DHUM 25A25 - Ontology, Epistemology and Politics of The Ecological Crisis

With the crossing of the freshwater limit in April 2022, six out of nine planetary boundaries have now been surpassed, according to climate science. Even the strongest climate deniers like Trump and Bolsonaro nowadays have to recognize the threat of the biosphere crisis to the human habitability of planet Earth. However, despite the shared recognition of the problem, the ontological, epistemological and political frameworks adequate to its resolution still diverge. Do we have to distinguish society from nature in order to understand how the former destroys the latter (Malm, Foster) or is this distinction part of the problem (Latour, Haraway, Moore)? In a first theoretical part, we will compare post-dualist approaches (advocating the abandonment of the society-nature distinction) with the theories that recognize a heuristic and epistemological value of the society-nature dualism. In a second practical perspective, we will map the range of policies, ideologies, and collective actions in response to the climate disaster: from neo-Malthusian eco-fascism defending a nationalist rootedness in the territory, to the liberal eco-modernism of green growth as well as the socialist project of a Green New Deal and the agroecological peasant movement La Via Campesina.

Marius BICKHARDT

Séminaire

English

You must be available for weekly readings of 20 pages and oral participation in class. Interest and familiarity in philosophy, political theory, and political science, as well as (scientific and political) ecology is appreciated but not necessary.

Autumn 2022-2023

The evaluation consists of three grades: a take-home (text commentary or essay), oral participation in class, and a critical review of one of the weekly readings.