Category Archives: Political Ecology

Progress

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The world is in a constant state of forward momentum. Whether it be the technological advancements that allow us to connect with others across the globe instantly or the social progress that allows the LGBTQ+ community to marry those they love. This momentum is far from a steady path, yet with every passing generation and year, societal values are ever changing.

Terror management theory interacts with this tug-of-war for progress in two primary ways. First, it serves as a backbone to why so many are reluctant to accept change, suggesting that people seek familiarity in community and norms when they feel under threat, feeding into discriminatory and conservative values, which in turn keep the flame of agitation alive, forming a feedback loop. Secondly, terror management theory also poses the opposite, that when people feel secure, they are willing to explore new cultural positions. This explains the wave of social progress seen following the industrial revolution. People are wealthier across the board, they have greater access to services and goods that enable this sense of security, ultimately allowing them to broaden their horizons and subscribe to progressive movements such as suffrage and racial equality.

While progress of the mind may be a constant, it faces a hurdle in the actual institution of policy. Those in power are generally those who face the greatest perceived threat to change, being some of the most wealthy and in the ruling demographic. This applies to national governance, but as I learned through my action project work with the UW chapter of the Institution Climate Action coalition, almost every legacy institution feels under threat and relies upon conservatism to maintain feelings of power. In the instance of UW and the ICA, we see a reliance on dirty money from fossil fuel companies.

These systemic layers of power are the primary reason why so many people feel powerless to institute change, and given that those in power are the last to adopt change, it feels like our society is much further behind than it should be.These feelings of powerless were present in our action project as much of the coalitions actions were easily brushed off. While this powerlessness is potent and hard to emotionally overcome, the most important pieces of social progress of modern history have all been led and supported by people without this institutional power, but are still able to stress the importance of progress and achieve their goals.

Final Blog Post: Solving the collective action problem

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Collaboration Is a Key Skill. So Why Aren't We Teaching It?

My paper is about solving the collective-action problem that inhibits humanity from creating sustainable communities. I highlight five major key points.

  1. We must understand the insecurities created by fear of death.
  • Worm at the core gives examples of how insecurities lead to violent tendencies and self-destructive behavior
  1. TDM is essential for creating strong communities that are necessary for fostering sustainable habits
  • Worm at the core gives solid evidence that explains individuals with strong bonds are more likely to collaborate.
  • Strong communities mean that individual values and goals become group goals
  • People are more likely to live selflessly, this means giving back to the community in a sustainable way. Recycling, Reusing, etc
  1. We need to cultivate a culture that promotes sustainability
  • Cultures are a set of informal rules and norms, often times they are more influential 
  • Culture can spread awareness
  1. Sacrifice is needed for change
  • Self-sacrifice must be ingrained in a sustainable culture
  • Litfin mentions that a sustained cycle of life and death must involve sacrafice
  • The planets life-force functions on the earths organisms taking but also being able to give back
  • For example, planting three trees after cutting down three trees
  1. Solving the collective action problem
  • The tipping point (motivating the moderate voter)
  • Pressuring key legislature
  • Organizing a movement
  • Public accountability
  • Incentivizing the public

 

Although I don’t mention it very much in the paper, my project, beyond plastics, is about creating legislation that incentivizes people to recycle, reuse and reduce. It’s also very important to note that the legislation Beyond Plastics is trying to pass is intended to be the groundwork for future sustainable practices. But I think the most important part of the project is getting people to collaborate. To answer the question of solving the collective action problem, we can look at our group projects. The assignment is structured where individual goals are aligned with group goals, thus incentivizing individuals to work together toward a common goal. This is a selective incentive that is critical to understanding my paper. The paper is structured as follows, understanding how we can optimize individuals into a group activity and optimize groups efficiently and get more people involved in the group. 

My conclusion is this: Our deaths have meaning through our actions and the sacrifices we make. Our histories are built upon the collective contributions of every individual who has ever lived. Group action is crucial to progress, but individual action is the first step.

What Did I Learn This Quarter?

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While my action project experience in this class could have been better, I am able to recognize the valuable lessons I learned from it – primarily about the importance of having a group leader. If we had one person taking charge, I think we could have gotten a lot more done. Regardless, I am proud of how we came together in the end to create engaging and informative content, despite our busy schedules.

In the context of our class, I found that our project, promoting the passage of legislation aimed to revolutionize plastic recycling in Washington, perfectly represents political ecology. We live in a system where we elect individuals to make environmental policy decisions on our behalf, and this recycling bill relies on them to pass it. I don’t want to say that my group’s action project was worthless (because I think there is a lot of value in public education), but we should acknowledge that a social media campaign will likely have a limited impact on the decisions made in Olympia.

Honestly, that is the reality of political ecology in the Anthropocene.

As far as the other action projects, WashPIRG’s Save the Orcas campaign was what finally allowed me to understand what our class was about. I could see that, like my group’s, theirs hinged on the actions of legislators, and that Senator Cantwell’s refusal to support breaching the dams might be motivated in some way by her fear of dying. Relatedly, the Ernest Becker group was contributing to the study of conceptions of death, which is beneficial in helping us to predict whether future environmental reforms might be possible in the face of climate disaster, given that Terror Management Theory explains our actions in response to death reminders. As this group mentioned in class, they were frustrated at the constraints they were given by the people in power over them, which is exactly what the ICA is for. This last group’s action project was directly investigating the political ecology of UW in the Anthropocene and trying to get our Board of Regents to follow through on their fossil fuel divestment commitments, again relying on people in power.

All in all, while it wasn’t my own group’s action project that led to me discovering the true meaning of our class, it was the action projects of our class in general that helped me to understand what it means to survive the political ecology of death in the Anthropocene.

Fear Within our Anthropocence and How We Can Over Come It

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My biggest takeaway about the political ecology of death in the Anthropocene is that people are ruled by fear. Political leaders, religious leaders, everyday people, and everyone in between has some amount of fear in their lives. Fear of our death, fear of failure, fand ear of how our world is being run.

This poem by Shakespeare speaks of fear:

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/50428/song-fear-no-more-the-heat-o-the-sun-

Fear does not have to be a negative influence. Letting fear control you allows for it to have power over you. But, acknowledging this fear creates a new opportunity. An opportunity for love, desire, hope, and a life full of adventure.

The Worm at the Core states “Why not depart from life as a sated guest from a feast” (Solomon) and I agree. Why not take our life for everything it has to offer. Living in the depths of despair does nothing for for anyone. This class has shown me that yes, our world is dark, has several demoralizing issues, and needs some fixing-but the beautiful thing is that we have the power to change this. We can be the light in our own world.

My action project was built around WashPirg’s Save the Orca Campaign with the goal of breaching the Lower Snake River Dam to allow more salmon to be available for the Orca’s to feed on. This is a passion project, and as I reference in my paper all passion projects are a way of coping with death anxiety. Passion projects to me are a positive way of working through personal death anxiety on some level. Being a part of something greater than oneself is an incredible feeling, and to me gives the feeling of hope.

Hope is stronger than fear, but when paired together can create opportunities to better our world

Shakespeare’s poem talks about how we will all come to rest as dust eventually (Shakespeare), and The Worm at the Core talks about how we are no more valuable to this Earth than a lizard or a potato from a biological perspective (Solomon), so then what is the point of being riddled with anxiety. This ay be a blindly optimistic point of view, but with how things are currently going… What do we have to lose by giving our best effort to enact change?

Chocolate and Chip

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During our most recent contemplative practice, which Professor Litfin recorded for us to listen to over Thanksgiving break, I took some time to reflect on where my holiday meal came from.

My aunt hosted our annual family dinner this year, so we were incredibly lucky to enjoy potatoes, green beans, eggs, and various fruits straight from her farm. But some of our food, like the turkey, needed to be bought from the grocery store. That turkey is what (or who) I thought most about during the contemplation exercise. Specifically, I considered what that turkey’s life must have been like before it ended up on our table. The article we read last month about slaughterhouses (Working Undercover in a Slaughterhouse: an interview with Timothy Pachirat) had a profound impact on my thought process.

As the article points out, death is widely normalized in our culture, but, at the same time, we all take great care to willingly ignore it. Deep down, I’m sure my family and I all understood that the turkey on our table had suffered for most of its life. It probably lived in awful conditions in a factory farm, where it was forcefully fattened up and bludgeoned to death, all for some family to eat in celebration of a holiday whose origins are rife with much of the same exploitation and violence. This reality is not one that many of us want to think about, but it’s one I forced myself to confront to help me be more appreciative of the (unwilling) sacrifice that animal made.

(Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)

After gaining this clarity, I found myself thinking back to Thanksgiving morning, when President Biden officially pardoned Chocolate and Chip at the White House (pictured right). When I was watching this event, I felt joy that these turkeys would go on to live happily and healthily for many more years. However, I’ve realized instead that our country has this tradition of sparing the life of one or two turkeys every Thanksgiving merely to obfuscate those we’d rather not see.

In closing, I am thankful for the many insights I have gained throughout this quarter from our weekly contemplative practices, and as this class comes to an end, I am beginning to realize the positive impact they have had on me. Setting aside some time to just sit with my thoughts is something I plan to do more of in the future.

Pondering death can make or break society

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Thinking more deeply about death has shocked me out of my daily rhythm. In some moments I’ve wished I was more religious as a way to “beat” the fear of death by utter belief in something else. The Worm at the Core tested me – it made me think, how is grappling with death culturally beneficial? Is finding my way through intense existential thoughts going to build me into a better person, or only blur my focus of reality more? 

A holistic and healthy relationship with death, rather than blind ignorance and avoidance, is the path I want to take. In The Worm at the Core’s “Living with Death” section, the authors propose that “being mortal, while terrifying, can also make our lives sublime by infusing us with courage, compassion, and concern for future generations.” (225) I strive to find this.

Sometimes the idea that I’m going to die one day doesn’t scare me though, but rather gives me a sense of nonchalance and indifference, which can often be equally damaging as fear of death. Climate change seems too overwhelming? Many of the repercussions will be hundreds of years from now, it’s not worth stressing about! Might as well give in to consumerism, it’s the path laid out for me!  

This is a coping mechanism that I believe many people, especially from industrialized consumer cultures hold. They warp fear of death into destructive acceptance and use the idea that they’re going to die at some point to justify overuse that sets future generations up for failure. 

Purposeful thinking about death that The Worm at the Core describes provides a different outlook. Everyone needs to grapple with death in their own way, but understanding death as a cyclical continuation of humanity lessens the fear for me. For more people to come after us and experience the joy and beauty of Earth, we all must die. Not die with the intention of draining all of the resources we want to experience before our own mortality – die with the intention of leaving room for a new generation of people. 

I want future generations of children to marvel at trees – to walk through forests with soil staining their feet and adore waterfalls, to see the remarkable diversity of animals in our world, and to gain joy from the things we take for granted. We will die, but our legacy and “immortality project” lies in preserving this remarkable place we call home. 

Anthropocene, capitalocene, plantationocene: human issues and their specific roots

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While I resonate with many of the arguments posited in The Worm at the Core, I also find myself questioning the universality posed by authors Sheldon Solomon, Jeff Greenberg, and Tom Pyszczynski. Their experiments, which largely have been performed on Americans, Canadians, and Israelis, have results which are then applied to humans as a whole, and without significant regard to class, race, and other differentiators. This is not to dismiss their conclusions, but rather to question whether every person has the same understandings and fears of death.

The movie Anthropocene as well, while helpful in showing the extent of climate crisis, at many points lacked an internationalist analysis and instead pointed to all humans as the cause of climate change. While somewhat different from universalizing fears of death, this is another example, in my opinion, of painting too broad a stroke with regards to climate and death. Specificity with regards to who/what has caused climate destruction allows for more accurate conclusions with regards to alleviating future destruction.

Large, heavy machinery works in the middle of a vast, barren field. Humans look on in the foreground.

Creating the capitalocene: endless accumulation – CounterPunch.org

This specificity is exemplified in a shift from calling our current era the “anthropocene” toward names such as “capitalocene” and “plantationocene” (plantation including chattel slavery as well as other forms of agro-industrialization). I was first introduced to these terms by a friend last week, and truthfully I’ve done only the barest readings of either. Nonetheless, in this interview, Donna Haraway says that “the Anthropocene is […] an historical, situated set of conjunctures that are absolutely not a species act.” In the same series of articles, Sophie Sap Moore et. al. posit that the plantation was “produced through processes of land alienation, labor extraction, and racialized violence.”

This terminology correction seems valuable to me as a way to shift focus from “mankind” as the cause of climate crisis (which might lead to eugenicist and fascist solutions such as reducing births) and instead towards an understanding that global systems of imperialism and colonialism have exploited masses of people for the benefit of a few, moving everyone closer to climate catastrophe. This in itself does not pose a solution, and in all honesty I don’t have one. Just that a more thorough analysis of our circumstances will lead to a sharper understanding of our duties. 

Something less heavy—I’m slowly starting to curate a (limited and not at all cohesive) death/climate crisis playlist. Please add and listen! Or don’t! 

When The Bee Stings

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credit: Ryan Haskins

I have a facts-based, biological view of mortality and existence, which I think is what has allowed me to find peace. I’ve accepted the simple fact that when I die, the same thing will happen to me that happens to all organisms on our planet: my corpse will be feasted on, and I’ll be turned into energy for other living beings.

As far as why I exist, I recognize that an organism’s singular purpose in life is to reproduce and contribute to evolution. Yes, this seems like a depressing outlook (especially because I’m gay), but it has led me to pledge to use my time here on Earth to “maximize what [I] can get out of life and minimize the harm [I] do to others” (Solomon et al. 224). Maybe this is emblematic of Terror Management Theory at work.

I’ve found it useful to apply that same ‘hard place’ worldview to my thoughts about living in a time of so many uncontrollable crises. I’m afraid of where America’s current struggles with capitalism, democracy, and international peacekeeping amidst the Anthropocene might take us. However, it motivates me to try to make a difference (however small), even when it seems futile. I choose what I get out of this life, so I am going to make the most of it and do my best to make society better for those who will come after.

When I started reading The Worm at the Core, I’ll admit that I had doubts about Terror Management Theory’s explanation of why people behave the way they do. In some ways, I still do. The book focuses almost solely on Western countries in experiments, ignores different gender perspectives, and overgeneralizes some claims without evidence. However, upon finishing the book and reflecting on some of my life decisions, I can see how TMT played a role, especially regarding my worldview.

As I review our other (sometimes quite bleak) course materials, I try to stay committed to my ‘hard place’ worldview and remember that change is possible if we envision it. I think this is why I’ve particularly enjoyed “The Ecomodernist Manifesto” and The God Species: Saving the Planet in the Age of Humans. When the bee stings and my time here on Earth is up, I may not have fulfilled my animal purpose, but I am confident that I will have fulfilled my human one.

Death is what makes life great

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What role does the denial of death have in the Anthropocene?
Humans are currently a driving force of ecological disasters. We are ruining the ecosystem, killing off species, and destroying the ozone layer, which will kill all human life if nothing changes. What can we do to change this?
I think a part of the problem is dominant modern culture ignores death. Maybe this could be because most people don’t think about their deaths. Worm in the Core quotes Michel de Montaigne’s famous essay That to study Philosophy Is to Learn to Die,

—let us learn bravely to stand our ground, and fight him. And to begin to deprive him of the greatest advantage he has over us, let us take a way quite contrary to the common course. Let us disarm him of his novelty and strangeness, let us converse and be familiar with him, and have nothing so frequent in our thoughts as death. Upon all occasions represent him to our imagination in his every shape; at the stumbling of a horse, at the falling of a tile, at the least prick with a pin, let us presently consider, and say to ourselves, “Well, and what if it had been death itself?” and, thereupon, let us encourage and fortify ourselves. Let us evermore, amidst our jollity and feasting, set the remembrance of our frail condition before our eyes, never suffering ourselves to be so far transported with our delights, but that we have some intervals of reflecting upon, and considering how many several ways this jollity of ours tends to death, and with how many dangers it threatens it.

The book points out effective terror management should constitute being comfortable with one’s death. We should normalize talking about death so we can take a deeper appreciation of life, with more empathy towards living things around us. By being comfortable and reflecting on our own inevitable deaths, we can appreciate life’s beauty. This means being conscious of our actions and how they affect others and the planet.
I propose to whoever is reading this to think about death, not morbidly but about your death, and how that affects your actions, thoughts, and world views. Thinking about what you think can help you reflect on how to live a more decisive and aware life. Hopefully, you can be more self-conscious about your actions, evaluate whether you are spending your time the way you want to, and how you have affected those around you.
Anthropocene Syndrome: a complex of environmental degradation,... | Download Scientific Diagram