immanence

Manifestos are back in style (if this one, this one, and this one are any indication). Here’s my latest crack at a fairly simple statement of principle.

The lesson of the field of environmental studies, to which I’ve dedicated more than three decades of my life, is that there’s a civilizational task ahead of us.

(When I say “us,” I mean to invoke humanity, fully aware that it’s a category that’s far from unified and settled. What “humanity” might be remains an open question. And when I say “civilizational,” I mean to indicate the immense complexity of ideas and practices that hold together much of the human side of the world as we know it.)

The task is that of instituting two radical and simultaneous shifts, one “external” and one “internal.”

The “external” shift is from ways of living premised on the inevitable exhaustion of temporarily available resources (fossil fuels, among others) and despoliation of our collective habitat, to ways of living premised on relations of sustainable solidarity linking broad swaths of humanity with the nonhuman, creaturely world. In other words, on ecological sustainability, non-toxicity, and biophilic solidarity.  

The “internal” shift is from ways of coexistence premised on intergroup rivalry and competition—among states and supra-national alliances, economic classes, races, nations, cultures, religions—to those premised on species-wide solidarity, dignity, and respect. In other words, on equity and justice.

Decades-long efforts to demonstrate that the “external” shift could somehow be accomplished without the “internal” one have failed. Without the “internal” shift, any efforts to advance the “external” requirement will be stymied. Ecological sustainability and social justice go hand in hand.  

The challenge is civilizational, which means it is daunting. But this also means that there are countless ways to move forward: on the material, technical, sociopolitical, cultural, economic, ethical, aesthetico-perceptual, and other dimensions of this dual shift. The main requirement is that the imagery and narration infusing any strategy and coordinating its moving pieces be clearly and effectively articulated.

That’s why culture, in my estimation, comes first.

Culture means not just you and I, but who you think you are, and who I think I am. Who you think I am, and who I think you are. And so on down the line for all the I’s and you’s we might come across. How we talk to each other about these things, and how we see them, hear them, feel them, smell them, taste them, envision them, teach them, grow them, eat them, drink them, excrete them, and bury them.

That’s where we start, even as we figure out what each of us does to take our own steps forward.