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Dr. Woooo wrote: > http://climateandcapitalism.com/2016/06/06/in-defense-of-ecological-marxism-john-bellamy-foster-responds-to-a-critic/ Back in 2007, I reviewed one of Foster's earlier books, "Marxism and Ecology: Materialism and Nature" (2000). The review can be found at http://www.communistvoice.org/40cMarx.html. It shows the relevance of Marxism to fighting the current environmental crisis, but it also shows the flaws in Foster's work. (Not that Jason Moore is any better.) Foster is fond of fancy philosophical phrases like "metabolic rift", but obscures crucial issues brought to the fore by the environmental crisis . The subjects covered in the review: * The writings of Marx and Engels * Alongside and after Marx and Engels * Lenin and the early Soviet Union * Stalinist and state capitalist ecocide * Marxism and global warming * --Not market methods, but direct regulation of production * --Class basis of environmental destruction * --The nature of state regulation * --Bringing the masses into the environmental struggle * Foster's Marxism without teeth >From the last paragraph of the review: "... Foster's book is harmed by the lack of the very materialism he preaches about: it is an idealist, and even elitist, history of materialism, a doctrine which can only really thrive when it becomes a force among the masses.Nevertheless, his book does show that Marx and Engels were concerned with environmental issues. ... [and] he does end up giving a certain panorama of the views and polemics of a number of people of historical interest. ... But what he doesn't do, despite the title of his book, is give a picture of what Marxism really means for ecology. Foster would drown Marxism, a revolutionary doctrine with many sharp edges, in a sea of bland, philosophical generalities. So to actually see what Marxism says to do about the environment today, one has to go elsewhere. " -- Joseph Green _________________________________________________________ Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm Set your options at: http://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com