Green anarchism (or eco-anarchism
["green anarchism (also called eco-anarchism)"]
in ''An Anarchist FAQ
An, AN, aN, or an may refer to:
Businesses and organizations
* Airlinair (IATA airline code AN)
* Alleanza Nazionale, a former political party in Italy
* AnimeNEXT, an annual anime convention located in New Jersey
* Anime North, a Canadian a ...
'' by various authors.) is an
anarchist school of thought
Anarchism is the political philosophy which holds ruling classes and the state to be undesirable, unnecessary and harmful, The following sources cite anarchism as a political philosophy: Slevin, Carl. "Anarchism." ''The Concise Oxford Dicti ...
that puts a particular emphasis on
ecology
Ecology () is the study of the relationships between living organisms, including humans, and their physical environment. Ecology considers organisms at the individual, population, community, ecosystem, and biosphere level. Ecology overl ...
and
environmental issues
Environmental issues are effects of human activity on the biophysical environment, most often of which are harmful effects that cause environmental degradation. Environmental protection is the practice of protecting the natural environment on t ...
.
A green anarchist theory is normally one that extends
anarchism beyond a critique of human interactions and includes a critique of the interactions between humans and non-humans as well. Beyond human liberation, green anarchist praxis can extend to some form of non-human,
total liberation
Total liberation, also referred to as total liberation ecology or veganarchism, is a political philosophy and movement that combines anarchism with a commitment to animal and earth liberation. Whilst more traditional approaches to anarchism ha ...
and an environmentally sustainable anarchist society.
The two main tendencies of green anarchism are
anarcho-primitivism
Anarcho-primitivism is an anarchist critique of civilization (anti-civ) that advocates a return to non-civilized ways of life through deindustrialization, abolition of the division of labor or specialization, and abandonment of large-scale organ ...
, which offers a critique of technology and argues that anarchism is best suited to uncivilised ways of life, and
social ecology, which argues that the hierarchical domination of nature by human stems from the hierarchical domination of human by human.
Mid-20th century
The English anarchist
Ethel Mannin
Ethel Edith Mannin (6 October 1900 – 5 December 1984) was a popular British novelist and travel writer, political activist and socialist. She was born in London.
Life and career
Mannin's father, Robert Mannin (d. 1948) was a member of the So ...
's 1944 book ''Bread and Roses: A Utopian Survey and Blue-Print'' contained ecological themes. The green anarchist
Murray Bookchin directly connected anarchism with ecology in his 1965 essay ''Ecology and Revolutionary Thought'', drawing from the anarcho-communism of
Peter Kropotkin's ''
Fields, Factories, and Workshops'', as well as work by the "proto-green-anarchists"
Herbert Read and
Paul Goodman
Paul Goodman (1911–1972) was an American writer and public intellectual best known for his 1960s works of social criticism. Goodman was prolific across numerous literary genres and non-fiction topics, including the arts, civil rights, decen ...
.
Contemporary developments
Contemporary writers such as
Murray Bookchin and
Alan Carter have claimed anarchism to be the only political ideology capable of addressing climate change.
Direct action
Some green anarchists engage in
direct action (not to be confused with
ecoterrorism
Eco-terrorism is an act of violence which is committed in support of environmentalism, environmental causes, against people or property.
The United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) defines eco-terrorism as "...the use or threatened ...
). Organizing themselves through groups like
Earth First!
Earth First! is a radical environmental advocacy group that originated in the Southwestern United States. It was founded in 1980 by Dave Foreman, Mike Roselle, Howie Wolke, Bart Koehler, and Ron Kezar. Today there are Earth First! groups around t ...
,
Root Force
Earth First! is a radical environmental advocacy group that originated in the Southwestern United States. It was founded in 1980 by Dave Foreman, Mike Roselle, Howie Wolke, Bart Koehler, and Ron Kezar. Today there are Earth First! groups around ...
, or more drastically the
Earth Liberation Front
The Earth Liberation Front (ELF), also known as "Elves" or "The Elves", is the collective name for Wiktionary:Autonomy, autonomous individuals or covert cells who, according to the Earth Liberation Front Press Office, ELF Press Office, use "econom ...
ELF,
Earth Liberation Army (ELA) and
Animal Liberation Front
The Animal Liberation Front (ALF) is an international, leaderless, decentralized political and social resistance movement that engages in and promotes non-violent direct action in protest against incidents of animal cruelty. It originated in th ...
(ALF). They may take direct action against what they see as
systems of oppression, such as the
logging industry
Logging is the process of cutting, processing, and moving trees to a location for transport. It may include skidding, on-site processing, and loading of trees or logs onto trucks or skeleton cars.
Logging is the beginning of a supply chain ...
, the
meat and
dairy industries,
animal testing
Animal testing, also known as animal experimentation, animal research, and ''in vivo'' testing, is the use of non-human animals in experiments that seek to control the variables that affect the behavior or biological system under study. This ...
laboratories,
genetic engineering facilities and, more rarely, government institutions.
Such actions are usually, though not always,
non-violent
Nonviolence is the personal practice of not causing harm to others under any condition. It may come from the belief that hurting people, animals and/or the environment is unnecessary to achieve an outcome and it may refer to a general philosoph ...
, with groups such as
The Olga Cell attempting assassinations of nuclear scientists, and other related groups sending letterbombs to nano tech and nuclear tech-related targets.
See also
*
Animal rights and punk subculture
*
Chellis Glendinning
Chellis Glendinning (born 1947) is an author and activist. She has been called a pioneer in the concept of ecopsychology—the belief that promoting environmentalism is healthy. She is a social-change activist with an emphasis on feminism, biore ...
*
Green Scare
The Green Scare is legal action by the US government against the radical environmental movement. It alludes to the Red Scares, periods of fear over communist infiltration of US society.
The term was popularized by environmental activists. It is ...
*
Eco-socialism
Eco-socialism (also known as green socialism or socialist ecology) is an ideology merging aspects of socialism with that of green politics, ecology and alter-globalization or anti-globalization. Eco-socialists generally believe that the expansi ...
*
Intentional community
*
Left-libertarianism
Left-libertarianism,Bookchin, Murray; Biehl, Janet (1997). ''The Murray Bookchin Reader''. New York: Cassell. p. 170.Goodway, David (2006). '' Anarchist Seeds Beneath the Snow: Left-Libertarian Thought and British Writers from William Morris to ...
*
Operation Backfire (FBI)
Operation Backfire is a multi-agency criminal investigation, led by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), into destructive acts in the name of animal rights and environmental causes in the United States described as eco-terrorism by the FB ...
*
Permaculture
Permaculture is an approach to land management and settlement design that adopts arrangements observed in flourishing natural ecosystems. It includes a set of design principles derived using whole-systems thinking. It applies these principle ...
References
Further reading
*
Biehl, Janet. ''Finding our Way. Rethinking Ecofeminist Politics'' (1991) .
*
Biehl, Janet. ''Ecofascism: Lessons from the German Experience'' (1996) .
*
Biehl, Janet. ''The Politics of Social Ecology: Libertarian Municipalism'' (1997) .
*
Biehl, Janet. ''The Murray Bookchin Reader'' (1997) .
*
Biehl, Janet. ''Mumford Gutkind Bookchin: The Emergence of Eco-Decentralism'' (2011) .
*
Biehl, Janet and Staudenmaier, Peter). ''Ecofascism: Lessons from the German Experience'' (1995).
*
Bookchin, Murray. ''
Our Synthetic Environment'' (1962) published under the pseudonym of Lewis Herber.
*
Bookchin, Murray. ''
Post-Scarcity Anarchism
''Post-Scarcity Anarchism'' is a collection of essays by Murray Bookchin, first published in 1971 by Ramparts Press. In it, Bookchin outlines the possible form anarchism might take under conditions of post-scarcity. One of Bookchin's major wo ...
'' (1971 and 2004) .
*
Bookchin, Murray. ''The Limits of the City'' (1973) .
*
Bookchin, Murray. ''Toward an Ecological Society'' (1980) .
*
Bookchin, Murray. ''The Rise of Urbanization and the Decline of Citizenship'' (1987 and 1992) .
*
Bookchin, Murray. ''The Philosophy of Social Ecology: Essays on Dialectical Naturalism'' (1990 and 1996) Montreal: Black Rose Books .
*
Bookchin, Murray. ''Re-Enchanting Humanity'' (1995) .
*
Bookchin, Murray. ''Social Ecology and Communalism'', with
Eirik Eiglad, AK Press, 2007.
*
CrimethInc.
CrimethInc., also known as CWC, which stands for either "CrimethInc. Ex-Workers Collective" or "CrimethInc Ex-Workers Ex-Collective", is a decentralized anarchist collective of autonomous cells.
*
*
* CrimethInc. emerged in the mid-1990s, initia ...
''
Days of War, Nights of Love'' – Crimethink For Beginners (2001).
*
CrimethInc.
CrimethInc., also known as CWC, which stands for either "CrimethInc. Ex-Workers Collective" or "CrimethInc Ex-Workers Ex-Collective", is a decentralized anarchist collective of autonomous cells.
*
*
* CrimethInc. emerged in the mid-1990s, initia ...
''
Recipes for Disaster'' – An Anarchist Cookbook (2004).
*
CrimethInc.
CrimethInc., also known as CWC, which stands for either "CrimethInc. Ex-Workers Collective" or "CrimethInc Ex-Workers Ex-Collective", is a decentralized anarchist collective of autonomous cells.
*
*
* CrimethInc. emerged in the mid-1990s, initia ...
''
Expect Resistance
CrimethInc., also known as CWC, which stands for either "CrimethInc. Ex-Workers Collective" or "CrimethInc Ex-Workers Ex-Collective", is a decentralized anarchist collective of autonomous cells.
*
*
* CrimethInc. emerged in the mid-1990s, initia ...
'' – A crimethink field manual (2007).
*
CrimethInc.
CrimethInc., also known as CWC, which stands for either "CrimethInc. Ex-Workers Collective" or "CrimethInc Ex-Workers Ex-Collective", is a decentralized anarchist collective of autonomous cells.
*
*
* CrimethInc. emerged in the mid-1990s, initia ...
''
Work
Work may refer to:
* Work (human activity), intentional activity people perform to support themselves, others, or the community
** Manual labour, physical work done by humans
** House work, housework, or homemaking
** Working animal, an animal t ...
'' – An economic and ethical analysis of
capitalism
Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their operation for profit. Central characteristics of capitalism include capital accumulation, competitive markets, price system, priva ...
(2011).
*
Ellul, Jacques. ''La technique ou l'enjeu du siècle''. Paris: Armand Colin, 1954. Paris: Économica, 1990 and 2008.
*
Ellul, Jacques. ''The Technological Society''. Trans. John Wilkinson. New York: Knopf, 1964. London: Jonathan Cape, 1965. Rev. ed.: New York: Knopf/Vintage, 1967. with introduction by
Robert K. Merton
Robert King Merton (born Meyer Robert Schkolnick; July 4, 1910 – February 23, 2003) was an American sociologist who is considered a founding father of modern sociology, and a major contributor to the subfield of criminology. He served as th ...
(professor of sociology,
Columbia University
Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...
).
*
Ellul, Jacques. ''The Technological System''. Trans. Joachim Neugroschel. New York: Continuum, 1980.
*
Glendinning, Chellis My Name Is Chellis and I’m in Recovery from Western Civilization''. Gabriola BC Canada: New Society Publishers/New Catalyst/ Sustainability Classics, 2007; and Boston: Shambhala Publications, 1994.
*
Jensen, Derrick. 1995, ''Listening to the Land: Conversations about Nature, Culture, and Eros'' (with George Draffan and John Osborn),
Sierra Club Books, Republished 2004 by Chelsea Green Publishing Company, .
*
Jensen, Derrick. 1995, ''Railroads and Clearcuts: Legacy of Congress's 1864 Northern Pacific Railroad Land Grant'' (with George Draffan and John Osborn), Keokee Company Publishing, .
*
Jensen, Derrick. 2000, ''
A Language Older Than Words'', Context Books, Republished 2004 by Chelsea Green Publishing Company, .
*
Jensen, Derrick. 2002 ''
The Culture of Make Believe'', New York: Context Books, Republished 2004 by Chelsea Green Publishing Company, .
*
Jensen, Derrick. 2003, ''Strangely Like War: The Global Assault on Forests'' (with George Draffan), Chelsea Green, .
*
Jensen, Derrick. 2004, ''Welcome to the Machine: Science, Surveillance, and the Culture of Control'' (with George Draffan), Chelsea Green Publishing Company, .
*
Jensen, Derrick. 2005, ''Walking on Water: Reading, Writing, and Revolution'', Chelsea Green, .
*
Jensen, Derrick. 2006, ''
Endgame
Endgame, Endgames, End Game, End Games, or similar variations may refer to:
Film
* ''The End of the Game'' (1919 film)
* ''The End of the Game'' (1975 film), short documentary U.S. film
* ''Endgame'' (1983 film), 1983 Italian post-apocalyptic f ...
, Volume 1: The Problem of Civilization'', Seven Stories Press, .
*
Jensen, Derrick. 2006, ''Endgame, Volume 2: Resistance'', Seven Stories Press, .
*
Jensen, Derrick. 2007, ''Thought to Exist in the Wild: Awakening from the Nightmare of Zoos'' (with Karen Tweedy-Holmes), No Voice Unheard, .
*
Jensen, Derrick. 2007, ''As the World Burns: 50 Simple Things You Can Do to Stay in Denial'' (with
Stephanie McMillan
Stephanie McMillan (born 1965) is an American political cartoonist, editorialist, and activist from South Florida. A granddaughter of the German commercial animator Hans Fischerkoesen, McMillan aspired to become a cartoonist from the age of t ...
), Seven Stories Press, .
*
Jensen, Derrick. 2008, ''How Shall I Live My Life?: On Liberating the Earth from Civilization'', PM Press, .
*
Jensen, Derrick. 2010, ''Lives Less Valuable'', PM Press, .
*
Jensen, Derrick. 2010, ''Resistance Against Empire'', PM Press, .
*
Jensen, Derrick. 2010, ''Mischief in the Forest: A Yarn Yarn'' (with Stephanie McMillan), PM Press, .
*
Jensen, Derrick. 2011, ''Deep Green Resistance'' (with
Lierre Keith and Aric McBay), Seven Stories Press, .
*
Jensen, Derrick. 2011, ''Truths Among Us: Conversations on Building a New Culture'', PM Press, .
*
Jensen, Derrick. 2012, ''The Derrick Jensen Reader: Writings on Environmental Revolution'' (edited by
Lierre Keith), Seven Stories Press, .
*
Jensen, Derrick. 2012, ''Earth at Risk: Building a Resistance Movement to Save the Planet'' (edited by D.J. and
Lierre Keith), PM Press, .
*
Kohr, Leopold. ''The Breakdown of Nations'', Routledge & K. Paul, 1957
1986 Routledge version at books.google.com; Chelsea Green Publishing Company edition, 2001.
*
Kohr, Leopold. ''The Overdeveloped Nations: The Diseconomies Of Scale'', Schocken, 1978.
*
Kohr, Leopold.
"Disunion Now: A Plea for a Society based upon Small Autonomous Units" originally published in The Commonweal (26 September 1941) under the pseudonym Hans Koh
''Telos''91 (Spring 1992). New York: Telos Press. 1941.
*
Mannin, Ethel. ''Small is Beautiful: Selected Writings from the complete works.'' Posthumous collection, Vienna, 1995.
*
Mannin, Ethel. ''Bread and Roses: A Utopian Survey and Blue-Print''. 1944.
*
Perlman, Fredy.
Against His-Story, Against Leviathan
Fredy Perlman (20 August 1934 – 26 July 1985) was an American author, publisher, and activist. His best-known work, ''Against His-Story, Against Leviathan!'', retells the historical rise of state domination through the Hobbesian metaphor of ...
br>
*
Isaac Puente, Puente, Isaac. ''El Comunismo Libertario y otras proclamas insurreccionales y naturistas.'' 1933.
*
Thoreau, Henry David. ''
Walden; or, Life in the Woods''. 1854.
*
Zerzan, John. ''Future Primitive Revisited''. Feral House, May 2012.
*
Zerzan, John. ''Origins of the 1%: The Bronze Age'' pamphlet.
Left Bank Books, 2012.
*
Zerzan, John. ''Origins: A John Zerzan Reader''. Joint publication of FC Press and Black and Green Press, 2010.
*
Zerzan, John. ''Twilight of the Machines''. Feral House, 2008.
*
Zerzan, John. ''Running On Emptiness''. Feral House, 2002.
*
Zerzan, John. ''Against Civilization'' (editor). Uncivilized Books, 1999; Expanded edition, Feral House, 2005.
*
Zerzan, John. ''Future Primitive''.
Autonomedia
Autonomedia is a nonprofit publisher based in Williamsburg, Brooklyn known for publishing works of criticism. Staffed by volunteers, they have published over 200 books, usually with 3,000 of each run. Its most renowned book is Hakim Bey's essays o ...
, 1994.
*
Zerzan, John. ''Questioning Technology'' (co-edited with Alice Carnes). Freedom Press, 1988; 2d edition, New Society, 1991, .
*
Zerzan, John. ''Elements of Refusal''. Left Bank Books, 1988; 2d edition, C.A.L. Press, 1999.
External links
The Institute for Social Ecology
* Articles tagged with
green and
ecology at The Anarchist Library.
Green Anarchy
REWILD.info.
Primitivism
Tiamat Publications.
The News from Nowhere Practical Green Anarchist ideas and theory.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Green Anarchism
Anarchist schools of thought
Animal Liberation Front
Animal rights and politics
Animal rights movement
Animal welfare
Earth Liberation Front
Green anarchists
Green politics
Political theories
Simple living