Anthropocene or Capitalocene?: Nature, History, and the Crisis of Capitalism (Kairos)

I agree with the authors' complaint regarding the term "Anthropocene" as being just one more example of the anthropomorphism that's been the cause of our problems in the first place, so the term leaves us with only more of the same. But I take issue with their citation of capitalism as being the better candidate. While capitalism is shown to be a "world ecology" built upon the commodified relations of cheap labor, cheap nature and capital accumulation and is, therefore, geological in its extreme effects, the authors starting point can only be as far back as the "long 16th century" when trans-Atlantic exploitation and other developments were occurring. Even here they are apologetic since the going consensus is that the capitalist narrative doesn’t being until the age of steam and the Industrial Revolution that followed. I think the entire Human/Nature dichotomy began long before that and that it’s this rift that has opened up the space for all exploitation since, namely the patriarchal, hierarchical structure of human society. This occurred thousands of years ago with the harnessing of agricultural surplus and the development of cities (and throw in some sky gods for good measure.) I’m not some dyed in the wool feminist but can easily ferret out an obvious incongruity—domination of one sex, one class, one race, one species, etc., over another is our original sin. But I recant—it is all Nature and only Nature. Likewise it’s Nature that is feeding off of the, so-called, Anthropocene right now, furthering its own creative action through time. Meaning to say that we, as Nature, are recognizing that species extinction and the destruction of wild spaces need to be given our full creative attention. Perhaps “Anthropocene” is a good term after all as it might lend itself as a wake-up call, even while its framers might be congratulating their “arrival.”

I got concerned early on that this would be a book about semantics: Capitalocene versus Anthropocene, but there is more to it, the issue is deeper than semantics. “Anthropocene” is genuinely tied to the idea of our supremacy over nature; it is of course well-intending, acknowledging the damage we have done and will continue to do to the environment. The problem is that Anthropocene accepts our control of nature and its reduction to resources -and many of its advocates believe we simply need to a better job of “Anthropocening” the earth. Capitalocene theory, on the other hand, understands that we humans are part of nature, not unlike an apple tree or a fish in the water. And even here distinctions are important as we don’t want to equate the fish with the apple. Words matter when we think about humankind, animals and nature. The term Capitalocene avoids as well the idea that humans are bad, or that our presence on earth makes its premature annihilation inevitable. The problem is systemic (unrestrained capitalism) as well as ideological (our perceived supremacy over nature and its nonhuman occupants).

The message here is frightening, but the authors often lapse into a sort of arcane academic dialect which is almost incomprehensible at times. It would be nice to read the insights contained in these essays in laymans' terms, because they reveal that what we are doing to ourselves and to our planet through capitalism's exploitation of allegedly "free nature" is truly frightening and if continued will ultimately destroy us as a species along with the entire natural world which we are a part of.

Provides a fresh perspective on the age we live in and have created. Really gets at the fundamental issue.

Killer book. Great collection of writers, some more lyrical and literature-based, while some fairly intensely theoretical. Great collection for those out there who teach classes on modern debates about capitalism and nature.

This is a good book

Jason Moore, comme il l'indique au début de ce livre, est un de ceux qui a mis en cause la qualification d'une nouvelle ère géologique, où l'humanité serait devenue la principale force géologique sur terre, du nom d'anthropocène et à proposer, à la place, le nom de "capitalocène". Non seulement, explique-t-il, c'est attribuer à l'humanité tout entière ce qui est le résultat du développement du capitalisme, mais c'est maintenir une vision dualiste (l'homme et la nature) qui est en partie responsable de la dégradation actuelle de l'environnement. Dans le collectif qu'il dirige, il a donc réuni un certain nombre de contributions justifiant cette critique de l'anthropocène et cette appellation de capitalocène. Comme souvent, les contributions sont d'inégal intérêt, mais certaines sont très remarquables parmi lesquelles celle de Jason Moore lui-même et de Donna Haraway (qui elle, parle de chtulucene)