Center for Humans and Nature

Ideas of Humans and Nature

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Humans, Nature, and Democracy: Ecological Political Economy

Lead Staff: Bruce Jennings, M.A.

Rationale

The world is becoming acutely aware of critical problems associated with the global capitalist and neoliberal economic system. After the collapse of 2007-2008, the current system was rescued, but it has not been repaired. Among the central tenets of the current economic system are unlimited growth and belief in the supremacy of the free market, and the implementation of these doctrines seriously undermines the Earth’s ecological and social systems. Our economic habits of thought and our scientific understanding of ecological capacities and limits of the biosphere are seriously out of alignment. It is now essential to re-conceive basic economic models, and the underlying worldviews, conceptions of nature, and ethical frameworks upon which both the discipline of economics and the institutional structure of an economy rest. And it is no less essential to examine the implications that a new ecological framework for political economy has for governance, democracy, and the responsibilities of ecological citizenship.

History and Partners

 In late 2009, the Center launched a series of multidisciplinary meetings with approximately fifteen experts representing the natural sciences (especially evolutionary biology and ecology), the social sciences, law, and the humanities (including philosophy and theology). Key collaborators include Peter Brown (McGill University and Senior Scholar, Center for Humans and Nature), Richard Bernstein and Dmitri Nikulin (The New School for Social Research) and David Smith and Stephen Latham (Yale University).

There are two on-going tracks within this project. Track I focuses on the reconceptualization of basic economic categories, such as growth, wealth, prosperity, happiness, property, and social and intergenerational justice. Track II of the project looks at the transformation of private life and of our understanding of the human person or self that is implicated in an ecological worldview and an ecological economy. How are we to understand individuality in a much more tightly interdependent society? What shape will the basic ethical and legal concepts of rights, freedom, privacy, and the distinction between the public sphere and the private sphere take in the coming era? Cutting across both tracks of the project is the question of the future of democratic governance. Will a new political economy require more elitist and authoritarian modes of governance? Or will stronger and more extensive democratic citizenship, participation, deliberation and empowerment be the best way to realize ecological goals?

Goals and Strategies

The goal of this project is to create and communicate new and renewed conceptual frameworks for the long-term well being of humans and nature. Our conviction is that lasting solutions to the current social and ecological crises will only emerge through fundamental transformations in our worldviews, and this project frames central research questions and targets key audiences accordingly. To this end, we draw on the insights of multiple worldviews, across cultures and academic disciplines, by conducting original research and convening experts around a particular challenge or series of challenges. We are committed to communicating our ideas broadly, through books, white papers, journal articles, symposia, and social media. 

What’s Next

The next meeting for our multidisciplinary research group is in December of2010. A final meeting will be held in the spring of 2011. The project will result in a number of written products, including: commissioned papers presented at seminars to be published in a book or a special issue of an appropriate magazine or journal and a “green paper,” written by CHN project staff. During March to December of 2011, the project work will principally consist of staff research and writing of the green paper, tentatively entitled: The Imperative of an Ecological Political Economy: Ethical Foundations and Governance, and the final preparation of an edited volume of commissioned papers by project participants. This collection will supplement and elaborate on the argument and recommendations of the green paper. Bruce Jennings will also work with CHN Senior Scholar, Peter Brown, on a co-authored volume on governance of an economic system which is constructed in light of scientific perspectives on ecology, evolution, and energy systems (e.g., an ethics of respect for nature).