Ecopolitics
Redefining the Polis
Published on 1. September 2023
Book
Hardback
236 pages
978-1-4384-9425-8 (ISBN)
Description
Analyzes the different feelings, drives and instincts we have inherited from other species, to suggest a new understanding of ourselves as part of an eco-political community.
Against the idea of social contract theories that suggest humans invented the political, Gerard Kuperus argues that we have always been political and that our species came into existence in a world that was already political. By studying the rich social and political lives of other animals, Ecopolitics provides suggestions for how to think and feel differently about ourselves, our relationship to other people, and the places and beings around us. Kuperus suggests we understand ourselves as part of an ecopolitical community consisting of humans and other living beings as well as inanimate objects. By recognizing nature itself as utterly political and seeing ourselves as a part of this larger political unity, we can come to face the real challenges of our times. This means that we are not simply putting ourselves in nature as we are. We are also changing who we are.
Against the idea of social contract theories that suggest humans invented the political, Gerard Kuperus argues that we have always been political and that our species came into existence in a world that was already political. By studying the rich social and political lives of other animals, Ecopolitics provides suggestions for how to think and feel differently about ourselves, our relationship to other people, and the places and beings around us. Kuperus suggests we understand ourselves as part of an ecopolitical community consisting of humans and other living beings as well as inanimate objects. By recognizing nature itself as utterly political and seeing ourselves as a part of this larger political unity, we can come to face the real challenges of our times. This means that we are not simply putting ourselves in nature as we are. We are also changing who we are.
Reviews / Votes
"In offering a powerful argument for the political relevance of the relationship between the human and nonhumans, Ecopolitics constitutes a book that both merits discussion and will hopefully spark many experiments in political and social activism." - H-Net Reviews (H-Environment)"Kuperus promotes a minimalist political community in which cooperation and mutual aid fostered by empathy both define group membership and transform the relational personal identities of its members. This is a timely and interesting alternative narrative to the right-wing Populist demagoguery of the Hobbesian state of nature, which supports possessive individualism and inspires contractarian society, historically separating people from the natural world ... Highly recommended." - CHOICE
"This engaging interdisciplinary work offers a new, robust view of the political realm, one that includes the wide and differentiated chorus of non-human beings. Expanding and locating a notion of the polis (civic and biological community) into evolutionary time, it forges a novel and provocative vision of 'ecopolitics' rooted in collaboration-a shared sense of the good, and forms of interspecies mutual aid." - David Macauley, coeditor of The Seasons: Philosophical, Literary, and Environmental Perspectives
More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Albany, NY
United States
Target group
Professional and scholarly
US School Grade: College Graduate Student and over
Dimensions
Height: 235 mm
Width: 157 mm
Thickness: 19 mm
Weight
543 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-4384-9425-8 (9781438494258)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
E-Book
09/2023
1st Edition
De Gruyter
from
€84.99
Available for download
Person
Gerard Kuperus is Professor of Philosophy at the University of San Francisco. He is the author of Ecopolitical Homelessness: Defining Place in an Unsettled World.
Content
Acknowledgments
Introduction: Ecopolitics beyond the Human World
1. Salmon Politics and Latour's Gaia
2. Crossing Borders: On Rats, Mice, and Other Decolonizing Packs
3. Chimpanzee Politics: Towards Empathy
4. From the Tidepool to Human Migration: The Biological Roots of Politics
5. Human and Other Ants: Decentralized Ecopolitics
Conclusion: Ecopolitics as a Decentralized Basis for a New Future
Notes
Bibliography
Index
Introduction: Ecopolitics beyond the Human World
1. Salmon Politics and Latour's Gaia
2. Crossing Borders: On Rats, Mice, and Other Decolonizing Packs
3. Chimpanzee Politics: Towards Empathy
4. From the Tidepool to Human Migration: The Biological Roots of Politics
5. Human and Other Ants: Decentralized Ecopolitics
Conclusion: Ecopolitics as a Decentralized Basis for a New Future
Notes
Bibliography
Index