class – otherwise human society could\nnot continue. But this is only incidental to the overriding drive to\naccumulate capital on a larger and larger scale.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nProduction for a market, the\naccumulation of wealth having a monetary value, and even the sale of\nproductive skills for wages had existed since Ancient times but as\nmore or less isolated practices rather than as a complete economic\nsystem. It was only in the 16th century that “the capitalist\nera” began with the emergence of the world market, that is, of a\npattern of trade linking productive activities carried out not just\nin a single country but in a number of different countries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nCapitalism is essentially an\neconomic mechanism in which production is geared to the accumulation\nof capital out of monetary profits realised on the market. This\nmechanism first came into operation when, beginning in Europe in the\n16th century, wealth was increasingly produced for sale not just on\nsome fixed and stable local market but for a market which, because of\nits extent, was unpredictable and liable to fluctuate and which no\nsingle enterprise or government could control.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe effect on the countries\ninvolved of producing for this market was to subordinate the\nproduction of wealth within their frontiers to a new logic. This\nmeant re-investing profits so as continuously to cheapen methods of\nproduction as a way of remaining competitive in the struggle to\nrealise further profits. As a result profound changes were brought\nabout in the economic structure of these countries and so also later\nin their political superstructure amounting to the introduction of a\nnew form of society – capitalist society.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nSince the 16th century capitalism\nhas spread to the rest of the world so that today it is a truly world\nsystem embracing all countries including, in the form of state-run\ncapitalism, places like Russia, China and Eastern Europe. So when we\ntalk about human society today we are talking about a world society\nof which all humans are members, even if on an unequal basis. \nSimilarly, the relationship between this society and its natural\nenvironment is the relationship between the whole human species and\nthe whole of the biosphere.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nWEALTH AND VALUE<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nIn capitalism all the elements\nfor producing wealth have become objects of commerce bought and sold\non the market. The items of wealth produced by human labour acquire,\nin addition to their use-value, an exchange-value which governs the\nprice they can command on the market and which reflects the amount of\nhuman labour required on average to produce them from start to\nfinish. Human labour thus not only produces wealth by transforming\nnatural materials into things useful to human life, but it also\nconfers on the product an abstract economic value that can be\nconverted into money by sale on the market. Exchange-value can in\nfact be measured only in units of money and not directly in units of\nworking time and so is always expressed as price.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe distinction between wealth\nand value is crucial for an understanding of how capitalism works. \nBoth are produced by human labour, but whereas wealth is the joint\nproduct of actual human labour and nature-given materials, value is\nthe exclusive creation of human labour. Capitalism is a system where\nwealth is produced as value rather than as wealth as such; where it\nis produced for its exchange-value rather than its use-value, more\nprecisely for the additional exchange-value conferred by human labour\non some product in the course of its production. The aim of\ncapitalist production is to maximise the amount of this additional\nexchange-value that is produced and to accumulate it as capital.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe main feature of the economic\nstructure of capitalism is that the actual producers of wealth –\nthose who work on materials that originally came from nature – do not\ncontrol the use of the productive machinery that is at the disposal\nof society. This machinery is in the hands of separate, competing\nenterprises. It is these enterprises that employ those who actually\nproduce the wealth, paying them a wage or salary which is less than\nthe value they produce.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nSTAYING COMPETITIVE<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nEach enterprise, whether it is a\nsmall business, a limited company or a state corporation, is a\nseparate capital, or sum of money invested in production with a view\nto profit. Profits are created in the process of production and\nrepresent the new value conferred on the elements of production by\nthe producers over and above what they are paid as wages. But these\nprofits are realised on the market when the products are sold and\nconverted into money. Enterprises are thus engaged in a competitive\nstruggle with each other to make profits in which they all seek to\nmaximise the difference between their sales receipts and the amounts\nof money they originally laid out in purchasing the elements\nnecessary for production (materials, buildings, machines, power,\nproductive skills, etc). Most of these profits are then re-invested\nin production, so increasing the size of the capital the enterprise\ncontrols.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThis is not a matter of choice. \nIt is an imperative imposed on all enterprises by their competitive\nstruggle for profits as the price for their survival. Competition\ndrives enterprises to seek to maximise profits by reducing their\ncosts of production so as to be able to undercut their rivals. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nProduction costs can be reduced\nin a number of ways. Enterprises can get their employees to work\nharder; they can organise the process of production more efficiently;\nbut above all they can employ more productive instruments of\nproduction. These are all measures which increase productivity,\nmeaning that more of a product can be produced in the same period of\ntime so that its cost per individual article, or unit cost, falls. \nIn value terms, the price of the commodity in question falls because\nless labour time is required on average to produce it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nWhether an enterprise adopts an\naggressive or a defensive approach in this battle the result is the\nsame: all enterprises are forced to invest in new and better\nmachines. Once one enterprise has put itself in a position to\nundercut its competitors through having adopted some new\ncost-reducing technique, then the other enterprises are forced to\ndefend themselves by adopting a similar technique. Competition\nobliges all enterprises to run fast just to stand still. To remain\nin the race for profits, they must stay competitive and to stay\ncompetitive they must continually accumulate capital invested in new\nmore productive equipment. The weaker enterprises are pushed out of\nthe market and eliminated from the struggle for profits, their\ncapital passing into the hands of other enterprises.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nUNLIMITED GROWTH<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThis battle is fought throughout\nthe whole world capitalist economy and in all industries. The\nend-result is two-fold: the concentration of capitals into larger and\nlarger units and the build-up of the stock and productive power of\nthe instruments of production. Large enterprises, whether private or\nstate-owned, controlling huge concentrations of capital and a\ntendency towards unlimited economic growth are thus built into\ncapitalism. They are unavoidable features of capitalist society\nbrought about by the operation of its economic laws.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThese laws make it impossible to\nestablish a sustainable relationship between human society and the\nrest of nature in ways enabling nature to supply the materials and\nreabsorb them after human use. Such a relationship would only be\npossible in a society in which the aim of production was the natural\none of supplying the life-needs of its members. But this is\nprecisely not the aim of production under capitalism. Rather, as we\nhave seen, the economic mechanism of capitalism imposes “accumulation\nfor accumulation’s sake”, “production for production’s\nsake”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nIn a society geared to meeting\nhuman needs a point would eventually be reached where the\naccumulation of means of production would stop because those in\nexistence were sufficient to provide for the needs of the members of\nthat society. But there is no such limit in a society where the\nprimary aim is to accumulate abstract exchange-value. A tendency to\nunlimited economic growth is built-in to capitalism because what is\nbeing produced is precisely not physical wealth as such but abstract\nexchange-value. The accumulation of exchange-value entails an\naccumulation of physical means of production and therefore also an\nextraction and transformation of materials from nature on an\nincreasing scale. This takes place, for reasons we will now examine,\nwith little regard for the ecological consequences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nEcology is concerned with the\ncirculation of natural materials and with ensuring that these should\nbe extracted, transformed, consumed and decomposed in such a way as\nnot to upset the balanced functioning of the biosphere. Capitalist\neconomics, on the other hand, is concerned with the circulation of\nproducts, not as useful things made from natural materials, but only\nas goods to be sold on the market at a profit. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nIt is clear that, with such an\neconomic mechanism governing production, no adequate account will be\ntaken of the ecological consequences of which materials to use and\nwhich methods to employ in doing so. No proper account will be\ntaken, for instance, of whether a material is scarce or abundant, nor\nof whether it is renewable or non-renewable, nor of whether its\nextraction will upset the ecosystem or ruin the environment, nor of\nwhether its transformation or its consumption will release dangerous\nsubstances into the biosphere.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nBarry\nCommoner, in his book The\nClosing Circle<\/em>,\nlisted the sort of criteria that would have to be taken into account\nfrom an ecological point of view in making such choices:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cFor a rational decision about\nthe need for displacing cotton with nylon, we should compare the two\nmaterials with respect to: energy requirements for production, and\nthe resultant air pollution; environmental impacts due to production\nwastes such as pesticides, fertilizer, and chemical plant effluents;\ndurability of the products, and the environmental impacts incident to\nmaintaining them (e.g., laundering, ironing). From such an\nassemblage of facts, a rational strategy for using these alternative\nproducts could be worked out. For example, if the analysis were to\nshow that cotton is generally more socially valuable than nylon,\nexcept that cotton requires ironing while nylon does not, it might\nprove useful to design non-ironing cotton fabrics, or even to develop\nand encourage clothing fashions that no longer call for ironed\nfabrics. What is important is that the relative benefits and costs\nassociated with the alternative products be made explicit, so that a\nrational social choice can be made\u201d (Knopf, New York, 1972, p.314).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nUnder capitalism, however, in\nthis case as in all others, the sole deciding criterion is the\nminimising of the amount of human labour incorporated in the product.\n This is an economic law of capitalism ruthlessly imposed by the\nimperative of competition. Any enterprise which decided to adopt a\nmore ecologically sound, but more expensive, production method would\nbecome uncompetitive and so would eventually be eliminated from the\ncompetitive struggle for profits. Only those which adopted the\ncheaper, but ecologically less sound method would have a chance of\nsurviving. This does not mean that all new cost-saving techniques\nare necessarily more damaging to the environment than the techniques\nthey replace, but simply that the effect on the biosphere is not a\nrelevant consideration in their adoption. The techniques which keep\nthe cost of production to a minimum will be adopted under capitalism,\neven if they are ecologically harmful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThis is why the Earth’s easily\naccessible resources have been plundered without thought for the\nfuture throughout the history of capitalism; why chemical fertilisers\nand pesticides are used in agriculture; why animals are injected with\nhormones; why conifer forests are planted in Britain in preference to\nmore ecologically appropriate deciduous ones; why existing power\nstations and factories release all sorts of dangerous and obnoxious\nsubstances into the air and water; why human waste is not recycled\nback to the land; why non-biodegradable plastics and textiles are\nproduced; why lead is put in petrol, why goods are made not to last,\nand so on. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nIt is true that in the end\ncapitalism is forced to take some account of the laws of ecology, but\nonly after the damage has been done – after some resource has ceased\nto be available in abundant supply, after some source of needed water\nhas been polluted – and only to the extent that this ecological\ndamage raises production costs to a level where it becomes less\ncostly to take steps to try to conserve resources or reduce pollution\nthan not to do so. Too little, too late is neither a rational nor a\nsatisfactory approach to protecting the environment but it is the\nmost that the rigid economic laws of capitalism will ever permit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/a>\nCHAPTER 5<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u0007\b<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe\nEcological Perspective<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nHuman productive activity,\nunderstood as the transformation of nature to supply human needs,\nnecessarily takes place in the context of nature and is subject to\nthe laws of ecology. It can indeed take a form that is incompatible\nwith these laws, but not without sooner or later undermining its own\nbasis as the activity of an animal species to satisfy its needs. In\nshort, humans are a part of nature and cannot permanently defy its\nlaws.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nIn the 19th century, when\nindustrial capitalism was in its period of triumphant expansion, a\ndifferent perspective was generally adopted and the history of\nhumanity was portrayed, even by many critics of capitalism, as a\nstruggle against nature which was about to end in a complete human\nvictory. But to talk about a struggle against nature is quite\ninappropriate. The utilisation of nature by humans to supply their\nneeds involves cooperating with nature not battling against it. \nProduction, to be sustainable over any period of time, has to respect\nthe laws of ecology. If this necessary ecological dimension of\nproduction is taken into account, then there is no justification for\nseeing human productive activity as a struggle to conquer nature in\nwhich every technological advance represents a victory of human\nsociety over nature. Rather, human productive activity has to be\nunderstood as being the natural activity of a particular animal\ntaking place within the context of nature and its cycles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nWASTEFUL AND DANGEROUS TECHNOLOGY<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nAs we saw in an earlier chapter,\nwhat humans take from nature can be divided into two categories:\nrenewable and non-renewable. Materials are renewable when they are\ncontinually reproduced by some natural process, whether this is\nspontaneous (as in the case of fish in the sea) or results from human\nintervention (harnessing of natural plant growth, as in agriculture).\n Other natural processes – such as the sun’s rays, rivers,\nwaterfalls, the wind – are also used by humans in production, but as\ninstruments of production rather than as raw materials. Most\nmaterials in the strict sense of the term that are renewable are of\nplant or animal origin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nNon-renewable resources on the\nother hand – such as mineral ores, coal, oil, clay, sand – are so\ncalled because they do not form part of some natural cycle that\nreproduces them, at least not with a timescale having any relevance\nfor humans. Concern has been expressed that non-renewable resources\nwill eventually run out but, despite some wild predictions that were\nmade in the recent past, depletion of non-renewable resources is not\nan immediate problem and probably never will be, not even under\ncapitalism despite the way it plunders and wastes these resources. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nOne advantage non-renewable\nmaterials have over most renewable ones is that they can normally be\nused more than once. With the important exceptions of coal, oil and\nnatural gas when burned, they can be recycled. A proportion of some\nmetals is lost through corrosion but all metals can in principle be\nrecovered and re-used. It has been suggested, for instance, that\nmost of the gold mined since Ancient times is still in use. Much of\nthe iron, copper, tin and other metals mined since the same time is\nstill around somewhere even if not still used as gold is.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe\nfact that a large proportion of non-renewable materials can be\ncontinually re-used is one reason why the threat of them becoming\ndepleted is not likely to become a real prospect. Another is that\nthese resources can be conserved by making instruments of production\neasier to repair and by manufacturing goods of all kinds to last\nrather than to break down or become unusable after a carefully\ncalculated period of time, as is common practice under capitalism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nFurther, non-renewable resources\ncan be replaced in many cases by renewable ones. Electricity\ngeneration is a case in point. Most electricity is generated today\nby huge steam-driven turbines. At the moment the main ways in which\nthis steam is raised are by the burning of the fossil fuels – coal,\noil and natural gas – and increasingly by the heat given off by the\nprocess of nuclear fission. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nBurning fossil fuels, besides\npreventing them from being used as raw materials for the manufacture\nof their various derivatives, contributes to atmospheric pollution,\nwhile nuclear fission is a quite reckless way of just raising steam\nto turn turbines. Even if nuclear power stations were as safe as\nthey are officially claimed to be, they still represent a threat to\nthe biosphere in that any increase in the level of radioactivity is\ndangerous because of the role it plays in provoking mutations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nSuch mutations are already\nbrought about by normal background radiation, coming from the Earth’s\nrocks and from space, but, as we saw in the second chapter, it is\nvery rare that such mutations are favourable; more are likely to be\nunfavourable to the organism affected. Any increase in the level of\nradioactivity beyond its natural level is bound to increase the\nnumber of mutations and so the number of unfavourable ones. Future\ngenerations will rightly regard the decision to utilise nuclear power\non a widening scale for electricity generation, let alone for\nmilitary purposes, as an act of folly, especially as right from the\nstart it was known that there was no satisfactory solution to the\nproblem of disposing of the radioactive waste that inevitably results\nfrom the process. Dumping this in the sea or burying it in the\nground is merely to pollute a part of the biosphere for generations\nto come.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThere exist, however,\necologically less damaging alternatives for generating electricity. \nTurbines can be turned by water, wind and tidal power or by steam\nraised by the heat of the sun’s rays. These are not only clean ways\nof generating electricity – they do not pollute the biosphere – but\nhave the additional advantage of being based on renewable natural\nprocesses. It may also be possible to make the burining of fossil\nfuels less environmentally intrusive. The eventual choice must be\nleft for the majority to decide after a full consideration of all the\nfacts, including any possible side-effects.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nNON-POLLUTING TECHNOLOGY<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nAs for the techniques employed to\ntransform materials, whether renewable or non-renewable, if these are\nnot to upset the functioning of natural cycles they must not release\ninto the biosphere or leave as waste products toxic substances or\nsubstances that cannot be assimilated by nature. In other words, a\nnon-polluting technology should be applied. This is quite feasible\nfrom a technical point of view since non-polluting transformation\ntechniques are known in all fields of production. However they are\nnot employed on any wide scale today because they would add to\nproduction costs and so are ruled out by the economic laws of\ncapitalism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe main renewable material which\nhumans extract from nature is of course food, derived from plants and\nfrom other animals. Some of this is provided spontaneously by nature\nand is simply gathered or hunted by humans, but most is deliberately\ncultivated or raised.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nSome human productive activity\nessentially remains that of hunting and gathering, even if\nsophisticated technology is employed. What humans need to do is to\nfit it into a functioning natural cycle in much the same way as other\nanimals do, taking care to leave enough of the plants or animals\ngathered or hunted for these to be able to continue reproducing their\nnumbers, including a surplus for human consumption. This is an\nelementary rule, but one which has been neglected time and again\nunder capitalism where the competitive struggle for profits makes\ncooperation between enterprises extremely difficult, whether they are\nprivately owned or state controlled.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nWhere cultivation or rearing is\ninvolved humans have to do more than merely fit themselves into an\nalready existing cycle; they have, in a very real sense, to create a\nnew natural cycle. In the absence of human intervention (except as\nhunters and gatherers) the fertility of the soil tends to be restored\nautomatically so that the ecological area concerned is able to go on\nsupporting from year to year its particular pattern of plant and\nanimal life. When humans practise agriculture or raising animals,\nthis previously-existing cycle is inevitably upset. But this in\nitself is not serious from an ecological point of view as long as a\nnew cycle, incorporating these human productive activities, comes\ninto being. This, however, requires conscious human intervention in\nwhich deliberate steps are taken by humans to ensure that the mineral\nand organic matter their productive activity takes out of the soil is\nrestored to it, precisely so that it can go on supporting the\nrequired level of plant and animal life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThis was understood and practised\nin the relatively self-sufficient agriculture communities which\nexisted up until the coming of capitalism, where what was produced\nwas largely consumed on the spot. The human waste resulting from\nconsumption together with animal waste and those parts of plants and\nanimals that were not used for food or other purposes were restored\nto the soil where they were decomposed by insects, fungi and bacteria\ninto the elements that sustain the soil’s fertility.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nWhen, however, the place of\nproduction and the place of consumption are separated this cycle\ntends to break down, with the result that the fertility of the soil\ndiminishes. If an area specialises in the production of a crop for\nexport, i.e. for consumption elsewhere, this means that some of the\nmineral and organic matter incorporated in the crop will leave that\narea for ever and not be restored to the soil. The same applies to\nanimal rearing. Animals require large amounts of calcium for their\nbones, as well as other minerals such as phosphorus, iron and\nmagnesium, which also come from the soil via the plants on which they\nfeed. If these animals are exported, whether dead or alive, and\nconsumed elsewhere, then the minerals they contain are lost to the\nsoil of the area where they were raised.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nA complementary problem arises at\nthe other end, at the point of consumption: what to do with the\nhuman waste which, when the points of production and consumption were\nthe same, was automatically restored to the soil and recycled by\nnature? Releasing it into the sea or into rivers or sewers means\nthat it is lost to agriculture, even if not, unfortunately, to the\nbiosphere since this contributes to water pollution by encouraging\nthe proliferation of some life-forms (algae, bacteria) to the\ndetriment of others which the water normally supports.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe\n“solution” that has been found under capitalism, because it\nis the cheapest in terms of the labour content of the products, has\nbeen to use artificial fertilisers – nitrates and phosphates that\nhave been manufactured in chemical plants. This works in the sense\nof allowing the land to go on producing the same amount, or more, of\nthe same crop or animal, but at a price in terms of polluting the\nwater in the region concerned. Artificial fertilisers, not being\nheld by the soil in the same way that organic waste is, tend to be\nleached off by rain into waterways where they cause pollution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe\necological solution to the problem is to find some way of restoring\nto the soil the organic waste resulting from human consumption in\nurban areas. Barry Commoner suggested that this might be done by\nmeans of pipelines linking the town and the countryside. A longer\nterm solution would be that envisaged by socialists from the earliest\ndays and summarised in the following terms by Marx and Engels in 1848\nin The\nCommunist Manifesto<\/em>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cCombination of agriculture\nwith manufacturing industries; \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\ngradual abolition of the\ndistinction between town and country, by a more equable distribution\nof the population over the country\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe underlying principle behind\nthe changes in the materials and productive methods used which are\ndemanded by taking proper account of the ecological dimension of\nproduction is that the productive system as a whole should be\nsustainable for the rest of nature. In other words what humans take\nfrom nature, the amount and the rhythm at which they do so, as well\nas the way they use these materials and dispose of them after use,\nshould all be done in such a way as to leave nature in a position to\ngo on supplying and reabsorbing the required materials after use.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nIn the long run this implies\nstable or only slowly rising consumption and production levels,\nthough it does not rule out carefully planned rapid growth over a\nperiod to reach a level at which consumption and production could\nthen platform off. A society in which production, consumption and\npopulation levels were stable has been called a “steady-state\neconomy” where production would be geared simply to meeting\ncurrent needs and to replacing and repairing the stock of means of\nproduction (raw materials and instruments of production) required\nfor this.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nIt is obvious that today human\nneeds are far from being met on a world scale and that a growth in\nthe production of food, housing and other basic amenities would still\nbe needed for some years even if production ceased to be governed by\nthe economic laws of capitalism. However it should not be forgotten\nthat a “steady-state economy” would be a much more normal\nsituation than an economy geared to blindly accumulating more and\nmore means of production. After all, the only rational reason for\naccumulating means of production is to eventually be in a position to\nsatisfy all reasonable consumption needs. Once the stock of means of\nproduction at the disposal of a society which had set itself this\ngoal has been built up to this level – and, logically, this point\nmust eventually be reached, since the consumption needs of a given\npopulation are finite – then accumulation, or the further expansion\nof the stock of means of production, can stop and production levels\nbe stabilised.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nSo if human society is to be able\nto organise its production in an ecologically acceptable way, then it\nmust abolish the capitalist economic mechanism of profit accumulation\nand gear production instead to the direct satisfaction of needs. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nTHE GREEN PERSPECTIVE<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThis is a point on which we\ndiffer from the various Green parties and movements. To find an\neffective solution, we would argue, awareness and indignation about a\nproblem must be accompanied by an understanding of what is causing\nit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nBut the explanations of the cause\nof the environmental crisis which circulate amongst Greens tend to\ndiffer from ours. Some blame modern technology rather than the use,\nor, more accurately, the abuse, that is made of it under the present\nsystem. Others attribute the pressure on resources and the\nenvironment to overpopulation. Others say that humans are too greedy\nand preach restraint on consumption for moral reasons. But\nrespecting the laws of ecology does not mean abandoning modern\ntechnological knowledge and going back to the productive methods and\npersonal consumption levels that existed before the coming of\nindustrial capitalism. It means rather using materials and methods \ncompatible with a balanced functioning of nature. With appropriate\nmodification, modern industrial techniques of production are quite\ncapable of providing enough good-quality food, clothing and shelter\nfor every person on Earth and of doing this without damaging the\nenvironment. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe Green Party in Britain\ncorrectly sees the solution to the environmental crisis as lying in\nthe achievement of “a system of human activity which is in\nharmony with the Earth’s life-sustaining systems”, as they put\nit in their 1987 General Election manifesto. However, they see this\nas being achieved through the election of a Green Party government\nwhich would take measures to gradually transform the present\ngrowth-oriented and profit-motivated capitalist economy into a\ndecentralised, democratically-run and ecologically-sustainable one. \nWhile awaiting the election of such a government the Green Party\nconcentrates, like environmentalists in the Labour and other parties,\non advocating reform measures to try to protect nature and the\nenvironment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nWe are up against a\nwell-entrenched economic and social system based on class and\nproperty and governed by coercive economic laws. Reforms under\ncapitalism, however well meaning or determined, can never solve the\nenvironmental crisis – the most they can do is to palliate some\naspect of it on a precarious temporary basis. They can certainly\nnever turn capitalism into a democratic, ecological society.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe conclusion is clear: if the\npresent environmental crisis is to be solved and the threat to –\nindeed the actual degradation of – the environment removed, then\ncapitalism must go. It must be replaced by a socialist society based\non the common ownership and democratic control of the means of\nproduction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/a>\nCHAPTER 6<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u0007\b<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nProduction\nfor human needs<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nTo produce the things that people\nneed and want in an ecologically acceptable way presupposes a\nparticular relationship between society and the rest of nature. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nFor this to happen the members of\nthat society must be in a position to control production and direct\nits purposes. This cannot be done in a society where the means of\nproduction are owned and controlled by only a section of society nor\nin a society whose economic structure is such that production is\ngoverned by the operation of blind economic laws which impose their\nown priorities. Production for needs therefore demands an end both\nto minority control over the means of production and to production\nfor the market.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nProduction for needs requires,\nfirst of all, that control over the use of the means of production\n(nature, raw materials, instruments of production) should cease to be\nthe exclusive privilege of a minority within society and become\navailable to all. Everyone must stand in the same relationship with\nregard to the means of production. Class control of the means of\nproduction must, in other words, be replaced by common ownership and\ndemocratic control. Secondly, production for needs demands an end to\nproduction for the market. It means that wealth is produced simply\nfor its use-value, that is, capacity to satisfy human need. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nProduction for the market is an\nexpression of the fact that means of production and therefore the\nproducts are owned, not by all the members of a society in common but\nby individuals or groups. Exchange would completely disappear in a\nsociety in which there were no property rights over the means of\nproduction. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nDEMOCRACY AND COMMON OWNERSHIP \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nProduction for needs can only\ntake place on the basis of common ownership. With common ownership,\nwhat is produced is no longer the property of some individual or\ngroup, which has to be purchased before it can be used, but becomes\ndirectly available for people to take in accordance with their needs.\n It is for the majority class, which does all of the work, to\ndemocratically take political control in order to end minority\nownership of the means of production and distribution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe social arrangements\npermitting production for needs are basically the same as those that\nprevailed the last time it was practised by humans, in societies\nbased on hunting and gathering that existed until the arrival of\nclass society: the absence of property rights over the means of\nproduction and the ability of each member of society to have access\nto enough products to satisfy their life-needs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nToday,\nhowever, humans are no longer living in small bands engaged in\nhunting and gathering but in a world society, embracing the whole\nplanet and the whole human species, in which they practise\nagriculture and the industrial transformation of materials. When we\nsay, then, that it is common ownership which provides the framework\nfor the development of a balanced relationship between human society\nand the rest of nature, we are talking about the common ownership of\nall the Earth’s natural and industrial resources by the whole of\nhumanity. We are talking about a world socialist society which would\nrecreate, on a world scale and on the basis of today’s technological\nknowledge, the communistic social relations of freedom, equality and\ncommunity which humans enjoyed before the coming of property society.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nFrom the point of view of\nsatisfying the needs of human beings, capitalism is a quite\nirrational system. Within this society food is not produced\nprimarily to be eaten, houses to be lived in, or clothes to be worn. \nEverything is produced for sale, not for use. The aim of production,\nfar from being the natural one of producing useful things to satisfy\nhuman needs, is to maximise profits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nHumanity is now in a position,\nand has been for some time, to supply in an ecologically acceptable\nway the needs of all its members. The means of production and the\ntechnological knowledge at its disposal are sufficient to allow this\nto be done. What is lacking is the appropriate social framework: the\ncommon ownership of the Earth’s natural and industrial resources.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nCommon ownership is not to be\nequated with state ownership, which is another form of minority\ncontrol over the use of the means of production since, as we saw, the\nstate is a feature only of class-divided societies. Common ownership\non a world scale means that there would be no property or territorial\nrights over any part of the globe nor over any of the instruments of\nproduction created throughout the world by human activity. The Earth\nand its natural and industrial resources would not belong to anyone\n-individuals, companies, or states. They would simply be there to be\nused in accordance with democratically-decided rules and procedures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe\nprecise details of the democratic decision-making structure of a\nworld socialist society cannot be laid down today but it is possible\nto envisage, for instance, the local community being the basic unit\nof such a structure. In this case people could elect a local council\nto coordinate and administer local affairs. Delegates could be sent\nto regional councils for matters concerning a wider area, and so on\npossibly with a world council responsible for matters that could best\nbe dealt with on a world scale (for instance, the supply of certain\nkey minerals, the protection of the biosphere as a whole, the mining\nand farming of the oceans, and space research). The procedures for\nelecting delegates to the various councils could vary, but would\ninclude machinery whereby the councils could be instructed by\nmajority poll. (These matters are dealt with more fully in our\npamphlet Socialism\nas a Practical Alternative<\/em>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nOn the basis of common ownership\nand democratic control, the world-wide network of productive units\ncan be geared to meet human needs. This would not have to involve\nthe organisation of production and distribution by a world planning\nauthority, but the setting up of a mechanism which would enable the\nproductive network to respond in a flexible way to the demand for\nproducts communicated to it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nFREE ACCESS<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nGearing production to meeting\nneeds means, in the first instance, making arrangements for\nindividuals to have access to what they need. This access would be\nfree; socialism not being a society in which goods and services are\nproduced for sale, people would not have to buy what they needed. \nThey would be able to decide for themselves what their needs were and\nthen to take from the stock of products set aside for individual\nconsumption.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nSignals to the network of\nproductive units as to what to produce would thus come from what\npeople actually chose to take from distribution stores under\nconditions of free access. This would essentially be a question of\nstock control in the first instance at local community level. In\nthis case, needs would be communicated by local communities to the\nproductive network as demands for given amounts of specified products\nand materials. This would then be communicated throughout the\nsystem, from supplier to supplier, and where necessary to other\nregions or to the world level, again as demands for given amounts of\nproducts and materials.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nGoods would be produced and\ndistributed in their natural form as useful things intended to\nsatisfy some human need or other. Because they were no longer being\nintroduced for sale on the market, they would not have a price. So,\ninstead, estimates of what was likely to be needed over a given\nperiod would be expressed as physical quantities of specified\nproducts and materials not money.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThere would be no need for any\nuniversal unit of account to measure it. Calculations would be\ncarried out directly in kind not money. Other more important factors\nthan cost would be able to be taken into account in making choices\nabout which materials and productive methods to use. Instead of what\nminimised the production cost of some product being the only\ncriterion, other factors such as the health, comfort and enjoyment of\nthe those doing the work the protection of the environment and the\nconservation and the ecological suitability of materials and energy\ncould be given the important place they deserve. This would\nnaturally lead to different, in many cases quite different,\nproductive methods being adopted than now under capitalism. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nPROTECTING THE ENVIRONMENT<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nIn such a needs-oriented society,\nthe concept of “profits” would be meaningless while the\nimperative to “growth” would disappear. Instead, after an\ninitial increase in useful production to provide the whole world’s\npopulation with an infrastructure of basic amenities (such as farms,\nhousing, transport and water supplies) production can be expected to\nstabilise at a level sufficient to provide for current needs and\nrepairing and maintaining the stock of means of production. A\nsustainable relationship with the rest of nature would be achieved\nand maintained in which needs on a world scale would be in balance\nwith the capacity of the biosphere to renew itself after supplying\nthem.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nAs the only consciously-acting\nlife-form within the biosphere, humans ought to act as the\nbiosphere’s “brain”, consciously regulating its functioning\nin the interest of present and future generations. But before humans\ncan hope to play this role we must first integrate our own activities\ninto a sustainable natural cycle on a planetary scale. This we can\nonly do within the framework of a world socialist society in which\nthe Earth and its natural and industrial resources have become the\ncommon heritage of all humanity. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\t\t28<\/p>\n\n\n\n

^TOP^<\/a>
\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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