Phil,
Y ou wrote:
>
> That is an *entirely false* statement about Marx's position on the
relation
> between nature, ecology, and humanity. Read _Philosophical and Economic
> Manuscripts_ for the most comprehensive account thereof --- the whole
> thing
OK . . . I've read the 1844 manuscripts several times since the first time
I read it in 1965 (Eric Fromm's edition) and studied specific sections more
often. Now would you please direct me to the passage you have in
mind--i.e., the comprehensive account in which Marx discusses nature and
ecology. In fact, Marx often used the term "nature's storehouse" in works
including but not limited to: the 1844 Manuscripts, German Ideology,
Theories of Surplus Value, the Grundrisse as well as Capital. This usage
often parallels the unanalyzed nature of "use value". The 1844 manuscripts
mainly developed the analys of "alienation" and "alienated labor"--a
position which Marx reworked as fetishization after the 1850s period of
study of economics which he had only briefly begun at the time he wrote the
1844 manuscripts. The ecological coneption of man's relationship to nature
wasn't there in 1844 or 1859 (Introduction to a Critique of Political
Economy) or in 1867-1891 (pub dates of capital v1-v3), the latter
pothumously of course. One of course should remember that the "ecological
concept" didn't exist in any developed way when Marx was writing.. George
Marsh's pioneering work, "Man and Nature; or Physical Geography as Modified
by Human Action" appeared in 1863. Neither Marx nor Engels have ever given
any indication of being aware of Marsh's work and even this work still
maintained the basic judaeo-christian notion that God created the World for
humans to enjoy (or conversely, created humans to enjoy the world that He
had created) but definitely retained that perspective.
So, please enlighten me. Exactly where is Marx's discussion of the
ecological relations between society and environment.
I'm sorry about the confusion concerning the word "followers", I meant those
who came after him working in the field of dialectical materialism, and yes
I would include Stalin as someone who worked in the area of dialectical
materialism (whether erroneously or not, he still worked there), also Ernest
Mandel. And they are very clear examples of the theoretical and practical
outcomes of the absence of an ecological conception in Marx's analysis of
human economy. I don't know enough about you to make a judgment on that.
In any event, I don't think Marx's theory need be abandoned because of this
absence. I compare it the necessary reworking to the correction Kepler
needed to make to Copernicus' system in order to get it to line up with the
observed movement of the heavenly bodies.
Paul H. Dillon
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