EPW Publication Call For Papers: -Revisiting Debates on Marxism and Ecology: Towards a new paradigm in Political Ecology

 

Revisiting Debates on Marxism and Ecology: Towards a new paradigm in Political Ecology

CALL FOR PAPERS and PHOTO ESSAYS

EPW Engage invites papers on the theme concerning debates on Marxism and Ecology. Marxian corpus on this question has remained untouched for a long time. It was only after the intervention of John Bellamy Foster in early 2000 that this debate was reinvigorated. In contemporary times this question has been framed in the light of the recent climate crisis.  Certain strands within Marxism due to an adherence to crude forms of economic determinism has somewhat ignored the pertinent question of ecology. This is despite the fact that categories or terms like economics and ecology share a common genealogy and roots.

The perceptive debate initiated by Engels in Dialectics of Nature; in which he sees the existence of nature and society as one metabolic process which exists in continuity. In other words, the processes unfolding in the social setting have a parallel in nature. This guides the course of social and natural evolution which can be explored in the light of contemporary understanding of ecology and society.  According to Marx, “capitalist production…disturbs the metabolic interaction between man and the earth, i.e. it prevents the return to the soil of its constituent elements consumed by man in the form of food and clothing; hence it hinders the operation of the eternal natural condition for the lasting fertility of the soil”. It can thus be argued that a certain sort of ecological understanding was inherent in Marx's original frame as is seen in the concept of metabolic rift and social ecology and as highlighted by Marxist naturalists like Richard Lewontin and scholars from Monthly Review School like John Bellamy Foster. Metabolic rift largely propounds the irrevocable damage inflicted on nature and agriculture by industrial capitalist development. According to Foster Marx’s “entire dialectical framework rested on what would today be called an ecological (or socioecological) systems theory, connecting the materialist conception of history to that of nature—and requiring continuing study not only of changing developments in human history, but also in natural history (which in Marx’s work took the form of extensive inquiries into geology, agronomy, chemistry, physics, biology, physiology, mathematics, and more).”

Now, the question that ensues from this discourse is that can this have a bearing on the questions germane to the Indian context like that of ecology and caste or different environmental conceptions and their link with caste and class in the Indian context? Can this Marxist discourse fundamentally deal with the complex question of caste, class and its interplay with ecology? Lastly, it would be an attempt to explore the theoretical debates and their implications on environmental policies. 

Sub-Themes

1.    Discourse on Political ecology: Understanding different paradigms on Nature/Value and Ethics. This particular sub-theme will explore different approaches to Political Ecology and the accompanying questions regarding ethics/morality and its interplay with nature.

2.  Revisiting Debates on Marxism, Ecology and Development.  This sub-theme would highlight the nuanced debates within the Marxian oeuvre, concerning ecology and its complex interaction with social and economic domains. It will specifically revisit the debate on the Marxian concept of metabolic rift.

3.   Understanding the complexities of Caste/Class and Environment. This section covers the complex interaction between castes/class dynamics and environment. It will further accentuate the common assertion of different environmentalism based on caste/class stratification.

4.    Philosophical underpinnings of Environmental Policies: Towards a New Framework. This section will explore the limitations of the contemporary environmental policy framework, especially its lack of engagement with the theoretical and philosophical debates concerning the environment.

5.  Conceptualizing Alternative Futures: Towards a Radical Ecological Democracy in India.  This sub-theme will focus on envisioning a future that radically departs from the contemporary dualistic thinking(which reifies nature and denaturalizes culture), that gets manifested in obsolete environmental policies and paradigms in India, in which the spheres of nature, social, political and economic are seen as separated from each other.

Important Information

Word limit: 2500-3500 words 

Deadline: 21st February 2022

Please refer to the submission guidelines here: https://www.epw.in/notes-contributors-epw-engage 

Send your articles to edit@epw.in with ‘EPW-Engage- Marxism and Ecology’ in the subject line.

 

Contact Info: 

Divya Jyoti- divya@epw.in   +918447301470

Priyam Mathur- priyam@epw.in

Contact Email: divya@epw.in