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<title>E.2 What do eco-anarchists propose instead of capitalism?</title>

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<h1>E.2 What do eco-anarchists propose instead of capitalism?</h1>

<p>
Given what eco-anarchists consider to be the root cause of 
our ecological problems (as discussed in the <a href="secE1.html">last section</a>), it 
should come as no surprise that they think that the current 
ecological crisis can only be really solved by eliminating those
root causes, namely by ending domination within humanity and 
creating an anarchist society. So here we will summarise the 
vision of the free society eco-anarchists advocate before 
discussing the limitations of various non-anarchist proposals 
to solve environmental problems in subsequent sections.
</p><p>
However, before so doing it is important to stress that eco-anarchists
consider it important to fight against ecological and social problems
today. Like all anarchists, they argue for direct action and 
solidarity to struggle for improvements and reforms under the 
current system. This means that eco-anarchism <i>"supports every effort
to conserve the environment"</i> in the here and now. The key difference 
between them and environmentalists is that eco-anarchists place such 
partial struggles within a larger context of changing society as a 
whole. The former is part of <i>"waging a delaying action against the
rampant destruction of the environment"</i> the other is <i>"a create movement
to totally revolutionise the social relations of humans to each other
and of humanity to nature."</i> [Murray Bookchin, <b>Toward an Ecological
Society</b>, p. 43] This is one of the key differences between an 
ecological perspective and an environmental one (a difference 
discussed in <a href="secE1.html#sece12">section E.1.2</a>). Finding ways to resist capitalism's 
reduction of the living world to resources and commodities and its 
plunder of the planet, our resistance to specific aspects of an 
eco-cidal system, are merely a starting point in the critique of 
the whole system and of a wider struggle for a better society. 
As such, our outline of an ecological society (or ecotopia) is not 
meant to suggest an indifference to partial struggles and reforms 
within capitalism. It is simply to indicate why anarchists are confident 
that ending capitalism and the state will create the necessary 
preconditions for a free and ecologically viable society.
</p><p>
This perspective flows from the basic insight of eco-anarchism, namely
that ecological problems are not separate from social ones. As we are 
part of nature, it means that how we interact and shape with it will be 
influenced by how we interact and shape ourselves. As Reclus put it
<i>"every people gives, so to speak, new clothing to the surrounding
nature. By means of its fields and roads, by its dwelling and every
manner of construction, by the way it arranges the trees and the 
landscape in general, the populace expresses the character of its
own ideals. If it really has a feeling for beauty, it will make
nature more beautiful. If, on the other hand, the great mass of 
humanity should remain as it is today, crude, egoistic and inauthentic,
it will continue to mark the face of the earth with its wretched 
traces. Thus will the poet's cry of desperation become a reality:
'Where can I flee? Nature itself has become hideous.'"</i> In order to
transform how we interact with nature, we need to transform how we
interact with each other. <i>"Fortunately,"</i> Reclus notes, <i>"a complete 
alliance of the beautiful and the useful is possible."</i> [quoted by
Clark and Martin (eds.) , <b>Anarchy, Geography, Modernity</b>,  p. 125 
and p. 28] 
</p><p>
Over a century later, Murray Bookchin echoed this insight:
</p><p><blockquote><i>
"The views advanced by anarchists were deliberately called <b>social</b> 
ecology to emphasise that major ecological problems have their roots 
in social problems -- problems that go back to the very beginnings of 
patricentric culture itself. The rise of capitalism, with a law of life 
based on competition, capital accumulation, and limitless growth, brought 
these problems -- ecological and social -- to an acute point; indeed, one 
that was unprecedented in any prior epoch of human development. Capitalist 
society, by recycling the organise world into an increasingly inanimate, 
inorganic assemblage of commodities, was destined to simplify the biosphere, 
thereby cutting across the grain of natural evolution with its ages-long 
thrust towards differentiation and diversity.
</p><p>
"To reverse this trend, capitalism had to be replaced by an ecological 
society based on non-hierarchical relationships, decentralised communities, 
eco-technologies like solar power, organic agriculture, and humanly scaled 
industries -- in short, by face-to-face democratic forms of settlement
economically and structurally tailored to the ecosystems in which they 
were located."</i> [<b>Remaking Society</b>, pp. 154-5]
</blockquote></p><p>
The vision of an ecological society rests on the obvious fact that people
can have both positive and negative impacts on the environment. In current
society, there are vast differences and antagonisms between privileged 
whites and people of colour, men and women, rich and poor, oppressor and 
oppressed. Remove those differences and antagonisms and our interactions
with ourselves and nature change radically. In other words, there is a vast 
difference between free, non-hierarchical, class, and stateless societies 
on the one hand, and hierarchical, class-ridden, statist, and authoritarian 
ones and how they interact with the environment.
</p><p>
Given the nature of ecology, it should come as no surprise that social
anarchists have been at the forefront of eco-anarchist theory and 
activism. It would be fair to say that most eco-anarchists, like most
anarchists in general, envision an ecotopia based on communist-anarchist
principles. This does not mean that individualist anarchists are 
indifferent to environmental issues, simply that most anarchists are
unconvinced that such solutions will actually end the ecological crisis
we face. Certain of the proposals in this section are applicable to 
individualist anarchism (for example, the arguments that co-operatives
will produce less growth and be less likely to pollute). However, others
are not. Most obviously, arguments in favour of common ownership and
against the price mechanism are not applicable to the market based
solutions of individualist anarchism. It should also be pointed out, 
that much of the eco-anarchist critique of capitalist approaches to 
ecological problems are also applicable to individualist and mutualist 
anarchism as well (particularly the former, as the latter does recognise 
the need to regulate the market). While certain aspects of capitalism 
would be removed in an individualist anarchism (such as massive 
inequalities of wealth, capitalist property rights as well as direct 
and indirect subsidies to big business), it is still has the 
informational problems associated with markets as well as a growth 
orientation.
</p><p>
Here we discuss the typical eco-anarchist view of a free ecological 
society, namely one rooted in social anarchist principles. Eco-anarchists, 
like all consistent anarchists advocate workers' self-management of the
economy as a necessary component of an ecologically sustainable society. 
This usually means society-wide ownership of the means of production and 
all productive enterprises self-managed by their workers (as described 
further in <a href="secI3.html">section I.3</a>). This is a key aspect of making a truly ecological 
society. Most greens, even if they are not anarchists, recognise the 
pernicious ecological effects of the capitalist "grow or die" principle; 
but unless they are also anarchists, they usually fail to make the 
connection between that principle and the <b>hierarchical form</b> of the 
typical capitalist corporation. The capitalist firm, like the state, is 
centralised, top-down and autocratic. These are the opposite of what an 
ecological ethos would suggest. In contrast, eco-anarchists emphasise 
the need for socially owned and worker self-managed firms. 
</p><p>
This vision of co-operative rather than hierarchical production is a common
position for almost all anarchists. Communist and non-communist social 
anarchists, like mutualists and collectivists, propose co-operative 
workplaces but differ in how best to distribute the products produced. The 
former urge the abolition of money and sharing according to need while the 
latter see income related to work and surpluses are shared equally among all 
members. Both of these systems would produce workplaces which would be 
under far less pressure toward rapid expansion than the traditional 
capitalist firm (as individualist anarchism aims for the abolition of 
rent, profit and interest it, too, will have less expansive workplaces).
</p><p>
The slower growth rate of co-operatives has been documented in a number 
of studies, which show that in the traditional capitalist firm, owners' 
and executives' percentage share of profits greatly increases as more
employees are added to the payroll. This is because the corporate
hierarchy is designed to facilitate exploitation by funnelling a
disproportionate share of the surplus value produced by workers to 
those at the top of the pyramid (see <a href="secC2.html">section C.2</a>) Such a design gives 
ownership and management a very strong incentive to expand, since, other 
things being equal, their income rises with every new employee hired. 
[David  Schweickart, <b>Against Capitalism</b>, pp. 153-4] Hence the 
hierarchical form of the capitalist corporation is one of the main 
causes of runaway growth as well as social inequality and the rise of
big business and oligopoly in the so-called "free" market.
</p><p>
By contrast, in an equal-share worker co-operative, the addition of more
members simply means more people with whom the available pie will have to
be equally divided -- a situation that immensely reduces the incentive to
expand. Thus a libertarian-socialist economy will not be under the same
pressure to grow. Moreover, when introducing technological innovations
or facing declining decline for goods, a self-managed workplace would be
more likely to increase leisure time among producers rather than increase
workloads or reduce numbers of staff. 
</p><p>
This means that rather than produce a few big firms, a worker-controlled
economy would tend to create an economy with more small and medium sized
workplaces. This would make integrating them into local communities and
eco-systems far easier as well as making them more easily dependent on 
green sources of energy. Then there are the other ecological advantages to 
workers' self-management beyond the relative lack of expansion of specific 
workplaces and the decentralisation this implies. These are explained 
well by market socialist David Schweickart:
</p><p><blockquote><i>
"To the extent that emissions affect the workers directly on the job
(as they often do), we can expect a self-managed firm to pollute less.
Workers will control the technology; it will not be imposed on them 
from without.
</p><p>
"To the extent that emissions affect the local community, they are 
likely to be less severe, for two reasons. Firstly, workers (unlike 
capitalist owners) will necessarily live nearby, and so the 
decision-makers will bear more of the environmental costs directly. 
Second . . . a self-managed firm will not be able to avoid local 
regulation by running away (or threatening to do so). The great 
stick that a capitalist firm holds over the head of a local community 
will be absent. Hence absent will be the macrophenomenon of various 
regions of the country trying to compete for firms by offering a 
'better business climate' (i.e. fewer environmental restrictions)."</i> 
[<b>Op. Cit.</b>, p. 145] 
</blockquote></p><p>
For an ecological society to work, it requires the active participation 
of those doing productive activity. They are often the first to be 
affected by industrial pollution and have the best knowledge of how 
to stop it happening. As such, workplace self-management is an 
essential requirement for a society which aims to life in harmony
with its surrounds (and with itself, as a key aspect of social 
unfreedom would be eliminated in the form of wage slavery). 
</p><p>
For these reasons, libertarian socialism based on producer co-operatives 
is essential for the type of economy necessary to solve the ecological 
crisis. These all feed directly into the green vision as <i>"ecology points 
to the necessity of decentralisation, diversity in natural and social 
systems, human-scale technology, and an end to the exploitation of 
nature."</i> [John Clark, <b>The Anarchist Moment</b>, p. 115] This can only be
achieved on a society which bases itself on workers' self-management 
as this would facilitate the decentralisation of industries in ways 
which are harmonious with nature.
</p><p>
So far, all forms of social anarchism are in agreement. However, 
eco-anarchists tend to be communist-anarchists and oppose both
mutualism and collectivism. This is because workers' ownership and 
self-management places the workers of an enterprise in a position 
where they can become a particularistic interest within their 
community. This may lead to these firms acting purely in their own 
narrow interests and against the local community. They would be, 
in other words, outside of community input and be solely accountable 
to themselves. This could lead to a situation where they become 
"collective capitalists" with a common interest in expanding their 
enterprises, increasing their "profits" and even subjecting themselves 
to irrational practices to survive in the market (i.e., harming 
their own wider and long-term interests as market pressures have 
a distinct tendency to produce a race to the bottom -- see 
<a href="secI1.html#seci13">section I.1.3</a> for more discussion). This leads most eco-anarchists 
to call for a confederal economy and society in which communities 
will be decentralised and freely give of their resources without 
the use of money. 
</p><p>
As a natural compliment to workplace self-management, eco-anarchists
propose communal self-management. So, although it may have appeared that 
we focus our attention on the economic aspects of the ecological crisis 
and its solution, this is not the case. It should always be kept in mind 
that all anarchists see that a complete solution to our many ecological 
and social problems must be multi-dimensional, addressing all aspects of 
the total system of hierarchy and domination. This means that only anarchism, 
with its emphasis on the elimination of authority in <b>all</b> areas of life, 
goes to the fundamental root of the ecological crisis. 
</p><p>
The eco-anarchist argument for direct (participatory) democracy is that
effective protection of the planet's ecosystems requires that all people
are able to take part at the grassroots level in decision-making
that affects their environment, since they are more aware of their 
immediate eco-systems and more likely to favour stringent environmental 
safeguards than politicians, state bureaucrats and the large, polluting 
special interests that now dominate the "representative" system of government.
Moreover, real change must come from below, not from above as this is
the very source of the social and ecological problems that we face as it
divests individuals, communities and society as a whole of their power,
indeed right, to shape their own destinies as well as draining them of
their material and "spiritual" resources (i.e., the thoughts, hopes and 
dreams of people).
</p><p>
Simply put, it should be hardly necessary to explore in any great
depth the sound ecological and social reasons for decentralising 
decision making power to the grassroots of society, i.e. to the 
people who have to live with the decisions being reached. The 
decentralised nature of anarchism would mean that any new 
investments and proposed solutions to existing problems would be
tailored to local conditions. Due to the mobility of capital, laws
passed under capitalism to protect the environment have to be created
and implemented by the central government to be effective. Yet the
state, as discussed in <a href="secE1.html">section E.1</a>, is a centralised structure 
unsuited to the task of collecting and processing the information and 
knowledge required to customise decisions to local ecological and social 
circumstances. This means that legislation, precisely due to its scope, 
cannot be finely tuned to local conditions (and so can generate local 
opposition, particularly if whipped up by corporate front organisations).
In an eco-anarchist society, decentralisation would not have the threat
of economic power hanging over it and so decisions would be reached which 
reflected the actual local needs of the population. As they would be 
unlikely to want to pollute themselves or their neighbours, eco-anarchists 
are confident that such local empowerment will produce a society which
lives with, rather than upon, the environment.
</p><p>
Thus eco-communities (or eco-communes) are a key aspect of an ecotopia.
Eco-communes, Bookchin argued, will be <i>"networked confederally through 
ecosystems, bioregions, and biomes"</i> and be <i>"artistically tailored to 
their naturally surrounding. We can envision that their squares will 
be interlaced by streams, their places of assembly surrounded by 
groves, their physical contours respected and tastefully landscaped,
their soils nurtured caringly to foster plant variety for ourselves,
our domestic animals, and wherever possible the wildlife they may
support on their fringes."</i> They would be decentralised and <i>"scaled
to human dimensions,"</i> using recycling as well as integrating <i>"solar, 
wind, hydraulic, and methane-producing installations into a highly
variegated pattern for producing power. Agriculture, aquaculture,
stockraising, and hunting would be regarded as crafts -- an
orientation that we hope would be extended as much as possible
to the fabrication of use-values of nearly all kinds. The need
to mass-produce goods in highly mechanised installations would 
be vastly diminished by the communities' overwhelming emphasis on
quality and permanence."</i> [<b>The Ecology of Freedom</b>, p. 444]
</p><p>
This means that local communities will generate social and economic 
policies tailored to their own unique ecological circumstances, in 
co-operation with others (it is important stress that eco-communes do
not imply supporting local self-sufficiency and economic autarchy 
as values in themselves). Decisions that have regional impact are 
worked out by confederations of local assemblies, so that everybody 
affected by a decision can participate in making it. Such a system 
would be self-sufficient as workplace and community participation 
would foster creativity, spontaneity, responsibility, independence, 
and respect for individuality -- the qualities needed for a 
self-management to function effectively. Just as hierarchy shapes
those subject to it in negative ways, participation would shape us
in positive ways which would strengthen our individuality and 
enrich our freedom and interaction with others and nature.
</p><p>
That is not all. The communal framework would also impact on how industry 
would develop. It would allow eco-technologies to be prioritised in terms 
of R&D and subsidised in terms of consumption. No more would green
alternatives and eco-technologies be left unused simply because most 
people cannot afford to buy them nor would their development be 
under-funded simply because a capitalist sees little profit form it 
or a politician cannot see any benefit from it. It also means that the 
broad outlines of production are established at the community assembly 
level while they are implemented in practice by smaller collective bodies 
which also operate on an egalitarian, participatory, and democratic basis. 
Co-operative workplaces form an integral part of this process, having
control over the production process and the best way to implement 
any general outlines. 
</p><p>
It is for these reasons that anarchists argue that common ownership
combined with a use-rights based system of possession is better for
the environment as it allows everyone the right to take action to
stop pollution, not simply those who are directly affected by it.
As a framework for ecological ethics, the communal system envisioned
by social anarchists would be far better than private property and 
markets in protecting the environment. This is because the pressures
that markets exert on their members would not exist, as would the
perverse incentives which reward anti-social and anti-ecological 
practices. Equally, the anti-ecological centralisation and hierarchy
of the state would be ended and replaced with a participatory system
which can take into account the needs of the local environment and
utilise the local knowledge and information that both the state 
and capitalism suppresses.
</p><p>
Thus a genuine solution to the ecological crisis presupposes communes,
i.e. participatory democracy in the social sphere. This is a transformation 
that would amount to a political revolution. However, as Bakunin continually
emphasised, a political revolution of this nature cannot be envisioned 
without a <b>socio-economic</b> revolution based on workers' self-management. 
This is because the daily experience of participatory decision-making, 
non-authoritarian modes of organisation, and personalistic human 
relationships would not survive if those values were denied during working 
hours. Moreover, as mentioned above, participatory communities would be 
hard pressed to survive the pressure that big business would subject them 
to. 
</p><p>
Needless to say, the economic and social aspects of life cannot be
considered in isolation. For example, the negative results of workplace 
hierarchy and its master-servant dynamic will hardly remain there. Given 
the amount of time that most people spend working, the political 
importance of turning it into a training ground for the development 
of libertarian values can scarcely be overstated. As history has 
demonstrated, political revolutions that are not based upon social 
changes and mass psychological transformation -- that is, by a 
deconditioning from the master/slave attitudes absorbed from the 
current system -- result only in the substitution of new ruling 
elites for the old ones (e.g. Lenin becoming the new "Tsar" and 
Communist Party aparatchiks becoming the new "aristocracy"). 
Therefore, besides having a slower growth rate, worker co-operatives 
with democratic self-management would lay the psychological foundations 
for the kind of directly democratic political system necessary to 
protect the biosphere. Thus "green" libertarian socialism is the only 
proposal radical enough to solve the ecological crisis. 
</p><p>
Ecological crises become possible only within the context of social
relations which weaken people's capacities to fight an organised 
defence of the planet's ecology and their own environment. This 
means that the restriction of  participation in decision-making 
processes within hierarchical organisations such as the state and 
capitalism firms help create environmental along with social problems 
by denying those most affected by a problem the means of fixing it. 
Needless to say, hierarchy within the workplace is a prerequisite to 
accumulation and so growth while hierarchy within a community is a 
prerequisite to defend economic and social inequality as well as 
minority rule as the disempowered become indifferent to community 
and social issues they have little or no say in. Both combine to
create the basis of our current ecological crisis and both need
to be ended.
</p><p>
Ultimately, a free nature can only begin to emerge when we live in a fully 
participatory society which itself is free of oppression, domination and
exploitation. Only then will we be able to rid ourselves of the idea of 
dominating nature and fulfil our potential as individuals and be a creative 
force in natural as well social evolution. That means replacing the current
system with one based on freedom, equality and solidarity. Once this is
achieved, <i>"social life will yield a sensitive development of human and
natural diversity, falling together into a well balanced harmonious
whole. Ranging from community through region to entire continents, we
will see a colourful differentiation of human groups and ecosystems,
each developing its unique potentialities and exposing members of the
community to a wide spectrum of economic, cultural and behavioural 
stimuli. Falling within our purview will be an exciting, often dramatic,
variety of communal forms -- here marked by architectural and industrial
adaptations to semi-arid ecosystems, there to grasslands, elsewhere by
adaptation to forested areas. We will witness a creative interplay 
between individual and group, community and environment, humanity and
nature."</i> [Bookchin, <b>Post-Scarcity Anarchism</b>, p. 39]
</p><p>
So, to conclude, in place of capitalism eco-anarchists favour ecologically 
responsible forms of libertarian socialism, with an economy based on the 
principles of complementarily with nature; decentralisation (where possible 
and desirable) of large-scale industries, reskilling of workers, and a 
return to more artisan-like modes of production; the use of eco-technologies
and ecologically friendly energy sources to create green products; the use 
of recycled and recyclable raw materials and renewable resources; the 
integration of town and country, industry and agriculture; the creation of
self-managed eco-communities which exist in harmony with their surroundings;
and self-managed workplaces responsive to the wishes of local community 
assemblies and labour councils in which decisions are made by direct 
democracy and co-ordinated (where appropriate and applicable) from the 
bottom-up in a free federation. Such a society would aim to develop the
individuality and freedom of all its members in order to ensure that 
we end the domination of nature by humanity by ending domination within
humanity itself. 
</p><p>
This is the vision of a green society put forth by Murray Bookchin. To 
quote him:
</p><p><blockquote><i>
"We must create an ecological society -- not merely because such a
society is desirable but because it is direly necessary. We must 
begin to live in order to survive. Such a society involves a 
fundamental reversal of all the trends that mark the historic 
development of capitalist technology and bourgeois society --
the minute specialisation or machines and labour, the concentration
of resources and people in gigantic industrial enterprises and 
urban entities, the stratification and bureaucratisation of life,
the divorce of town from country, the objectification of nature
and human beings. In my view, this sweeping reversal means that 
we must begin to decentralise our cities and establish entirely 
new eco-communities that are artistically moulded to the ecosystems
in which they are located . . . 
</p><p>
"Such an eco-community . . . would heal the split between town and
country, indeed, between mind and body by fusing intellectual with
physical work, industry with agriculture in a rotation or 
diversification of vocational tasks. An eco-community would be 
supported by a new kind of technology -- or eco-technology --
one composed of flexible, versatile machinery whose productive
applications would emphasise durability and quality . . ."</i>
[<b>Toward an Ecological Society</b>, pp. 68-9]
</blockquote></p><p>
Lastly, we need to quickly sketch out how anarchists see
the change to an ecological society happening as there is little
point having an aim if you have no idea how to achieve it.
</p><p>
As noted above, eco-anarchists (like all anarchists) do not counterpoise 
an ideal utopia to existing society but rather participate in current 
ecological struggles. Moreover, we see that struggle itself as the 
link between what is and what could be. This implies, at minimum, a 
two pronged strategy of neighbourhood movements and workplace organising
as a means of both fighting and abolishing capitalism. These would work 
together, with the former targeting, say, the disposal of toxic wastes 
and the latter stopping the production of toxins in the first place. 
Only when workers are in a position to refuse to engage in destructive 
practices or produce destructive goods can lasting ecological change 
emerge. Unsurprisingly, modern anarchists and anarcho-syndicalists have 
been keen to stress the need for a green syndicalism which addresses 
ecological as well as economical exploitation. The ideas of community
and industrial unionism are discussed in more detail 
in <a href="secJ5.html">section J.5</a> 
along with other anarchist tactics for social change. Needless to
say, such organisations would use direct action as their means of
achieving their goals (see <a href="secJ2.html">section J.2</a>). It 
should be noted that some 
of Bookchin's social ecologist followers advocate, like him, greens
standing in local elections as a means to create a counter-power to
the state. As we discuss in <a href="secJ5.html#secj514">section J.5.14</a>, 
this strategy (called
Libertarian Municipalism) finds few supporters in the wider anarchist 
movement.
</p><p>
This strategy flows, of course, into the structures of an ecological 
society. As we discuss in <a href="secI2.html#seci23">section I.2.3</a>, 
anarchists argue that the 
framework of a free society will be created in the process of fighting
the existing one. Thus the structures of an eco-anarchist society (i.e.
eco-communes and self-managed workplaces) will be created by fighting the 
ecocidal tendencies of the current system. In other words, like all 
anarchists eco-anarchists seek to create the new world while fighting 
the old one. This means what we do now is, however imperfect, an example 
of what we propose instead of capitalism. That means we act in an 
ecological fashion today in order to ensure that we can create an 
ecological society tomorrow.
</p><p>
For more discussion of how an anarchist society would work, see 
<a href="secIcon.html">section I</a>. We will discuss the limitations of various proposed 
solutions to the environmental crisis in the following sections.
</p>

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