The Environmentalist’s Tools: "An Ecomoderist Manifesto" and Beyond

 

The Breakthrough Institute is a research center based in the Bay Area of California devoted to finding “technological solutions to environmental and human development challenges.” It supports efforts to curb climate change through the implementation of advanced technologies and the rapid modernization of developing countries. Members of the Breakthrough Institute are frustrated by the underutilization of life-saving technologies such as affordable nuclear power, genetic modification in agriculture, and water desalination in the places where they are most needed. “An Ecomodernist Manifesto” (2015) is a short outline of the Institute’s philosophy co-authored by 18 of its members who span fields from economics to documentary filmmaking. 

“An Ecomodernist Manifesto” is divided into seven sections that each grapple with an element of “ecomodernism.” For the sake of brevity, I will try to summarize each section succinctly but it is essential to note that much detail will be lost in translation. 

1. The manifesto begins with a brief history of recent accomplishments of humanity as a species: increased life span, decreased violence, the proliferation of personal liberties, etc. Given these outcomes of economic growth and globalization, the manifesto opposes the 1970’s concept of the “limits to growth.” If done correctly, humanity can continue to use increasing amounts of energy and grow their economies without further damaging the planet. 

2. The human impact on the environment is currently peaking. In the coming years, the population will begin to decline and urbanization will free more land for “re-wilding” and “re-greening” the planet. 

3. The manifesto challenges environmentalist rhetorics that subtly valorize the “noble savage.” Early human societies did not “tread lightly” on the land, requiring a much greater amount of resources per-capita to sustain significantly smaller populations. Modern technologies allow us to “decouple” from the “natural world”: “Nature unused is nature spared.” 

4. Energy has the profound potential to lift people out of poverty and further “decouple” us from nature. We should collaborate internationally to build energy infrastructures reliant on carbon-free, high-density energy sources such as next-generation solar, molten salt fission, and hydrogen fusion. 

5. The proposed endeavor to “decouple” from nature is not solely utilitarian; it also is rooted in our affinity for “wild” and “preserved” nature. 

6. Natural “decoupling” must not be conflated with free-market capitalism. To perform a just and equitable decoupling, we must collaborate internationally and build coalitions, leading to a more interconnected world. 

7. Plurality and democracy are some of ecomodernism’s central values, and the philosophy opposes extremism and dogmatism. Above all, ecomodernism is possible. 

Despite its criticisms of the dogmas of the environmental movement, “An Ecomodernist Manifesto” has profound metaphysical shortcomings of its own. The first, and likely most fundamental, is the assumption that the best thing we humans can do for “nature” is to remove ourselves from it entirely. Such an assertion relies on a binary reminiscent of Western enlightenment philosophy and one that has been critiqued relentlessly by scholars within and outside of that tradition. This dichotomy is apparent in one of the Enlightenment’s most famous phrases: Descartes’ “I think therefore I am” and its concomitant divide between res extensa and res cogitans. If we are to derive being from cognitive function, a divide is proliferated between mind and body, placing the self that is beyond the realm of the “natural.” This framework for conceptualizing being is by no means universal, despite its naturalization within many Enlightenment-influenced societies. A second, equally controversial, assumption is that “development” is something that is universally desirable. It is impossible to deny that Western intervention has decimated local economies in nations that have yet to “develop.” However, to propose that the energy-rich consumption lifestyle of “developed” nations is the most desirable framework for all human life seems to ignore millennia of plural cultural histories from which plural “modernization” frameworks could emerge. 

Deeply entangled with the eurocentrism found in “An Ecomodernist Manifesto” there is nevertheless an important critique of mainstream environmentalism. While the manifesto may not provide us with a useful framework for doing so, it proposes that the environmental movement refocus on advocating for material changes that help save human lives in the present. I have had the opportunity to meet many members of the Institute and my experience with them has given me insight into the relationships at play between religion, environmentalism, and capitalism from the perspective of the ecomodernists. Ecomodernists often critique what they perceive to be the “religious” qualities of mainstream environmentalism, asserting that the movement’s ideals have become so lofty that they have become detached from material reality, becoming distant from the urgency of the environmental crisis. While there may be validity in this critique, such accusation neglects the fact that the same relationship exists between ecomodernism and capitalism. In both mainstream environmentalism and ecomodernism, specific tools are utilized as the driving force behind the movement, tools that both have a tendency towards dogmatism. 

Perhaps the question then becomes not what to do, but how to do it? What tools must we use to bring about desirable change? Both ecomodernism and mainstream environmentalism are right to seek out some larger framework that pushes their movement beyond theory, as effective tools to encourage direct action - even as such a framework risks becoming a dogma. Ecomodernism’s reliance on capitalism as a driving force may have the same dangers as mainstream environmentalism’s dependence on more obviously religious forms of devotion. There may be yet other tools buried at the bottom of the toolbox. From the confrontation between ecological metaphysics and ecomodernism a path might begin to emerge, one that is plural and collaborative and just. There may be a way for environmentalism to become an emergent quality of healthier, more equitable societies. 

(CS)

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