A forgotten comment by a noted Marxist, on our collective responsibility to preserve natural wealth so that future generations can survive and flower.
Ernest Mandel on productivism, limits to growth, and socialist human development
Archive | Quotes & Insights
E.P. Thompson on human nature and socialism
A 1960 passage that is even more relevant today …
Early warning 2: Commoner on global warming
50 years ago, Barry Commoner explained why rising levels of carbon dioxide in the air could lead to disaster
Early warning: Bookchin on global warming
Bookchin got it right 50 years ago, long before anyone else noticed.
Quoting Bookchin
“The assumption that what currently exists ….”
Ulrich Beck: ‘Ecological crisis is a breach of fundamental rights’
A key insight from the author of ‘Risk Society’
Is capitalism 'obsessed' with growth?
Are fish ‘obsessed’ with water?
Neil Smith on the fight for the unity of nature
“Socialism is neither a utopia nor a guarantee. It is however the place and the time where and when the unity of nature becomes a real possibility.”
I don't believe in charity
Edward Galeano on solidarity …
China Miéville on art and politics
A Marxist science fiction writer on how we feel about the art we like or dislike, and how that relates to politics
Che: Marxism is an essential part of humanity's heritage
Che Guevara, 1960: When asked whether or not we are Marxists, our position is the same as that of a physicist, when asked if he is a “Newtonian” or of a biologist when asked if he is a “Pasteurian.”
George Novack: The mission of humankind
[Quotes and Insights #32] “The present inhabitants of the earth are the raw material for the production of an authentically human race.”
Michael Lebowitz: In the beginning is the dream
[Quotes and Insights #31] “That dream moves us – even as we catch only fleeting glimpses.”
Robert Biel: Imperialism and ecocide
If capitalism had been established in one small society in a small area it would consume itself in its unsustainability and cease to exist. But it is inherently global, and this is the problem.
Paulo Freire: The 'generosity' of the oppressors is nourished by death, despair, and poverty
True generosity consists precisely in fighting to destroy the causes which nourish false charity. False charity constrains the fearful and subdued, the “rejects of life,” to extend their trembling hands.
Richard Levins: Capitalism, hunger and health
[Quotes and Insights #28] “The continuation of hunger in the modern world is not the result of an intractable problem thwarting our best efforts to feed people. Rather, agriculture in the capitalist world is directly concerned with profit and only indirectly with feeding people. “Similarly, the organization of health care is directly an economic enterprise […]
Paul Sweezy: Capitalism versus the environment
[Quotes and Insights #27] Since there is no way to increase the capacity of the environment to bear the burdens placed on it, it follows that the adjustment must come entirely from the other side of the equation. And since the disequilibrium has already reached dangerous proportions, it also follows that what is essential for […]
Bertolt Brecht: A song about carbon pricing
[Quotes and Insights #26] by Dave Riley Die Massnahme (The Measures Taken or The Decision) was the first of Bertolt Brecht’s “learning” plays. It is a heavily didactic perhaps — even a tres propagandistic (egads!) and shocking — but is nonetheless beautifully conceived and written with music by Hans Eisler. It premièred at the Berlin Schauspielhaus […]
Friedrich Engels: Can humanity conquer nature?
[Quotes and Insights #25] A persistent myth holds that Marx and Engels had unlimited faith in humanity’s ability to conquer nature and create ever more abundance — and no interest in sustainability or ecology. The myth falls apart when we examine what they actually wrote. “Let us not, however, flatter ourselves overmuch on account of […]
Murray Bookchin: Anthropocentrism versus biocentrism – a false dichotomy
[Quotes and Insights #24] Introduction by Ian Angus — Some green writers, particularly those who support the viewpoint known as deep ecology, accuse socialist environmentalists of anthropocentrism, of giving absolute priority to human needs and ignoring or downplaying the needs of non-human nature. To that, they counterpose what is variously called biocentrism or ecocentrism – the […]