Deep ecology
Encyclopedia
Deep ecology is a contemporary ecological philosophy
that recognizes an inherent worth of all living beings, regardless of their instrumental utility to human needs. The philosophy emphasizes the interdependence of organisms within ecosystem
s and that of ecosystems with each other within the biosphere
. It provides a foundation for the environmental
, ecology
and green movement
s and has fostered a new system of environmental ethics
.
Deep ecology's core principle is the belief that, like humanity, the living environment as a whole has the same right
to live and flourish. Deep ecology describes itself as "deep" because it persists in asking deeper questions concerning "why" and "how" and thus is concerned with the fundamental philosophical questions about the impacts of human life as one part of the ecosphere
, rather than with a narrow view of ecology
as a branch of biological science, and aims to avoid merely anthropocentric
environmentalism
, which is concerned with conservation of the environment only for exploitation by and for humans purposes, which excludes the fundamental philosophy of deep ecology. Deep ecology seeks a more holistic view of the world humans live in and seeks to apply to life the understanding that separate parts of the ecosystem (including humans) function as a whole.
in 1973, and he helped give it a theoretical foundation. "For Arne Næss, ecological science, concerned with facts and logic alone, cannot answer ethical questions about how we should live. For this we need ecological wisdom. Deep ecology seeks to develop this by focusing on deep experience, deep questioning and deep commitment. These constitute an interconnected system. Each gives rise to and supports the other, whilst the entire system is, what Næss would call, an ecosophy: an evolving but consistent philosophy of being, thinking and acting in the world, that embodies ecological wisdom and harmony." Næss rejected the idea that beings can be ranked according to their relative value. For example, judgments on whether an animal has an eternal soul
, whether it uses reason
or whether it has consciousness
(or indeed higher consciousness
) have all been used to justify the ranking of the human animal
as superior to other animals. Næss states that from an ecological point of view "the right of all forms [of life] to live is a universal right which cannot be quantified. No single species of living being has more of this particular right to live and unfold than any other species." This metaphysical
idea is elucidated in Warwick Fox
's claim that we and all other beings are "aspects of a single unfolding reality". As such Deep Ecology would support the view of Aldo Leopold
in his book, A Sand County Almanac
that humans are "plain members of the biotic community". They also would support Leopold's "Land Ethic": "a thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise." Daniel Quinn in Ishmael
, showed that an anthropocentric myth underlies our current view of the world, and a jellyfish would have an equivalent jellyfish centric view.
Deep ecology offers a philosophical basis for environmental advocacy which may, in turn, guide human activity against perceived self-destruction. Deep ecology and environmentalism
hold that the science of ecology shows
that ecosystems can absorb only limited change by humans or other dissonant influences. Further, both hold that the actions of modern civilization threaten global ecological well-being. Ecologists have described change and stability in ecological systems in various ways, including homeostasis
, dynamic equilibrium
, and "flux of nature". Regardless of which model is most accurate, environmentalists contend that massive human economic activity has pushed the biosphere
far from its "natural" state through reduction of biodiversity, climate change
, and other influences. As a consequence, civilization is causing mass extinction
. Deep ecologists hope to influence social and political change through their philosophy.
or induction
to derive the philosophy directly from scientific ecology but rather hold that scientific ecology directly implies the metaphysics of deep ecology, including its ideas about the self and further, that deep ecology finds scientific underpinnings in the fields of ecology
and system dynamics
.
In their 1985 book Deep Ecology, Bill Devall and George Sessions describe a series of sources of deep ecology. They include the science of ecology itself, and cite its major contribution as the rediscovery in a modern context that "everything is connected to everything else." They point out that some ecologists and natural historians, in addition to their scientific viewpoint, have developed a deep ecological consciousness—for some a political consciousness
and at times a spiritual consciousness. This is a perspective beyond the strictly human viewpoint, beyond anthropocentrism
. Among the scientists they mention specifically are Rachel Carson
, Aldo Leopold
, John Livingston, Paul R. Ehrlich
and Barry Commoner
, together with Frank Fraser Darling
, Charles Sutherland Elton
, Eugene Odum
and Paul Sears
.
A further scientific source for deep ecology adduced by Devall and Sessions is the "new physics." which they describe as shattering Descartes
's and Newton
's vision of the universe as a machine explainable in terms of simple linear
cause and effect. They propose that Nature is in a state of constant flux and reject the idea of observers as existing independent of their environment. They refer to Fritjof Capra
's The Tao of Physics
and The Turning Point for their characterisation of how the new physics leads to metaphysical and ecological views of interrelatedness, which, according to Capra, should make deep ecology a framework for future human societies. Devall and Sessions also credit the American poet and social critic Gary Snyder
—with his devotion to Buddhism
, Native American
studies, the outdoors, and alternative social movements—as a major voice of wisdom in the evolution of their ideas.
The scientific version of the Gaia hypothesis
was also an influence on the development of deep ecology.
has been used by Warwick Fox
to support this idea.
In relation to the Judeo-Christian
tradition, Næss offers the following criticism: "The arrogance of stewardship [as found in the Bible
] consists in the idea of superiority which underlies the thought that we exist to watch over nature like a highly respected middleman between the Creator
and Creation." This theme had been expounded in Lynn Townsend White, Jr.
's 1967 article "The Historical Roots of Our Ecological Crisis", in which however he also offered as an alternative Christian view of man's relation to nature that of Saint Francis of Assisi
, who he says spoke for the equality of all creatures, in place of the idea of man's domination over creation.
. Macy, working as an anti-nuclear activist in the USA, found that one of the major impediments confronting the activists' cause was the presence of unresolved emotions of despair, grief, sorrow, anger and rage. The denial of these emotions led to apathy and disempowerment.
We may have intellectual understanding of our interconnectedness, but our culture, experiential deep ecologists like John Seed
argue, robs us of emotional and visceral experience of that interconnectedness which we had as small children, but which has been socialised out of us by a highly anthropocentric alienating culture.
Through "Despair and Empowerment Work" and more recently "The Work that Reconnects", Macy and others have been taking Experiential Deep Ecology into many countries including especially the USA, Europe (particularly Britain and Germany), Russia and Australia.
The Dragon Dreaming approach developed by the Gaia Foundation
of Australia for organisation and project planning is based upon experiential deep ecology.
, who first wrote about the idea of deep ecology, from the early days of developing this outlook conceived Spinoza as a philosophical source.
Others have followed Naess' inquiry, including Eccy de Jonge, in Spinoza and Deep Ecology: Challenging Traditional Approaches to Environmentalism, and Brenden MacDonald, in Spinoza, Deep Ecology, and Human Diversity—Realization of Eco-Literacies
One of the topical centres of inquiry connecting Spinoza to Deep Ecology is "self-realization." See Arne Naess in The Shallow and the Deep, Long-Range Ecology movement and Spinoza and the Deep Ecology Movement for discussion on the role of Spinoza's conception of self-realization and its link to deep ecology.
, the creation of ecoregion
s, the breakdown of industrialism in its current form, and an end to authoritarianism
.
Deep ecology is not normally considered a distinct movement, but as part of the green movement
. The deep ecological movement could be defined as those within the green movement who hold deep ecological views. Deep ecologists welcome the labels "Gaian
" and "Green
" (including the broader political implications of this term, e.g. commitment to peace
). Deep ecology has had a broad general influence on the green movement by providing an independent ethical platform for Green parties, political ecologists and environmentalist
s.
The philosophy of deep ecology helped differentiate the modern ecology movement
by pointing out the anthropocentric bias of the term "environment
", and rejecting the idea of humans as authoritarian guardians of the environment.
, it must have interests. Deep ecology is criticised for assuming that plants, for example, have their own interests as they are manifested by the plant's behavior - self-preservation being considered an expression of a will to live, for instance. Deep ecologists claim to identify with non-human nature, and in doing so, criticise those who claim that non-human (or non-sentient) lifeforms' needs or interests are inexistant or unknowable. The criticism is that the interests that a deep ecologist atributes to non-human organisms such as survival, reproduction, growth and prosperity are really human interests. "The earth is endowed with 'wisdom', wilderness equates with 'freedom', and life forms are said to emit 'moral' qualities."
However, the overarching criticism assumes that humans, in governing their own affairs, are somehow isent from this same assumption; i.e. how can governing humans truly presume to understand the interests of the rest of humanity. While the deep ecologist critic would answer that the logical application of language and social mores would provide this justification, i.e. voting patterns etc., the deep ecologist would note that these needs and interests are ultimately deducible solely from the application of logic to the observed behavior of the life form, which is the same standard used by deep ecologists to perceive the standard of interests for the natural world.
coined the term deep ecology he compared it favourably with shallow environmentalism which he criticized for its utilitarian and anthropocentric attitude to nature and for its materialist
and consumer-oriented
outlook. Against this is Arne Næss
's own view that the "depth" of deep ecology resides in the persistence of its interrogative questioning, particularly in asking "Why?" when faced with initial answers.
and deep ecology put forward a new conceptualization of the self. Some ecofeminists, such as Marti Kheel
, argue that self-realization and identification with all nature places too much emphasis on the whole, at the expense of the independent being. Ecofeminists contend that their concept of the self (as a dynamic process consisting of relations) is superior. Ecofeminists would also place more emphasis on the problem of androcentrism
rather than anthropocentrism
.
movement, when he says that they both "misunderstand scientific information and then arrive at conclusions based on their misunderstanding, which are in turn used as justification for their ideologies. Both begin with an ideology and are political and social in focus." Elsewhere though, he asserts that deep ecology must be taken seriously in the debate about the relationship between humans and nature because it challenges the fundamental assumptions of Western philosophy
. Botkin has also criticized Næss's restatement and reliance upon the balance of nature idea and the perceived contradiction between his argument that all species are morally equal and his disparaging description of pioneering species.
such as Murray Bookchin
claim that deep ecology fails to link environmental crises with authoritarianism
and hierarchy
. Social ecologists believe that environmental problems are firmly rooted in the manner of human social interaction, and protest that an ecologically sustainable society could still be socially exploitative. Deep ecologists reject the argument that ecological behavior is rooted in the social paradigm (according to their view, that is an anthropocentric fallacy), and they maintain that the converse of the social ecologists' objection is also true in that it is equally possible for a socially egalitarian
society to continue to exploit the Earth.
movement and Earth First!
.
Peter Singer
's 1975 book Animal Liberation
critiqued anthropocentrism and put the case for animals to be given moral consideration. This can be seen as a part of a process of expanding the prevailing system of ethics to wider groupings. However, Singer has disagreed with deep ecology's belief in the intrinsic value of nature separate from questions of suffering, taking a more utilitarian stance. The feminist
and civil rights movement
s also brought about expansion of the ethical system for their particular domains. Likewise deep ecology brought the whole of nature under moral consideration. The links with animal rights
are perhaps the strongest, as "proponents of such ideas argue that 'All life has intrinsic value'".
Many in the radical environmental direct-action movement Earth First!
claim to follow deep ecology, as indicated by one of their slogans No compromise in defence of mother earth. In particular, David Foreman
, the co-founder of the movement, has also been a strong advocate for deep ecology, and engaged in a public debate with Murray Bookchin
on the subject. Judi Bari
was another prominent Earth Firster who espoused deep ecology. Many Earth First! actions have a distinct deep ecological theme; often these actions will be to save an area of old growth forest
, the habitat of a snail or an owl, even individual trees. It should however be noted that, especially in the United Kingdom, there are also strong anti-capitalist
and anarchist currents in the movement, and actions are often symbolic or have other political aims. At one point Arne Næss also engaged in environmental direct action, though not under the Earth First! banner, when he tied himself to a Norwegian fjord
in a successful protest against the building of a dam.
Robert Greenway and Theodore Roszak
have employed the deep ecology platform as a means to argue for ecopsychology
. Although ecopsychology
is a highly differentiated umbrella that encompasses many practices and perspectives, its ethos is generally consistent with deep ecology. As this now almost forty-year old "field" expands and continues to be reinterpreted by a variety of practitioners, social and natural scientists, and humanists, "ecopsychology
" may change to include these novel perspectives.
Philosophy
Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...
that recognizes an inherent worth of all living beings, regardless of their instrumental utility to human needs. The philosophy emphasizes the interdependence of organisms within ecosystem
Ecosystem
An ecosystem is a biological environment consisting of all the organisms living in a particular area, as well as all the nonliving , physical components of the environment with which the organisms interact, such as air, soil, water and sunlight....
s and that of ecosystems with each other within the biosphere
Biosphere
The biosphere is the global sum of all ecosystems. It can also be called the zone of life on Earth, a closed and self-regulating system...
. It provides a foundation for the environmental
Environmental movement
The environmental movement, a term that includes the conservation and green politics, is a diverse scientific, social, and political movement for addressing environmental issues....
, ecology
Ecology movement
The global ecology movement is based upon environmental protection, and is one of several new social movements that emerged at the end of the 1960s. As a values-driven social movement, it should be distinguished from the pre-existing science of ecology....
and green movement
Green Movement
The Green Movement refers to a series of actions after the 2009 Iranian presidential election, in which protesters demanded the removal of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad from office...
s and has fostered a new system of environmental ethics
Environmental ethics
Environmental ethics is the part of environmental philosophy which considers extending the traditional boundaries of ethics from solely including humans to including the non-human world...
.
Deep ecology's core principle is the belief that, like humanity, the living environment as a whole has the same right
Rights
Rights are legal, social, or ethical principles of freedom or entitlement; that is, rights are the fundamental normative rules about what is allowed of people or owed to people, according to some legal system, social convention, or ethical theory...
to live and flourish. Deep ecology describes itself as "deep" because it persists in asking deeper questions concerning "why" and "how" and thus is concerned with the fundamental philosophical questions about the impacts of human life as one part of the ecosphere
Biosphere
The biosphere is the global sum of all ecosystems. It can also be called the zone of life on Earth, a closed and self-regulating system...
, rather than with a narrow view of ecology
Ecology
Ecology is the scientific study of the relations that living organisms have with respect to each other and their natural environment. Variables of interest to ecologists include the composition, distribution, amount , number, and changing states of organisms within and among ecosystems...
as a branch of biological science, and aims to avoid merely anthropocentric
Anthropocentrism
Anthropocentrism describes the tendency for human beings to regard themselves as the central and most significant entities in the universe, or the assessment of reality through an exclusively human perspective....
environmentalism
Environmentalism
Environmentalism is a broad philosophy, ideology and social movement regarding concerns for environmental conservation and improvement of the health of the environment, particularly as the measure for this health seeks to incorporate the concerns of non-human elements...
, which is concerned with conservation of the environment only for exploitation by and for humans purposes, which excludes the fundamental philosophy of deep ecology. Deep ecology seeks a more holistic view of the world humans live in and seeks to apply to life the understanding that separate parts of the ecosystem (including humans) function as a whole.
Development
The phrase "deep ecology" was coined by the Norwegian philosopher Arne NæssArne Næss
Arne Dekke Eide Næss was a Norwegian philosopher, the founder of deep ecology. He was the youngest person to be appointed full professor at the University of Oslo....
in 1973, and he helped give it a theoretical foundation. "For Arne Næss, ecological science, concerned with facts and logic alone, cannot answer ethical questions about how we should live. For this we need ecological wisdom. Deep ecology seeks to develop this by focusing on deep experience, deep questioning and deep commitment. These constitute an interconnected system. Each gives rise to and supports the other, whilst the entire system is, what Næss would call, an ecosophy: an evolving but consistent philosophy of being, thinking and acting in the world, that embodies ecological wisdom and harmony." Næss rejected the idea that beings can be ranked according to their relative value. For example, judgments on whether an animal has an eternal soul
Soul
A soul in certain spiritual, philosophical, and psychological traditions is the incorporeal essence of a person or living thing or object. Many philosophical and spiritual systems teach that humans have souls, and others teach that all living things and even inanimate objects have souls. The...
, whether it uses reason
Reason
Reason is a term that refers to the capacity human beings have to make sense of things, to establish and verify facts, and to change or justify practices, institutions, and beliefs. It is closely associated with such characteristically human activities as philosophy, science, language, ...
or whether it has consciousness
Consciousness
Consciousness is a term that refers to the relationship between the mind and the world with which it interacts. It has been defined as: subjectivity, awareness, the ability to experience or to feel, wakefulness, having a sense of selfhood, and the executive control system of the mind...
(or indeed higher consciousness
Higher consciousness
Higher consciousness, also called super consciousness , objective consciousness , Buddhic consciousness , cosmic consciousness, God-consciousness and Christ consciousness , are expressions used in various spiritual traditions to denote the consciousness of a human being who has reached a...
) have all been used to justify the ranking of the human animal
Human
Humans are the only living species in the Homo genus...
as superior to other animals. Næss states that from an ecological point of view "the right of all forms [of life] to live is a universal right which cannot be quantified. No single species of living being has more of this particular right to live and unfold than any other species." This metaphysical
Metaphysics
Metaphysics is a branch of philosophy concerned with explaining the fundamental nature of being and the world, although the term is not easily defined. Traditionally, metaphysics attempts to answer two basic questions in the broadest possible terms:...
idea is elucidated in Warwick Fox
Warwick Fox
Warwick Fox is an Australian philosopher and ethicist. He is the author of Toward a Transpersonal Ecology and A Theory of General Ethics: Human Relationships, Nature, and the Built Environment....
's claim that we and all other beings are "aspects of a single unfolding reality". As such Deep Ecology would support the view of Aldo Leopold
Aldo Leopold
Aldo Leopold was an American author, scientist, ecologist, forester, and environmentalist. He was a professor at the University of Wisconsin and is best known for his book A Sand County Almanac , which has sold over two million copies...
in his book, A Sand County Almanac
A Sand County Almanac
A Sand County Almanac: And Sketches Here and There is a 1949 non-fiction book by American ecologist, forester, and environmentalist Aldo Leopold. Describing the land around the author's home in Sauk County, Wisconsin, the collection of essays advocate Leopold's idea of a "land ethic", or a...
that humans are "plain members of the biotic community". They also would support Leopold's "Land Ethic": "a thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise." Daniel Quinn in Ishmael
Ishmael (novel)
Ishmael is a 1992 philosophical novel by Daniel Quinn. It examines mythology, its effect on ethics, and how that relates to sustainability. The novel uses a style of Socratic dialogue to deconstruct the notion that humans are the end product, the pinnacle of biological evolution...
, showed that an anthropocentric myth underlies our current view of the world, and a jellyfish would have an equivalent jellyfish centric view.
Deep ecology offers a philosophical basis for environmental advocacy which may, in turn, guide human activity against perceived self-destruction. Deep ecology and environmentalism
Environmentalism
Environmentalism is a broad philosophy, ideology and social movement regarding concerns for environmental conservation and improvement of the health of the environment, particularly as the measure for this health seeks to incorporate the concerns of non-human elements...
hold that the science of ecology shows
History of ecology
Ecology is generally spoken of as a new science, having only become prominent in the second half of the 20th century. More precisely, there is agreement that ecology emerged as a distinct discipline at the turn of the 20th century, and that it gained public prominence in the 1960s, due to...
that ecosystems can absorb only limited change by humans or other dissonant influences. Further, both hold that the actions of modern civilization threaten global ecological well-being. Ecologists have described change and stability in ecological systems in various ways, including homeostasis
Homeostasis
Homeostasis is the property of a system that regulates its internal environment and tends to maintain a stable, constant condition of properties like temperature or pH...
, dynamic equilibrium
Dynamic equilibrium
A dynamic equilibrium exists once a reversible reaction ceases to change its ratio of reactants/products, but substances move between the chemicals at an equal rate, meaning there is no net change. It is a particular example of a system in a steady state...
, and "flux of nature". Regardless of which model is most accurate, environmentalists contend that massive human economic activity has pushed the biosphere
Biosphere
The biosphere is the global sum of all ecosystems. It can also be called the zone of life on Earth, a closed and self-regulating system...
far from its "natural" state through reduction of biodiversity, climate change
Climate change
Climate change is a significant and lasting change in the statistical distribution of weather patterns over periods ranging from decades to millions of years. It may be a change in average weather conditions or the distribution of events around that average...
, and other influences. As a consequence, civilization is causing mass extinction
Extinction event
An extinction event is a sharp decrease in the diversity and abundance of macroscopic life. They occur when the rate of extinction increases with respect to the rate of speciation...
. Deep ecologists hope to influence social and political change through their philosophy.
Scientific
Næss and Fox do not claim to use logicLogic
In philosophy, Logic is the formal systematic study of the principles of valid inference and correct reasoning. Logic is used in most intellectual activities, but is studied primarily in the disciplines of philosophy, mathematics, semantics, and computer science...
or induction
Inductive reasoning
Inductive reasoning, also known as induction or inductive logic, is a kind of reasoning that constructs or evaluates propositions that are abstractions of observations. It is commonly construed as a form of reasoning that makes generalizations based on individual instances...
to derive the philosophy directly from scientific ecology but rather hold that scientific ecology directly implies the metaphysics of deep ecology, including its ideas about the self and further, that deep ecology finds scientific underpinnings in the fields of ecology
Ecology
Ecology is the scientific study of the relations that living organisms have with respect to each other and their natural environment. Variables of interest to ecologists include the composition, distribution, amount , number, and changing states of organisms within and among ecosystems...
and system dynamics
System dynamics
System dynamics is an approach to understanding the behaviour of complex systems over time. It deals with internal feedback loops and time delays that affect the behaviour of the entire system. What makes using system dynamics different from other approaches to studying complex systems is the use...
.
In their 1985 book Deep Ecology, Bill Devall and George Sessions describe a series of sources of deep ecology. They include the science of ecology itself, and cite its major contribution as the rediscovery in a modern context that "everything is connected to everything else." They point out that some ecologists and natural historians, in addition to their scientific viewpoint, have developed a deep ecological consciousness—for some a political consciousness
Political consciousness
Following the work of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Karl Marx outlined the workings of a political consciousness.-The politics of consciousness:...
and at times a spiritual consciousness. This is a perspective beyond the strictly human viewpoint, beyond anthropocentrism
Anthropocentrism
Anthropocentrism describes the tendency for human beings to regard themselves as the central and most significant entities in the universe, or the assessment of reality through an exclusively human perspective....
. Among the scientists they mention specifically are Rachel Carson
Rachel Carson
Rachel Louise Carson was an American marine biologist and conservationist whose writings are credited with advancing the global environmental movement....
, Aldo Leopold
Aldo Leopold
Aldo Leopold was an American author, scientist, ecologist, forester, and environmentalist. He was a professor at the University of Wisconsin and is best known for his book A Sand County Almanac , which has sold over two million copies...
, John Livingston, Paul R. Ehrlich
Paul R. Ehrlich
Paul Ralph Ehrlich is an American biologist and educator who is the Bing Professor of Population Studies in the department of Biological Sciences at Stanford University and president of Stanford's Center for Conservation Biology. By training he is an entomologist specializing in Lepidoptera , but...
and Barry Commoner
Barry Commoner
Barry Commoner is an American biologist, college professor, and eco-socialist. He ran for president of the United States in the 1980 US presidential election on the Citizens Party ticket. He was also editor of Science Illustrated magazine.-Biography:Commoner was born in Brooklyn...
, together with Frank Fraser Darling
Frank Fraser Darling
Sir Frank Fraser Darling was an English ecologist, ornithologist, farmer, conservationist and author, who is strongly associated with the highlands and islands of Scotland.-Early life:...
, Charles Sutherland Elton
Charles Sutherland Elton
Charles Sutherland Elton FRS was an English zoologist and animal ecologist. His name is associated with the establishment of modern population and community ecology, including studies of invasive organisms.-Personal life:...
, Eugene Odum
Eugene Odum
Eugene Pleasants Odum was an American scientist known for his pioneering work on ecosystem ecology. He wrote the first ecology textbook: Fundamentals of Ecology....
and Paul Sears
Paul Sears
Paul Bigelow Sears was an American ecologist and writer. He was born in Bucyrus, Ohio. Sears attended Ohio Wesleyan University , the University of Nebraska at Lincoln , and the University of Chicago Paul Bigelow Sears (December 17, 1891-April 30, 1990) was an American ecologist and writer. He was...
.
A further scientific source for deep ecology adduced by Devall and Sessions is the "new physics." which they describe as shattering Descartes
René Descartes
René Descartes ; was a French philosopher and writer who spent most of his adult life in the Dutch Republic. He has been dubbed the 'Father of Modern Philosophy', and much subsequent Western philosophy is a response to his writings, which are studied closely to this day...
's and Newton
Isaac Newton
Sir Isaac Newton PRS was an English physicist, mathematician, astronomer, natural philosopher, alchemist, and theologian, who has been "considered by many to be the greatest and most influential scientist who ever lived."...
's vision of the universe as a machine explainable in terms of simple linear
Linear
In mathematics, a linear map or function f is a function which satisfies the following two properties:* Additivity : f = f + f...
cause and effect. They propose that Nature is in a state of constant flux and reject the idea of observers as existing independent of their environment. They refer to Fritjof Capra
Fritjof Capra
Fritjof Capra is an Austrian-born American physicist. He is a founding director of the Center for Ecoliteracy in Berkeley, California, and is on the faculty of Schumacher College....
's The Tao of Physics
The Tao of Physics
The Tao of Physics: An Exploration of the Parallels Between Modern Physics and Eastern Mysticism is a book by physicist Fritjof Capra, published in 1975 by Shambhala Publications of Berkeley, California. It was a bestseller in the United States, and has been published in 43 editions in 23 languages...
and The Turning Point for their characterisation of how the new physics leads to metaphysical and ecological views of interrelatedness, which, according to Capra, should make deep ecology a framework for future human societies. Devall and Sessions also credit the American poet and social critic Gary Snyder
Gary Snyder
Gary Snyder is an American poet , as well as an essayist, lecturer, and environmental activist . Snyder is a winner of a Pulitzer Prize for Poetry...
—with his devotion to Buddhism
Buddhism
Buddhism is a religion and philosophy encompassing a variety of traditions, beliefs and practices, largely based on teachings attributed to Siddhartha Gautama, commonly known as the Buddha . The Buddha lived and taught in the northeastern Indian subcontinent some time between the 6th and 4th...
, Native American
Native Americans in the United States
Native Americans in the United States are the indigenous peoples in North America within the boundaries of the present-day continental United States, parts of Alaska, and the island state of Hawaii. They are composed of numerous, distinct tribes, states, and ethnic groups, many of which survive as...
studies, the outdoors, and alternative social movements—as a major voice of wisdom in the evolution of their ideas.
The scientific version of the Gaia hypothesis
Gaia hypothesis
The Gaia hypothesis, also known as Gaia theory or Gaia principle, proposes that all organisms and their inorganic surroundings on Earth are closely integrated to form a single and self-regulating complex system, maintaining the conditions for life on the planet.The scientific investigation of the...
was also an influence on the development of deep ecology.
Spiritual
The central spiritual tenet of deep ecology is that the human species is a part of the Earth and not separate from it. A process of self-realisation or "re-earthing" is used for an individual to intuitively gain an ecocentric perspective. The notion is based on the idea that the more we expand the self to identify with "others" (people, animals, ecosystems), the more we realize ourselves. Transpersonal psychologyTranspersonal psychology
Transpersonal psychology is a form of psychology that studies the transpersonal, self-transcendent or spiritual aspects of the human experience....
has been used by Warwick Fox
Warwick Fox
Warwick Fox is an Australian philosopher and ethicist. He is the author of Toward a Transpersonal Ecology and A Theory of General Ethics: Human Relationships, Nature, and the Built Environment....
to support this idea.
In relation to the Judeo-Christian
Judeo-Christian
Judeo-Christian is a term used in the United States since the 1940s to refer to standards of ethics said to be held in common by Judaism and Christianity, for example the Ten Commandments...
tradition, Næss offers the following criticism: "The arrogance of stewardship [as found in the Bible
Bible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
] consists in the idea of superiority which underlies the thought that we exist to watch over nature like a highly respected middleman between the Creator
God
God is the English name given to a singular being in theistic and deistic religions who is either the sole deity in monotheism, or a single deity in polytheism....
and Creation." This theme had been expounded in Lynn Townsend White, Jr.
Lynn Townsend White, Jr.
Lynn Townsend White, Jr. was a professor of medieval history at Princeton, Stanford and, for many years, University of California, Los Angeles. He was president of Mills College, Oakland from 1943 to 1958....
's 1967 article "The Historical Roots of Our Ecological Crisis", in which however he also offered as an alternative Christian view of man's relation to nature that of Saint Francis of Assisi
Francis of Assisi
Saint Francis of Assisi was an Italian Catholic friar and preacher. He founded the men's Franciscan Order, the women’s Order of St. Clare, and the lay Third Order of Saint Francis. St...
, who he says spoke for the equality of all creatures, in place of the idea of man's domination over creation.
Experiential
Drawing upon the Buddhist tradition is the work of Joanna MacyJoanna Macy
Joanna Rogers Macy, Ph.D , is an environmental activist, author, scholar of Buddhism, general systems theory, and deep ecology.-Biography:...
. Macy, working as an anti-nuclear activist in the USA, found that one of the major impediments confronting the activists' cause was the presence of unresolved emotions of despair, grief, sorrow, anger and rage. The denial of these emotions led to apathy and disempowerment.
We may have intellectual understanding of our interconnectedness, but our culture, experiential deep ecologists like John Seed
John Seed
John Seed is an Australian environmentalist and director of the Rainforest Information Centre which successfully campaigned to save the sub-tropical rainforests of New South Wales. He is also a prominent figure in the deep ecology movement and co-creator of the Council of All Beings, and other...
argue, robs us of emotional and visceral experience of that interconnectedness which we had as small children, but which has been socialised out of us by a highly anthropocentric alienating culture.
Through "Despair and Empowerment Work" and more recently "The Work that Reconnects", Macy and others have been taking Experiential Deep Ecology into many countries including especially the USA, Europe (particularly Britain and Germany), Russia and Australia.
The Dragon Dreaming approach developed by the Gaia Foundation
Gaia Movement
The Gaia Movement is an international network of individuals and groups that share a concern for living more sustainably on the earth. The term "Gaia" comes from Greek mythology, where it is the name of the Goddess of the Earth...
of Australia for organisation and project planning is based upon experiential deep ecology.
Philosophical – Spinoza and deep ecology
Arne NæssArne Næss
Arne Dekke Eide Næss was a Norwegian philosopher, the founder of deep ecology. He was the youngest person to be appointed full professor at the University of Oslo....
, who first wrote about the idea of deep ecology, from the early days of developing this outlook conceived Spinoza as a philosophical source.
Others have followed Naess' inquiry, including Eccy de Jonge, in Spinoza and Deep Ecology: Challenging Traditional Approaches to Environmentalism, and Brenden MacDonald, in Spinoza, Deep Ecology, and Human Diversity—Realization of Eco-Literacies
One of the topical centres of inquiry connecting Spinoza to Deep Ecology is "self-realization." See Arne Naess in The Shallow and the Deep, Long-Range Ecology movement and Spinoza and the Deep Ecology Movement for discussion on the role of Spinoza's conception of self-realization and its link to deep ecology.
Principles
Proponents of deep ecology believe that the world does not exist as a resource to be freely exploited by humans. The ethics of deep ecology hold that a whole system is superior to any of its parts. They offer an eight-tier platform to elucidate their claims:Movement
In practice, deep ecologists support decentralizationDecentralization
__FORCETOC__Decentralization or decentralisation is the process of dispersing decision-making governance closer to the people and/or citizens. It includes the dispersal of administration or governance in sectors or areas like engineering, management science, political science, political economy,...
, the creation of ecoregion
Ecoregion
An ecoregion , sometimes called a bioregion, is an ecologically and geographically defined area that is smaller than an ecozone and larger than an ecosystem. Ecoregions cover relatively large areas of land or water, and contain characteristic, geographically distinct assemblages of natural...
s, the breakdown of industrialism in its current form, and an end to authoritarianism
Authoritarianism
Authoritarianism is a form of social organization characterized by submission to authority. It is usually opposed to individualism and democracy...
.
Deep ecology is not normally considered a distinct movement, but as part of the green movement
Green Movement
The Green Movement refers to a series of actions after the 2009 Iranian presidential election, in which protesters demanded the removal of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad from office...
. The deep ecological movement could be defined as those within the green movement who hold deep ecological views. Deep ecologists welcome the labels "Gaian
Gaian Greens
A Gaian is a radical Green who views the ecology of the Earth's biosphere not only as the basis of human moral examples, but of all cognition and even sentience...
" and "Green
Green politics
Green politics is a political ideology that aims for the creation of an ecologically sustainable society rooted in environmentalism, social liberalism, and grassroots democracy...
" (including the broader political implications of this term, e.g. commitment to peace
Peace movement
A peace movement is a social movement that seeks to achieve ideals such as the ending of a particular war , minimize inter-human violence in a particular place or type of situation, often linked to the goal of achieving world peace...
). Deep ecology has had a broad general influence on the green movement by providing an independent ethical platform for Green parties, political ecologists and environmentalist
Environmentalist
An environmentalist broadly supports the goals of the environmental movement, "a political and ethical movement that seeks to improve and protect the quality of the natural environment through changes to environmentally harmful human activities"...
s.
The philosophy of deep ecology helped differentiate the modern ecology movement
Ecology movement
The global ecology movement is based upon environmental protection, and is one of several new social movements that emerged at the end of the 1960s. As a values-driven social movement, it should be distinguished from the pre-existing science of ecology....
by pointing out the anthropocentric bias of the term "environment
Environmentalism
Environmentalism is a broad philosophy, ideology and social movement regarding concerns for environmental conservation and improvement of the health of the environment, particularly as the measure for this health seeks to incorporate the concerns of non-human elements...
", and rejecting the idea of humans as authoritarian guardians of the environment.
Interests in nature
Animal rights activists state that for something to require rights and protection intrinsicallyIntrinsic and extrinsic properties
An intrinsic property is an essential or inherent property of a system or of a material itself or within. It is independent of how much of the material is present and is independent of the form the material, e.g., one large piece or a collection of smaller pieces...
, it must have interests. Deep ecology is criticised for assuming that plants, for example, have their own interests as they are manifested by the plant's behavior - self-preservation being considered an expression of a will to live, for instance. Deep ecologists claim to identify with non-human nature, and in doing so, criticise those who claim that non-human (or non-sentient) lifeforms' needs or interests are inexistant or unknowable. The criticism is that the interests that a deep ecologist atributes to non-human organisms such as survival, reproduction, growth and prosperity are really human interests. "The earth is endowed with 'wisdom', wilderness equates with 'freedom', and life forms are said to emit 'moral' qualities."
However, the overarching criticism assumes that humans, in governing their own affairs, are somehow isent from this same assumption; i.e. how can governing humans truly presume to understand the interests of the rest of humanity. While the deep ecologist critic would answer that the logical application of language and social mores would provide this justification, i.e. voting patterns etc., the deep ecologist would note that these needs and interests are ultimately deducible solely from the application of logic to the observed behavior of the life form, which is the same standard used by deep ecologists to perceive the standard of interests for the natural world.
Deepness
Deep ecology is criticised for its claim to be deeper than alternative theories, which by implication are shallow. However despite repeated complaints about use of the term it still enjoys wide currency; deep evidently has an attractive resonance for many who seek to establish a new ethical framework for guiding human action with respect to the natural world. It may be presumptuous to assert that one's thinking is deeper than others'. When Arne NæssArne Næss
Arne Dekke Eide Næss was a Norwegian philosopher, the founder of deep ecology. He was the youngest person to be appointed full professor at the University of Oslo....
coined the term deep ecology he compared it favourably with shallow environmentalism which he criticized for its utilitarian and anthropocentric attitude to nature and for its materialist
Economic materialism
Materialism is a mindset that views the consumption and acquisition of material goods as positive and desirable. It is often bound up with a value system which regards social status as being intrinsically linked to affluence as well as the perception that happiness can be increased through...
and consumer-oriented
Consumerism
Consumerism is a social and economic order that is based on the systematic creation and fostering of a desire to purchase goods and services in ever greater amounts. The term is often associated with criticisms of consumption starting with Thorstein Veblen...
outlook. Against this is Arne Næss
Arne Næss
Arne Dekke Eide Næss was a Norwegian philosopher, the founder of deep ecology. He was the youngest person to be appointed full professor at the University of Oslo....
's own view that the "depth" of deep ecology resides in the persistence of its interrogative questioning, particularly in asking "Why?" when faced with initial answers.
Ecofeminist response
Both ecofeminismEcofeminism
Ecofeminism is a social and political movement which points to the existence of considerable common ground between environmentalism and feminism, with some currents linking deep ecology and feminism...
and deep ecology put forward a new conceptualization of the self. Some ecofeminists, such as Marti Kheel
Marti Kheel
Marti Kheel was a vegan ecofeminist activist scholar credited with founding in California in 1982. She authored several books in deep ecology and ecofeminism, including , and several widely-cited articles in college courses and related scholarship, such as , , and...
, argue that self-realization and identification with all nature places too much emphasis on the whole, at the expense of the independent being. Ecofeminists contend that their concept of the self (as a dynamic process consisting of relations) is superior. Ecofeminists would also place more emphasis on the problem of androcentrism
Androcentrism
Androcentrism is the practice, conscious or otherwise, of placing male human beings or the masculine point of view at the center of one's view of the world and its culture and history...
rather than anthropocentrism
Anthropocentrism
Anthropocentrism describes the tendency for human beings to regard themselves as the central and most significant entities in the universe, or the assessment of reality through an exclusively human perspective....
.
Misunderstanding scientific information
Daniel Botkin has likened deep ecology to its antithesis, the wise useWise use
The wise use movement in the United States is a loose-knit coalition of groups promoting the expansion of private property rights and reduction of government regulation of publicly held property. This includes advocacy of expanded use by commercial and public interests, seeking increased access to...
movement, when he says that they both "misunderstand scientific information and then arrive at conclusions based on their misunderstanding, which are in turn used as justification for their ideologies. Both begin with an ideology and are political and social in focus." Elsewhere though, he asserts that deep ecology must be taken seriously in the debate about the relationship between humans and nature because it challenges the fundamental assumptions of Western philosophy
Western philosophy
Western philosophy is the philosophical thought and work of the Western or Occidental world, as distinct from Eastern or Oriental philosophies and the varieties of indigenous philosophies....
. Botkin has also criticized Næss's restatement and reliance upon the balance of nature idea and the perceived contradiction between his argument that all species are morally equal and his disparaging description of pioneering species.
"Shallow" view superior
Writer William Grey believes that developing a non-anthropocentric set of values is "a hopeless quest" He seeks an improved "shallow" view, writing, "What's wrong with shallow views is not their concern about the well-being of humans, but that they do not really consider enough in what that well-being consists. We need to develop an enriched, fortified anthropocentric notion of human interest to replace the dominant short-term, sectional and self-regarding conception."Deep ecology as not "deep" enough
Social ecologistsSocial ecology
Social ecology is a philosophy developed by Murray Bookchin in the 1960s.It holds that present ecological problems are rooted in deep-seated social problems, particularly in dominatory hierarchical political and social systems. These have resulted in an uncritical acceptance of an overly...
such as Murray Bookchin
Murray Bookchin
Murray Bookchin was an American libertarian socialist author, orator, and philosopher. A pioneer in the ecology movement, Bookchin was the founder of the social ecology movement within anarchist, libertarian socialist and ecological thought. He was the author of two dozen books on politics,...
claim that deep ecology fails to link environmental crises with authoritarianism
Authoritarianism
Authoritarianism is a form of social organization characterized by submission to authority. It is usually opposed to individualism and democracy...
and hierarchy
Hierarchy
A hierarchy is an arrangement of items in which the items are represented as being "above," "below," or "at the same level as" one another...
. Social ecologists believe that environmental problems are firmly rooted in the manner of human social interaction, and protest that an ecologically sustainable society could still be socially exploitative. Deep ecologists reject the argument that ecological behavior is rooted in the social paradigm (according to their view, that is an anthropocentric fallacy), and they maintain that the converse of the social ecologists' objection is also true in that it is equally possible for a socially egalitarian
Egalitarianism
Egalitarianism is a trend of thought that favors equality of some sort among moral agents, whether persons or animals. Emphasis is placed upon the fact that equality contains the idea of equity of quality...
society to continue to exploit the Earth.
Links with other movements
Parallels have been drawn between deep ecology and other movements, in particular the animal rightsAnimal rights
Animal rights, also known as animal liberation, is the idea that the most basic interests of non-human animals should be afforded the same consideration as the similar interests of human beings...
movement and Earth First!
Earth First!
Earth First! is a radical environmental advocacy group that emerged in the Southwestern United States in 1979. It was co-founded on April 4th, 1980 by Dave Foreman, Mike Roselle, Howie Wolke, and less directly, Bart Koehler and Ron Kezar....
.
Peter Singer
Peter Singer
Peter Albert David Singer is an Australian philosopher who is the Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University and Laureate Professor at the Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics at the University of Melbourne...
's 1975 book Animal Liberation
Animal Liberation (book)
Animal Liberation is a book by Australian philosopher Peter Singer, published in 1975.The book is widely considered within the animal liberation movement to be the founding philosophical statement of its ideas...
critiqued anthropocentrism and put the case for animals to be given moral consideration. This can be seen as a part of a process of expanding the prevailing system of ethics to wider groupings. However, Singer has disagreed with deep ecology's belief in the intrinsic value of nature separate from questions of suffering, taking a more utilitarian stance. The feminist
Feminism
Feminism is a collection of movements aimed at defining, establishing, and defending equal political, economic, and social rights and equal opportunities for women. Its concepts overlap with those of women's rights...
and civil rights movement
Civil rights movement
The civil rights movement was a worldwide political movement for equality before the law occurring between approximately 1950 and 1980. In many situations it took the form of campaigns of civil resistance aimed at achieving change by nonviolent forms of resistance. In some situations it was...
s also brought about expansion of the ethical system for their particular domains. Likewise deep ecology brought the whole of nature under moral consideration. The links with animal rights
Animal rights
Animal rights, also known as animal liberation, is the idea that the most basic interests of non-human animals should be afforded the same consideration as the similar interests of human beings...
are perhaps the strongest, as "proponents of such ideas argue that 'All life has intrinsic value'".
Many in the radical environmental direct-action movement Earth First!
Earth First!
Earth First! is a radical environmental advocacy group that emerged in the Southwestern United States in 1979. It was co-founded on April 4th, 1980 by Dave Foreman, Mike Roselle, Howie Wolke, and less directly, Bart Koehler and Ron Kezar....
claim to follow deep ecology, as indicated by one of their slogans No compromise in defence of mother earth. In particular, David Foreman
David Foreman
Dave Foreman is a US environmentalist and co-founder of the radical environmental movement Earth First!-Work with The Wilderness Society:...
, the co-founder of the movement, has also been a strong advocate for deep ecology, and engaged in a public debate with Murray Bookchin
Murray Bookchin
Murray Bookchin was an American libertarian socialist author, orator, and philosopher. A pioneer in the ecology movement, Bookchin was the founder of the social ecology movement within anarchist, libertarian socialist and ecological thought. He was the author of two dozen books on politics,...
on the subject. Judi Bari
Judi Bari
Judi Bari was an American environmentalist and labor leader, a feminist, and the principal organizer of Earth First! campaigns against logging in the ancient redwood forests of Northern California in the 1980s and '90...
was another prominent Earth Firster who espoused deep ecology. Many Earth First! actions have a distinct deep ecological theme; often these actions will be to save an area of old growth forest
Old growth forest
An old-growth forest is a forest that has attained great age , and thereby exhibits unique ecological features. An old growth forest has also usually reached a climax community...
, the habitat of a snail or an owl, even individual trees. It should however be noted that, especially in the United Kingdom, there are also strong anti-capitalist
Anti-capitalism
Anti-capitalism describes a wide variety of movements, ideas, and attitudes which oppose capitalism. Anti-capitalists, in the strict sense of the word, are those who wish to completely replace capitalism with another system....
and anarchist currents in the movement, and actions are often symbolic or have other political aims. At one point Arne Næss also engaged in environmental direct action, though not under the Earth First! banner, when he tied himself to a Norwegian fjord
Fjord
Geologically, a fjord is a long, narrow inlet with steep sides or cliffs, created in a valley carved by glacial activity.-Formation:A fjord is formed when a glacier cuts a U-shaped valley by abrasion of the surrounding bedrock. Glacial melting is accompanied by rebound of Earth's crust as the ice...
in a successful protest against the building of a dam.
Robert Greenway and Theodore Roszak
Theodore Roszak (scholar)
Theodore Roszak was professor emeritus of history at California State University, East Bay. He is best known for his 1969 text, The Making of a Counter Culture.-Background:...
have employed the deep ecology platform as a means to argue for ecopsychology
Ecopsychology
Ecopsychology connects psychology and ecology. Its political and practical goals are to show humans ways of healing alienation and to build a "sane" society and a sustainable culture. Theodore Roszak is credited with coining the term in his 1992 book, The Voice of the Earth...
. Although ecopsychology
Ecopsychology
Ecopsychology connects psychology and ecology. Its political and practical goals are to show humans ways of healing alienation and to build a "sane" society and a sustainable culture. Theodore Roszak is credited with coining the term in his 1992 book, The Voice of the Earth...
is a highly differentiated umbrella that encompasses many practices and perspectives, its ethos is generally consistent with deep ecology. As this now almost forty-year old "field" expands and continues to be reinterpreted by a variety of practitioners, social and natural scientists, and humanists, "ecopsychology
Ecopsychology
Ecopsychology connects psychology and ecology. Its political and practical goals are to show humans ways of healing alienation and to build a "sane" society and a sustainable culture. Theodore Roszak is credited with coining the term in his 1992 book, The Voice of the Earth...
" may change to include these novel perspectives.
Early influences
- Mary Hunter AustinMary Hunter AustinMary Hunter Austin was an American writer. One of the early nature writers of the American Southwest, her classic The Land of Little Rain describes the fauna, flora and people – as well as evoking the mysticism and spirituality – of the region between the High Sierra and the Mojave Desert of...
| Ralph Waldo EmersonRalph Waldo EmersonRalph Waldo Emerson was an American essayist, lecturer, and poet, who led the Transcendentalist movement of the mid-19th century...
| Aldo LeopoldAldo LeopoldAldo Leopold was an American author, scientist, ecologist, forester, and environmentalist. He was a professor at the University of Wisconsin and is best known for his book A Sand County Almanac , which has sold over two million copies... - John MuirJohn MuirJohn Muir was a Scottish-born American naturalist, author, and early advocate of preservation of wilderness in the United States. His letters, essays, and books telling of his adventures in nature, especially in the Sierra Nevada mountains of California, have been read by millions...
| Henry David ThoreauHenry David ThoreauHenry David Thoreau was an American author, poet, philosopher, abolitionist, naturalist, tax resister, development critic, surveyor, historian, and leading transcendentalist...
Notable advocates of deep ecology
- David AbramDavid AbramDavid Abram is an American philosopher, cultural ecologist, and performance artist, best known for his work bridging the philosophical tradition of phenomenology with environmental and ecological issues...
- Judi BariJudi BariJudi Bari was an American environmentalist and labor leader, a feminist, and the principal organizer of Earth First! campaigns against logging in the ancient redwood forests of Northern California in the 1980s and '90...
- Thomas BerryThomas BerryThomas Berry, C.P. was a Catholic priest of the Passionist order, cultural historian and ecotheologian ....
- Wendell BerryWendell BerryWendell Berry is an American man of letters, academic, cultural and economic critic, and farmer. He is a prolific author of novels, short stories, poems, and essays...
- Leonardo BoffLeonardo BoffLeonardo Boff was born 14 December 1938 in Concórdia, Santa Catarina state, Brazil. He is a theologian, philosopher and writer, known for his active support for the rights of the poor and excluded....
- Fritjof CapraFritjof CapraFritjof Capra is an Austrian-born American physicist. He is a founding director of the Center for Ecoliteracy in Berkeley, California, and is on the faculty of Schumacher College....
- Michael DowdMichael DowdMichael Dowd is an American evolutionary theologian, bestselling author, and evangelist for Big History and Religious Naturalism....
- Vivienne ElantaVivienne ElantaVivienne Heloise Elanta was a Western Australian environmental activist.-Personal life:Born in Germany, Elanta was the eldest of Gertraud Adler and Robert Neuman's five children. She had just six years of schooling...
- David ForemanDavid ForemanDave Foreman is a US environmentalist and co-founder of the radical environmental movement Earth First!-Work with The Wilderness Society:...
- Warwick FoxWarwick FoxWarwick Fox is an Australian philosopher and ethicist. He is the author of Toward a Transpersonal Ecology and A Theory of General Ethics: Human Relationships, Nature, and the Built Environment....
- Edward GoldsmithEdward GoldsmithEdward René David Goldsmith , widely known as Teddy Goldsmith, was an Anglo-French environmentalist, writer and philosopher....
- Félix GuattariFélix GuattariPierre-Félix Guattari was a French militant, an institutional psychotherapist, philosopher, and semiotician; he founded both schizoanalysis and ecosophy...
- Paul HawkenPaul HawkenPaul Hawken is an environmentalist, entrepreneur, and author.-Life:Paul Hawken had a Swedish grandmother and a Scottish grandfather with a farm. His father worked at UC Berkeley...
- Martin HeideggerMartin HeideggerMartin Heidegger was a German philosopher known for his existential and phenomenological explorations of the "question of Being."...
(controversial: see Development above) - Derrick JensenDerrick JensenDerrick Jensen is an American author and environmental activist living in Crescent City, California. Jensen has published several books questioning and critiquing modern civilization and its values, including A Language Older Than Words, The Culture of Make Believe, and Endgame. He holds a B.S...
- Dolores LaChapelleDolores LaChapelleDolores LaChapelle was a mountaineer, skier, T'ai chi teacher, independent scholar, and leader in the Deep ecology movement. She graduated from Denver University in 1947 and then spent three years teaching skiing in Aspen, Colorado...
- Pentti LinkolaPentti LinkolaKaarlo Pentti Linkola is a radical Finnish deep ecologist, polemicist, and fisherman. He has written widely about his ideas and is a prominent thinker in Finland, but, at the same time, is also an extremely controversial figure. He lives a simple and austere life. Linkola was occupitional...
- John Livingston
- Joanna MacyJoanna MacyJoanna Rogers Macy, Ph.D , is an environmental activist, author, scholar of Buddhism, general systems theory, and deep ecology.-Biography:...
- Jerry ManderJerry ManderJerold Irwin "Jerry" Mander is an American activist and author, best known for his 1977 book, Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television...
- Freya MathewsFreya MathewsFreya Mathews is an Australian philosopher and author. Her work is mainly concerned with ecological philosophy but also deals with questions of metaphysics, epistemology, ethics and politics as well as a variety of themes, such as cosmology, place, identity and indigeneity versus modernity...
- Terence McKennaTerence McKennaTerence Kemp McKenna was an Irish-American philosopher, psychonaut, researcher, teacher, lecturer and writer on many subjects, such as human consciousness, language, psychedelic drugs, the evolution of civilizations, the origin and end of the universe, alchemy, and extraterrestrial beings.-Early...
- Bill McKibbenBill McKibbenWilliam Ernest "Bill" McKibben is an American environmentalist, author, and journalist who has written extensively on the impact of global warming. He is the Schumann Distinguished Scholar at Middlebury College...
- W.S. Merwin
- Arne NæssArne NæssArne Dekke Eide Næss was a Norwegian philosopher, the founder of deep ecology. He was the youngest person to be appointed full professor at the University of Oslo....
- David OrtonDavid Orton (deep ecology)David Keith Orton was a Canadian writer, thinker and environmental activist who played a leading role in developing "left biocentrism" within the philosophy of deep ecology. Orton and his collaborators added the word "left" to biocentrism to indicate their anti-industrial, anti-capitalist...
- Daniel QuinnDaniel QuinnDaniel Quinn is an American writer described as an environmentalist. He is best known for his book Ishmael , which won the Turner Tomorrow Fellowship Award in 1991....
- Theodore RoszakTheodore Roszak (scholar)Theodore Roszak was professor emeritus of history at California State University, East Bay. He is best known for his 1969 text, The Making of a Counter Culture.-Background:...
- Savitri Devi (controversial)
- John SeedJohn SeedJohn Seed is an Australian environmentalist and director of the Rainforest Information Centre which successfully campaigned to save the sub-tropical rainforests of New South Wales. He is also a prominent figure in the deep ecology movement and co-creator of the Council of All Beings, and other...
- Paul ShepardPaul ShepardPaul Howe Shepard, Jr. was an American environmentalist and author best known for introducing the "Pleistocene paradigm" to deep ecology. His works have attempted to establish a normative framework in terms of evolutionary theory and developmental psychology...
- Gary SnyderGary SnyderGary Snyder is an American poet , as well as an essayist, lecturer, and environmental activist . Snyder is a winner of a Pulitzer Prize for Poetry...
- Richard SylvanRichard SylvanRichard Sylvan was a philosopher, logician, and environmentalist.- Biography :Sylvan was born Francis Richard Routley in Levin, New Zealand, and his early work is cited with this surname...
- Douglas TompkinsDouglas TompkinsDouglas Tompkins is an American environmentalist, conservationist and a former businessman.Tompkins co-founded and ran two clothing companies: the outdoor clothing company The North Face; and with his then-wife Susie, the ESPRIT clothing company. Since leaving the business world in 1989, Tompkins...
- Oberon Zell-RavenheartOberon Zell-RavenheartOberon Zell-Ravenheart is a co-founder of the Church of All Worlds, as well as a writer and speaker on the subject of Neopaganism. He completed a Bachelor of Arts degree in psychology from Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri in 1965...
- John ZerzanJohn ZerzanJohn Zerzan is an American anarchist and primitivist philosopher and author. His works criticize agricultural civilization as inherently oppressive, and advocate drawing upon the ways of life of prehistoric humans as an inspiration for what a free society should look like...
- Vandana ShivaVandana ShivaVandana Shiva , is a philosopher, environmental activist, and eco feminist. Shiva, currently based in Delhi, has authored more than 20 books and over 500 papers in leading scientific and technical journals. She was trained as a physicist and received her Ph.D...
See also
- ATWAATWAATWA stands for the uncompromising ecological mandate propounded by the infamous American convict Charles Manson. ATWA names the interrelated life support systems of the Earth...
- Anarcho-primitivismAnarcho-primitivismAnarcho-primitivism is an anarchist critique of the origins and progress of civilization. According to anarcho-primitivism, the shift from hunter-gatherer to agricultural subsistence gave rise to social stratification, coercion, and alienation...
- Biocentrism (ethics)Biocentrism (ethics)Biocentrism , in a political and ecological sense, is an ethical point of view which extends inherent value to non-human species, ecosystems, and processes in nature - regardless of their sentience...
- Coupled human-environment systemCoupled human-environment systemMuch as space and time came to be linked a century ago, so today’s scientists are exploring a variety of ways in which Earth and its humans are linked...
- Deep Green ResistanceDeep Green ResistanceDeep Green Resistance is a perspective emerging from the current environmental movement that views mainstream environmental activism as being largely ineffective.- Beliefs :...
- Earth EconomicsEarth EconomicsEarth Economics, a 501c3 non-profit headquartered in Tacoma, Washington, United States, is dedicated to researching and applying the economic solutions of tomorrow today. Earth Economics provides robust, science-based, ecologically-sound, economic analysis, policy and tools to governments,...
(policy think tank) - Earth liberationEarth liberationEarth liberation has no universal understanding as a concept, as it is much considered to be a part of radical environmentalism, or as a militant off-shoot, favouring instead radical and revolutionary environmentalism.-History:...
- EcoCommunalism
- EcoTheologyEcotheologyEcotheology is a form of constructive theology that focuses on the interrelationships of religion and nature, particularly in the light of environmental concerns. Ecotheology generally starts from the premise that a relationship exists between human religious/spiritual worldviews and the...
- EcopsychologyEcopsychologyEcopsychology connects psychology and ecology. Its political and practical goals are to show humans ways of healing alienation and to build a "sane" society and a sustainable culture. Theodore Roszak is credited with coining the term in his 1992 book, The Voice of the Earth...
- Environmental psychologyEnvironmental psychologyEnvironmental psychology is an interdisciplinary field focused on the interplay between humans and their surroundings. The field defines the term environment broadly, encompassing natural environments, social settings, built environments, learning environments, and informational environments...
- Gaia hypothesisGaia hypothesisThe Gaia hypothesis, also known as Gaia theory or Gaia principle, proposes that all organisms and their inorganic surroundings on Earth are closely integrated to form a single and self-regulating complex system, maintaining the conditions for life on the planet.The scientific investigation of the...
- Growth FetishGrowth FetishGrowth Fetish is a book about economics and politics by the Australian liberal political theorist Clive Hamilton. Published in 2003 it became a best-seller in Australia, an unusual feat for what is normally considered a dry subject....
- Human ecologyHuman ecologyHuman ecology is the subdiscipline of ecology that focuses on humans. More broadly, it is an interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary study of the relationship between humans and their natural, social, and built environments. The term 'human ecology' first appeared in a sociological study in 1921...
- Negative Population GrowthNegative Population GrowthNegative Population Growth is a membership organization in the United States, founded in 1972.NPG works on overpopulation issues and advocates a gradual reduction in U.S. and world population. NPG believes the optimal population for the United States is 150 to 200 million and that the optimal...
- Neotribalism
- Pathetic fallacyPathetic fallacyThe pathetic fallacy, anthropomorphic fallacy or sentimental fallacy is the treatment of inanimate objects as if they had human feelings, thought, or sensations. The pathetic fallacy is a special case of the fallacy of reification...
- PermaculturePermaculturePermaculture is an approach to designing human settlements and agricultural systems that is modeled on the relationships found in nature. It is based on the ecology of how things interrelate rather than on the strictly biological concerns that form the foundation of modern agriculture...
- Population ConnectionPopulation ConnectionPopulation Connection is an organization in the United States, formerly known as Zero Population Growth. They adopted their current name in 2002.Zero Population Growth was originally founded in 1968 by Paul R...
- Sustainable developmentSustainable developmentSustainable development is a pattern of resource use, that aims to meet human needs while preserving the environment so that these needs can be met not only in the present, but also for generations to come...
- The Revenge of GaiaThe Revenge of GaiaThe Revenge of Gaia: Why the Earth is Fighting Back – and How we Can Still Save Humanity is a book by James Lovelock.- External links :* The Revenge of Gaia * , edited extract from The Guardian, 24 March 2006...
- Voluntary Human Extinction MovementVoluntary Human Extinction MovementThe Voluntary Human Extinction Movement, or VHEMT , is a movement which calls for the voluntary gradual self-extinction of the human species through abstaining from reproduction. VHEMT's motto is "May we live long and die out."...
Further reading
- Abram, DavidDavid AbramDavid Abram is an American philosopher, cultural ecologist, and performance artist, best known for his work bridging the philosophical tradition of phenomenology with environmental and ecological issues...
1996. The Spell of the Sensuous: Perception and Language in a More-than-Human World. Pantheon Books. - Conesa-Sevilla, J. 2006. The Intrinsic Value of the Whole: Cognitive and utilitarian evaluative processes as they pertain to ecocentric, deep ecological, and ecopsychological "valuing." The Trumpeter, 22(2): 26-42.
- Glasser, Harold (ed.) 2005. The Selected Works of Arne Næss, Volumes 1-10. Springer, ISBN 1-4020-3727-9. (review)
- Keulartz, Jozef 1998. Struggle for nature : a critique of radical ecology, London [etc.] : Routledge.
- Kull, KaleviKalevi KullKalevi Kull is an eminent biosemiotics professor at the University of Tartu, Estonia.He was the president of the Estonian Naturalists' Society in 1991–1994.Ecologist Olevi Kull was his younger brother.-Publications:...
2011. Foundations for ecosemiotic deep ecology. In: Peil, Tiina (ed.), The Space of Culture – the Place of Nature in Estonia and Beyond. (Approaches to Culture Theory 1.) Tartu: Tartu University PressTartu University PressTartu University Press is a university press publishing house that is part of Tartu University, Estonia.The press was founded in 1632. It is the largest university press in Estonia....
, 69–75. - Merchant, CarolynCarolyn MerchantCarolyn Merchant is an American ecofeminist philosopher and historian of science most famous for her theory on 'The Death of Nature', whereby she identifies the Enlightenment as the period when science began to atomize, objectify and dissect nature, foretelling its eventual conception as inert...
1990. The Death of Nature, HarperOne. ISBN 0062505955, 978-0062505958. - Tobias, Michael (ed.) 1988 (1984). Deep Ecology. Avant Books. ISBN 0-932238-13-0.
- Turner, Jack 1996. The Abstract Wild. Tucson, Univ of Arizona Press.
- de Steiguer, J.E. 2006. The Origins of Modern Environmental Thought. University of Arizona PressUniversity of Arizona PressThe University of Arizona Press, a publishing house founded in 1959 as a department of the University of Arizona, is a nonprofit publisher of scholarly and regional books...
246 pp.
Educational Programs
External links
- Downloadable interview with Dr. Alan Drengson about Deep Ecology and Arne Næss. June 6, 2008.
- Church of Deep Ecology
- Deep Ecology Movement, Alan Drengson, Foundation for Deep Ecology.
- Environmental Ethics Journal
- The Great Story - a leading Deep Ecology/Deep Time educational website
- Gaia Foundation: an Australian organisation based upon the principles of Deep Ecology. See especially its links page.
- The Green Web a left biocentric environmental research group, with a number of writings on deep ecology
- The Trumpeter, Canadian journal of ecosophy, quite a number of articles from Næss among others
- Welcome to All Beings: Joanna MacyJoanna MacyJoanna Rogers Macy, Ph.D , is an environmental activist, author, scholar of Buddhism, general systems theory, and deep ecology.-Biography:...
on the work of Experiential Deep Ecology - Social Ecology vs Deep Ecology - A Challenge for the Ecology Movement by Murray Bookchin