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In short, the successful communal CPR system is typically, just as in Marx's projection, "a working, not a parliamentary, body, executive and legislative at the same time"-with producers and communities wielding the knowledge needed to self-manage their system of appropriation from nature (Marx, 1985, p. 71). In addition, both Marx's projection and extant communal CPR systems contain "rights and obligations that defy a simple 'public or private' categorization." They both feature universal access rights and limitations on individual use (communal regulation of appropriation); hence both "resemble neither individualized private property systems nor common property (open access, state management) systems" (Usher, 1993, pp. 93, 95). Both reject the notion that "land or wildlife" should be "considered a commodity that could be alienated to exclusive private possession"; both protect "the right to obtain sustenance" from nature; and they both insist on "obligations that go with the right"-above all the obligation to keep appropriation from nature within sustainable bounds (pp. 95-6). For both, in short, communal property is "in effect a right to both individual livelihood and collective identity and existence," one in which "people do not think of themselves as 'owning' land or wildlife in any private sense" (p. 98).

Marxists looking to extend Marx's vision of communism in ecological directions can learn much from contemporary research on communal CPR management. Ostrom, for example, emphasizes that in the most effective and sustainable systems, user rights are "well-tailored" to the CPRs being appropriated and to the broader system of social production within which such appropriation occurs. Not only do "appropriation rules...reflect the specific attributes of the particular resource," but they also "are related to local conditions and to provision rules requiring labor, materials, and/or money" (1990, p. 92). Penalties for violations of appropriation rules are likewise tailored to the severity of the infractions in both ecological and social terms, that is, in line with the losses of present and future use values (or risks thereof) that they generate (p. 94). In addition, the "individuals or households who have rights to withdraw resource units from the CPR must be clearly defined, as must the boundaries of the CPR itself" (p. 91). Here, Usher notes that aboriginal-Canadian systems often "combined principles of universal access and benefit within the group," with "territorial boundaries that were permeable according to social rules" (1993, p. 95). This is consistent with Ostrom's observations of communal property in larger-scale CPRs (e.g., regional and national water resources used for irrigation), which indicate the necessity of "multiple layers" of "nested" associations of users to regulate "appropriation, provision, monitoring, enforcement, conflict resolution, and governance activities" (1990, p. 101). Such research findings can lend some ecological concreteness to Marx's projection of the association as one in which "not only municipal administration, but the whole initiative hitherto exercised by the State [is] laid into the hands of the Commune" (1985, p. 72).

At the same time, contemporary researchers can learn from Marx about the prerequisites of communal CPR management. Along with Marx's acute awareness of the importance of combining natural and social scientific insights, modern researchers could benefit from Marx's analysis of capitalism's social separation of the producers from necessary conditions of production-a separation that stands directly in the way of an ecologically sound and communally beneficial management of these conditions. Any extension of communal CPR management to the entire system of human production hinges on a broad diffusion of decision-making powers and scientific knowledge among producers and communities. It also hinges, as Marx emphasizes, on large reductions in individual work-times so that the producers will have sufficient free time to engage in communal management and to develop their managerial capabilities.¹⁵ These changes are inconsistent with wage-labor and other key institutions of the capitalist economy (e.g., financial capital and market rents) that separate producers and communities from effective control over the conditions of production. The extension of communal CPR management is thus a direct infringement of the power of capital and its state functionaries. Without a frontal challenge to capitalist relations in favor of communal relations, extant pockets of communal CPR management will be isolated and marginalized by capital's ecologically unsound production on a global scale.

The diversity of natural conditions means that any systemic eco-rationality must encourage the maintenance and development of diverse ways of life. An ecologically sound system will thus "reserve certain areas of our planet, land and water" for "the preservation of older and simpler ways of living," while supporting efforts by modern-day "communitarians" to "develop viable communities that [are] increasingly independent of inputs from technological society" (Dasmann, 1972, p. 212; 1975, pp. 136-7). The preservation of such alternative paths of living will itself require cooperation at all levels, based on a widely diffused knowledge of the ecological practices involved and the potential losses to society should they be "swamped out" by the dominant, more industrial forms of production (Dasmann, 1972, pp. 212-3).

The variety and diversity criterion is not based simply on the need for humanity to adapt its development to a variegated environment. It is a positive social value insofar as it signifies a rich plurality of paths for human fulfillment and for developing people's natural and social capabilities. An ecologically sound system must be cooperatively managed by producers and communities willing and able to make prudent, ecologically informed decisions on a day- to-day basis. Such a society will have to provide a variety of channels for individual fulfillment, based on "an extraordinary diversity of community lifeways" (Morrison, 1995, p. 181; cf. Dasmann, 1975, p. 159). Respect for variety and diversity can also help society avoid the misuse of ecological thinking as a rationale for a new tyranny of the collective over the individual (Pepper, 1993, p. 125). An ecologically sound system "must take into account varying needs and desires based on age, background, and personal preference"; otherwise, "there will be very little support" for such a system (Wright, 1983, p. 84). Without individual freedom and choice, the system cannot be an effective "vehicle for debate and experimentation that helps test what works best for different circumstances and objectives" (Brecher & Costello, 1994, p. 172; cf. Harvey, 1993, pp. 44-5).

Is Marx's communist vision open to diverse forms of human production and community, as required for society to healthily enmesh itself with the variegated and evolving world of extra- human nature? The answer does not hinge directly on The German Ideology's projection of infinitely increased variety in individual human activity once the association dispenses with all specialization of individuals' tasks within its division of labor.¹⁶ Even if this forecast is relevant only for a distant future, Marx's adherence to the variety/diversity criterion is arguably ensured by the potential for free human development that he sees created by capitalism and realized under communism.

Marx argues that capitalism is historically progressive not just because it increases the productivity of social labor (thereby increasing the potential free time of the producers), but because in doing so it broadens and diversifies the natural and social conditions of human production, thereby making possible a richer development of indi- viduals (Burkett, 1999a). Capitalism's development of social production opens up individual  development to the universal scope and variety of human and extra-human nature. At the same time, however, capitalism restricts and degrades people and nature in line with its requirements of exploitable labor power and conditions amenable to its exploitation. Capital not only usurps workers' potential free time, but also artificially simplifies, divides, and overextends the wealth-creating powers of labor and nature, partly by alienating scientific knowledge from producers and communities (Burkett, 1999b, Chapters 7 and 11). As a result, the human development potentiated by capitalism can only be realized through an explicit communalization of the conditions of production and their conversion from means of capital accumulation into means of de- veloping human beings. Given capital's socialization of production, free individual development and diversity in human ways of life require a communal regulation of production.

In short, Marx envisions communist production not just as a cooperative planning project but, more important, as a condition and result of free human development or "the all-round realisation of the individual"-"the development of the richness of human nature as an end in itself" (Marx & Engels, 1976, p. 309; Marx, 1968, pp. 117-8, emphasis in original). This conception of human development conforms to the variety and diversity criterion insofar as it foresees individuals for "whom the different social functions... are but so many modes of giving free scope to [their] own natural and acquired powers" (Marx, 1967, I, p. 488). Communism's "full development of [human] capacities" means, according to Engels, that "all members of society [can] develop, maintain and exert their capacities in all possible directions" (1939, pp. 167, 221; emphasis in original). Practically speaking, of course, such pursuit of diverse ways of life hinges on society's provision to all individuals of "the means of cultivating [their] gifts in all directions." In this sense, "personal freedom becomes possible only within the community" (Marx & Engels, 1976, p. 86).

Despite this emphasis on free, multi-directional human development, Marx and Engels do not directly address the diversification of communist production relations under the influence of variegated natural conditions. Nonetheless, Marx's analyses of production in general and capitalist production in particular show an acute awareness of how natural conditions help shape the organization of human production-and this awareness is often expressed in terms suggesting an ongoing mutual constitution of natural conditions and social production relations under communism (Burkett, 1999b, Chapters 2-6). In Theories of Surplus Value, for example, Marx points to "the fact that, in order to be exploited really in accordance with its nature, land requires different social relations" (1971, p. 301). In Volumes II and III of Capital, Marx analyzes how the circulation of capital and rents are each shaped (albeit anarchically, due to capitalism's exploitative and competitive relations) by the natural conditions specific to different kinds of agricultural and non-agricultural industry (see Burkett, 1998, and 1999b, Chapter 7, for details). These analyses demonstrate the need for an ecologically planned diversification of communism's productive and community organization.

An ecologically sound management of human production presumes that people share a fundamental ecological ethic, however diverse its forms. Ray Dasmann provides a wide-ranging consideration of this ethical criterion. He points out that because "environmental conservation represents a goal toward which we must work [together]," it is "not something that can be achieved tomorrow by appeal to [individual] self-interest"; it will thus "require a basic change of attitude on the part of many people" (Dasmann, 1968, p. 95). There must be "an extension of ethics from people to the land, and with this the development of an ecological conscience" in which people "feel a deep sense of personal responsibility toward the land" (p. 95; emphases in original). Given the cooperative requirements of ecological management, people will need to "regain a sense of community," and this "recovery of self-identity and awareness" as a social and natural species "can come only through education":

Not conservation education in the old sense, which too often has emphasized only the economically profitable aspects of resource management, but a new type of education based firmly upon a knowledge of human needs and land ecology. A knowledge of psychology and the social sciences, physical science and en- gineering, and biology are all an integral part of the requisite educational pattern. The education must reach not just the experts and specialists in conservation but must filter through to everyone who is responsible for the land. (Dasmann, 1975, pp. 158-9; 1968, p. 96).

Ethical considerations clearly reinforce the important role of widely diffused combinations of natural and social scientific knowledge in an ecologically sound system.

In sum, ecological values are at least as diverse as human ways of life; but to effectively resonate through the system of human appropriation from nature, these values must together constitute a shared sense of unity with and responsibility toward the land and other natural conditions as shared conditions of human life. In this sense, an ecological ethics is by definition a communal ethics. Marx's projection of the associated producers' shared sense of responsibility toward the land, based on a new system of communal property rights and the planned allocation of social labor enmeshed with natural conditions, has already been noted. Marx sees this communal responsibility as being reinforced by a broad diffusion of scientific knowledge and a correspondingly heightened consciousness of the land as a source of the "permanent necessities of life required by the chain of successive generations" (1967, III, p. 617).

As a framework for ecological ethics, the communal setting envisioned by Marx is arguably far superior to capitalist private property and markets. Consider, for example, the market-based approach to green- house gas emissions, as championed by the U.S. government and corporate capital. This approach commodifies pollution (or clean air, depending on one's point of view) by "creating an international market in emission credits." As Michael J. Sandel points out, this could "undermine the ethic we should be trying to foster on the environment," because "turning pollution into a commodity to be bought and sold removes the moral stigma that is properly associated with it" (Sandel, 1997, p. A19). More specifically, "such trading would enable rich countries to buy their way out of commitments to reduce greenhouse gases," thus "mak[ing] pollution just another cost of doing business"- and this "may undermine the sense of shared responsibility that increased global cooperation requires" (Ibid.). By comparison, communal property in the conditions of production and the "consciously regulated" utilization of these conditions "in accordance with a settled plan," appears much more congenial to the needed sense of shared responsibility (Marx, 1967, I, p. 80). Marx's communism, which rejects both authoritarian state controls and market prices and profits as resource-allocation devices, potentially provides a framework within which alternative ecological values can be openly and fairly articulated, juxtaposed, and reconciled or chosen from.¹⁷

Ecologically informed ethics cannot thrive unless they are routinely validated, both materially and socially, by the system of production, distribution, and consumption. The system must define "wealth" in human and ecological terms, thereby promoting "a consistent change in the habits of production" (Bahro, 1978, p. 428). As Mumford puts it: "We need more wealth, but a wealth measured in terms of life rather than profit and prestige" (1954, p. 113). This ecological wealth criterion means giving "primacy" to "simple reproduction with the employment of existing energies and resources," while generally promoting "improvement in quality as against the mere number of finished products" (Bahro, 1978, pp. 429-30). Ecological soundness requires that we no longer "gratuitously assume, as we constantly do, that the mere existence of a mechanism for manifolding or mass production carries with it an obligation to use it to the fullest capacity" (Mumford, 1954, p. 51). The system must have a built-in recognition that due to the "dangers to the earth's non-renewable resources, and to the natural environment of human civilization and human life...consumption of material goods and services cannot grow in an unlimited way" (Mandel, 1992, p. 207).

Some would argue that while Marx's communism may foster a shared sense of responsibility toward nature, this responsibility remains wedded to a Promethean conception of nature as primarily an instrument or subject of productive human labor. Alfred Schmidt, for example, suggests that even "when Marx and Engels complain about the unholy plundering of nature, they are not concerned with nature itself but with considerations of economic utility" (1971, p. 155). However, Marx's conception of wealth in general and natural wealth in particular encompasses the full gamut of human needs, including aesthetic use values not reducible to the industrial processing of natural conditions (Burkett, 1999b, Chapter 2). As David Pepper observes: "Marx did see nature's role as 'instrumental' to humans, but to him instrumental value did not mean merely economic or material. It included nature as a source of aesthetic, scientific and moral value" (1993, p. 64). Insofar as Marx's communism places use value in command of production, its wealth-creating priorities and activities would encompass the maintenance and improvement of natural wealth in all its aesthetic and material forms.¹⁸

Nonetheless, many have suggested that Marx's vision of communist wealth is anti-ecological because it features continued absolute growth of material production. Marx and Engels do, in fact, make many references to ongoing and even accelerated growth in the production of use values in the future association. However, before rushing to the conclusion that Marx's communism violates the ecological wealth criterion, two things should be noted about these growth projections. First, they are always made in close connection with Marx's vision of free and well-rounded human development, not with growth of material production and consumption for their own sake. Second, and of co-equal importance, they always refer to growth of wealth in a general sense not limited to the kinds of wealth involving industrial appropriation and processing of natural conditions.

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