Ecology and Marx's Vision of Communism

By Paul Burkett

Among the factors fomenting tensions between ecology and Marxism, perhaps the most important is the widespread view that Marx's vision of post-capitalist society not only treats natural conditions as effectively limitless but also embraces an anti-ecological ethic of technological optimism and human domination over nature. This interpretation is not just a product of facile identifications of Marx's projection with the historical experience of environmental havoc in the U.S.S.R. and other state-run "socialist" societies. The ecological incorrectness of Marx's communism is often asserted with reference to Marx's own writings.

In Alec Nove's reading, for example, Marx thought that "the problem of production had been 'solved'" by capitalism, so that communism would "not require to take seriously the problem of the allocation of scarce resources." Marx's communism thus presumes that "natural resources [are] inexhaustible," and that there is no need for "an environment-preserving, ecologically conscious, employment-sharing socialism" (Nove, 1990, pp. 230, 237). Evidently, Marx projected post-capitalist society as one of "abundance"-defined as "a sufficiency to meet requirements at zero price" (or what amounts to the same thing in Nove's view, production of goods and services at close to zero resource cost). This projection forced Marx into the absurd presumption that "scarce resources (oil, fish, iron ore, stockings, or whatever)... would not be scarce" under communism (Nove, 1983, pp. 15-6). Similarly, Andrew McLaughlin asserts that Marx "envisions a general material abundance" and provides "no basis for recognizing any interest in the liberation of nature from human domination" (1990, p. 95). Geoffrey Carpenter also refers to Marx's apparently unqualified "faith in the ability of an improved mode of production to eradicate scarcity indefinitely " (1997, p. 140). Lewis Feuer even claims that "Marx and Engels... placed so much faith in the creative dialectic" of economic history "that they could not seriously entertain the hypothesis that modern technology interacting with the earth's physical environment might imbalance the whole basis of modern industrial civilization" (1989, p. xii).¹

In responding to these charges, the present article investigates the extent to which Marx's vision of communism adheres to seven specific criteria for ecological soundness of economic systems: (1) the explicit recognition of society's managerial responsibility toward nature and its human appropriation; (2) systemic increases in ecological knowledge and its social diffusion among producers and communities; (3) ecological risk aversion based on a recognition of the limits to both human knowledge of and control over natural processes; (4) social cooperation to effectively regulate human ecological impacts from the global level on down; (5) respect for and encouragement of variety and diversity in human ways of life; (6) an ecological ethics involving a shared sense of membership in a human community enmeshed with natural conditions; and (7) new, pro-eco- logical definitions of  wealth explicitly recognizing the contribution of extra-human nature to human production and the limited character of natural conditions of any given quality.

To avoid misunderstanding, three things should be noted about this ecological evaluation of Marx's communism. First, my purpose is not to prove the technical and/or social feasibility of communist or "associated" production as projected by Marx but to consider whether there is anything fundamentally anti-ecological about its basic principles. Second, even though my main concern is with ecological correctness rather than overall feasibility, the inner consistency of Marx's communism is still important for my argument. Associated production must constitute an ecologically coherent vision-one meshing in a reasonable way with the free human development projected by Marx. Otherwise, Marx's communism would be a bootless vision, both ecologically and politically.²

Third, in proposing seven ecological criteria to be applied to Marx's vision of communism, no claim is being made that the criteria are comprehensive. Others may wish to apply their own criteria which may overlap with mine in greater or lesser degrees. Nonetheless, the following criteria seem to encompass the major ecological concerns that have been expressed by critics of Marx's communism.

A healthy and sustainable co-evolution of humanity and nature requires a socio-economic system with a built-in recognition of humanity's responsibility to manage its appropriation of nature, both qualitatively and quantitatively. For this purpose, the quality of natural conditions must be seen as encompassing aesthetic use values, not just nature's usefulness as a condition of industrial labor.

As four eminent ecologists point out, "humanity's dominance of earth means that we cannot escape responsibility for managing the planet"; even "maintaining the diversity of 'wild' species and the functioning of 'wild' ecosystems will require increasing human involvement" (Vitousek et al., 1997, p. 499). Given the biospheric impacts of human production, the question is no longer whether nature will be largely humanized but whether this humanization will be pro- or anti-ecological. Although a pro-ecological human production will not try to brutally force nature into desired shapes and forms, it will still need to gently and cautiously guide natural conditions in carefully chosen directions (Carson, 1962, pp. 275, 296). Socially developed human production cannot be purely natural in the same sense as the reproduction of other species sans human intervention. It follows that "the integration between humanity and nature" must be "consciously considered" in terms of "the mutual well-being of both" (Morrison, 1995, p. 182). The management of natural conditions in line with any given quality of human and natural life requires the explicit formulation and pursuit of social and ecological goals on local, national, and global levels-otherwise, "by default the options will close" (Dasmann, 1972, p. 221).

Marx clearly envisions post-capitalist society as recognizing its responsibility to manage its use of natural conditions. This respon- sibility manifests itself in the eclipse of capitalist notions of land ownership by communal user rights:

From the standpoint of a higher economic form of society, private ownership of the globe by single individuals will appear quite as absurd as private ownership of one man by another. Even a whole society, a nation, or even all simultaneously existing societies taken together, are not the owners of the globe. They are only its possessors, its usufructuaries, and, like boni patres familias, they must hand it down to succeeding generations in an improved condition. (1967, III, p. 776)

The ecological significance of Marx's conception of communal property is further discussed below; the point worth emphasizing here is that Marx does not see this property as conferring a right to overexploit land and other natural conditions in order to serve the production and consumption needs of the associated producers. Instead, the association treats "the soil" and other natural conditions "as eternal communal property, an inalienable condition for the existence and reproduction of a chain of successive generations of the human race" (1967, III, p. 812; emphases added). This built-in limitation of communal property rights to ensure long-run sustainability is strikingly similar to the position held by many indigenous American peoples, who believe that "the notion that any human, or group thereof, has sovereignty over any part of Mother Earth is a myth based upon the white man's Origin Story" (Hillerman, 1997, p. A23).³

Marx's insistence on the future society's responsibility toward the land follows from his projection of the unity of humanity and nature being realized in a higher form under communism. For Marx and Engels, people and nature are not "two separate 'things'"; hence they speak of people having "an historical nature and a natural history" (1976, p. 45; emphasis added). They observe how extra-human nature has been greatly altered by human production and development, so that "the nature that preceded human history...today no longer exists"; but they also recognize the ongoing importance of "natural instruments of production" in the use of which "individuals are subservient to nature" (pp. 46, 71). Communism, far from rupturing or trying to overcome the necessary unity of people and nature, makes this unity more transparent and places it at the service of a sustainable development of people as natural and social beings. Engels thus envisions the future society as one in which people will "not only feel but also know their oneness with nature" (1964, p. 183). The young Marx goes so far as to define communism as "the unity of being of man with nature" (1964, p. 137). In a more practical vein, Marx refers to the ongoing necessity for communist society to "wrestle with Nature to satisfy [its] wants, to maintain and reproduce life." This involves "the associated producers rationally regulating their interchange with nature, bringing it under their common control" (1967, III, p. 820). Such a rational regulation or "real conscious mastery of Nature" presumes, of course, that the producers have "become masters of their own social organisation" (Engels, 1939, p. 309).

Communism's acceptance of humanity's managerial responsibility toward nature is reflected in its "abolition of the contradiction between town and country," with its disruptive circulation of matter, as "one of the first conditions of communal life" (Marx & Engels, 1976, p. 72). As Engels puts it, the abolition of the antithesis between town and country is not merely possible. It has become a direct necessity of industrial production itself, just as it has become a necessity of agricultural production and, moreover, of public health. The present poisoning of the air, water and land can only be put an end to by the fusion of town and country... Only a society which makes possible the harmonious co-operation of its productive forces on the basis of one single vast plan can allow industry to settle in whatever form of distribution over the whole country is best adapted to its own development and the maintenance of development of the other elements of production. (1939, p. 323)⁴

In Capital, Marx foresees communism being built on a "higher synthesis" of "the old bond of union which held together agriculture and manufacture in their infancy." This new union is to work toward a "restoration" of "the naturally grown conditions for the maintenance of that circulation of matter" but "as a system, as a regulating law of social production, and under a form appropriate to the full development of the human race" (1967, I, pp. 505-6).⁵

Society's responsibility to manage natural conditions leads to a second criterion: the encouragement of "efforts to understand Earth's ecosystems and how they interact with the numerous components of human-caused global change" (Vitousek et al., 1997, p. 499). For this ecological knowledge to be applied throughout society's system of production and consumption, it will have to be thoroughly diffused among and grasped by producers and communities-and as such it will have to combine insights from both natural and social sciences. Ecological knowledge will often involve ways and means of limiting and channeling society's productive capabilities so as to maintain and improve the quality of natural conditions (Mumford, 1954, p. 113). It could mean, for example, "a system of alternatives assessment in which facilities regularly evaluate the availability of alternatives" to toxic forms of production and consumption, "coordinated with active attempts to develop and make available nontoxic alternatives for currently toxic processes and with systems of support for those making the transition" (Steingraber, 1997, p. 271). In this connection, one must recognize the possibility of an ecologically sound system making use of technologies developed prior to capitalism. Based on their survey of the soil damage associated with contemporary agriculture, for example, Matson et al. argue for "the development of more ecologically designed agricultural systems that reintegrate features of traditional agricultural knowledge and add new ecological knowledge" (1997, p. 508).⁶

Marx's communism contains several features that could greatly enhance the level and diffusion of the knowledge needed for sound ecological management of production. Marx envisions an expansion of "technical schools (theoretical and practical) in combination with the elementary school" (1966, p. 20).⁷

The "theoretical and practical" learning taking place in these schools will evidently represent new combinations of natural and social science. In the Paris Manuscripts, Marx projects that natural science... will become the basis of human science, as it has already become the basis of actual human life, albeit in an estranged form. One basis for life and another basis for science is a priori a lie... Natural science will in time incorporate into itself the science of man, just as the science of man will incorporate into itself natural science: there will be one science. (1964, p. 143; emphases in original)

The unification of natural and social science follows from communism's social union of the producers with the conditions of production. Capitalism, in Marx's view, alienates science (and other production conditions) vis-à-vis the producers (Burkett, 1999b, pp. 158-63). By placing scientific knowledge at the service of an exploitative division of labor, capital pushes the artificial division of natural and social science to an historical extreme. Communism's de-alienation of the conditions of production converts these conditions into means of the natural and social development of human beings, thereby negating the basis for false divisions between natural and social science.⁸

Marx also suggests that the younger members of communist society will experience "an early combination of productive labour with education"-presuming, of course, "a strict regulation of the working time according to the different age groups and other safety measures for the protection of children" (1966, p. 22).⁹ Indeed, Marx foresees a positive interchange between the intellectual develop- ment of all the producers during work-time and (expanded) free time, respectively. The point is developed in the Grundrisse:

Free time-which is both idle time and time for higher activity-has naturally transformed its possessor into a different subject, and he then enters into the direct production process as this different subject. This process is then both discipline, as regards the human being in the process of becoming; and, at the same time, practice, experimental science, materially creative and objectifying science, as regards the human being who has become, in whose head exists the accumulated knowledge of society. (Marx, 1973, p. 712)

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