Green Social Theory as a Bridge Between the Social Sciences and Natural Sciences
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Dec 27, 2023
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Abstract
This article aims to highlight the central role that green social theory can play in providing appropriate answers to questions related to interactions between humans and their natural sphere and the role of these interactions in the dangerous and accelerating environmental deterioration that the world is experiencing today. The article argues that traditional social theory, given its epistemological dependence on Western dichotomies that ontologically separate society from nature, culture from nature, and the outside from the inside, fails to provide valid explanations for this environmental phenomenon. Hence, green social theory is an alternative conceptual matrix that can help to understand the current environmental degradation by re-bridging nature and society, and then bridging between the natural sciences and social sciences by developing an integrated interdisciplinary approach. To this end, the article discusses the oppositions that derive from society/nature dichotomy, presents the intellectual and political context in which the green social theory arose, and then examines the main principles on which the green social theory is based.
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Keywords
Green social theorySociety/nature dualismNatural rooting of human beingsSustainable developmentEthical dimension of scienceInterdisciplinarity
References
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Berkes, F. Sacred Ecology. New York: Routledge, 2008.
Bullard, R. Dumping in Dixie: Race, Class, and Environmental Quality. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1990.
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Dean, W. With Broadax and Firebrand: The Destruction of the Brazilian Atlantic Forest. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995.
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Dickens, P. Society and Nature: Towards a Green Social Theory. London: Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1992.
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Jacobs, M. The Politics of the Real World. London: Earthscan, 1996.
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Milton, K. Environmentalism and Cultural Theory: Exploring the Role of Anthropology in Environmental Discourse. London: Routledge, 1996.
Murphy, R. Sociology and Nature, Social Action in Context. Oxford: Westview Press, 1997.
Nelson, M.K. & Shilling, D. Traditional Ecological Knowledge: Learning from Indigenous Practices for Environmental Sustainability. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018.
Norgaard, R.B. Development Betrayed: The End of Progress and the Ecoevolutionary Revisioning of the Future. London and New York: Routledge, 1994.
Pirsig, R. Zen and the Art of Motor Cycle Maintenance. London: Transworld Publishers, 1974.
Plato, The Dialogues of Plato. Translated by B. Jowett. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1924.
Plumwood, V. Feminism and the Mastery of Nature. London: Routledge, 1993.
Rose D.B. et al., “Thinking Through the Environment, Unsettling the Humanities,” Environmental Humanities, Vol. 1, N° 1 (2012).
Sahi, J. The Child and the Serpent. London: Arkana, 1980.
Sahlins, M.D. The Use and Abuse of Biology. An Anthropological Critique of Sociobiology. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 1976.
Schoon, M.L. & Leeuw, S. van der. “The Shift Toward Social-Ecological Systems Perspectives: Insights into the Human-Nature Relationship,” Natures Sciences Society, Vol. 23, N° 2 (2015).
Singer, P. Ethics. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994.
Skolimowski, H. Living Philosophy. Eco-Philosophy as a Tree of Life. London: Arkana, 1992.
Stauffer, R.C. “Haeckel, Darwin, and Ecology,” The Quarterly Review of Biology, Vol. 32, N° 2 (1957).
Swallow, E. Sanitation in Daily Life. Boston: Whitcomb and Barrows, 1910.
Szerszynski, B., Lash, S. & Wynne, B. “Introduction: Ecology, Realism and the Social Sciences,” In S. Lash, B. Szerszynski and B. Wynne (eds). Risk, Environment and Modernity. Towards a New Ecology. London: Sage, 1996.
Tester, K. Animals and Society. The Humanity of Animal Rights. Routledge: London, 1991.
Warren, D.M. “Linking Scientific and Indigenous Agricultural Systems,” In J. Lin Compton, The Transformation of International Agricultural Research and Development. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 1989.
Weizsäcker, E.U. Von. Earth politics. London and New Jersey: Zed books, 1994.
White, L. The Science of Culture. New York: Farrar, Strauss, 1949.
Whitehead, A.N. Science and the Modern World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1926.
Williams, R. Keywords: A Vocabulary of Culture and Society. New York: Oxford University Press, 1985.
Worster, D. The Wealth of Nature: Environmental History and the Ecological Imagination. New York: Oxford University Press, 1993.
Agrawal, A. “Dismantling the Divide Between Indigenous and Scientific Knowledge,” Development and Change, Vol. 26, N° 3 (1995).
Anderson, W. The Green Man: The Archetype of Our Oneness with the Earth. London: Harper Collins, 1990.
Aron, R. Les étapes de la pensée sociologique. Paris: Gallimard, 1967.
Barry, J. Environment and Social Theory. London: Routledge, 1999.
Baxter, B. “Must Political Theory Now Be Green?” In I. Hampsher-Monk and J. Stanyer, Contemporary Political Studies 1996, vols. 1-3. Belfast: Political Studies Association, 1996.
Benford, R. “The Half-Life of the Environmental Justice Frame: Innovation, Diffusion, and Stagnation,” In D. Pellowand R. Brulle, Power, Justice and Pollution: A Critical Appraisal of the Environmental Justice Movement.Cambridge: MIT Press, 2005.
Benton, T. “Biology and Social Science: Why the Return of the Repressed Should be Givena (Cautious) Welcome,” Sociology, Vol. 25, N° 1 (1991).
–––. Natural Relations. Ecology, Animal Rights and Social Justice. London: Verso, 1993.
Berkes, F. & Folke, C. (eds), Linking Social and Ecological Systems: Management Practices and Social Mechanisms for Building Resilience. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998.
Berkes, F. Sacred Ecology. New York: Routledge, 2008.
Bullard, R. Dumping in Dixie: Race, Class, and Environmental Quality. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1990.
Capra, F. The Turning Point: Science, Society, and the Rising Culture. London: Wildwood House, 1982.
Catton, W. and Dunlap, R.E. “A New Ecological Paradigm for Post-Exhuberant Sociology,” American Behavioral Scientist, Vol. 24, 1 (1980).
Cowan, J.G. The Elements of the Aborigine Tradition. Shaftsbury: Element Books Limited, 1992.
De Vos, A. Biggs, R. & Preiser, R. “Methods for Understanding Social-Ecological Systems: A Review of Place-based Studies,” Ecology and Society, Vol. 24, N° 4 (2019).
Dean, W. With Broadax and Firebrand: The Destruction of the Brazilian Atlantic Forest. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995.
Díaz, S. et al. “The IPBES Conceptual Framework- Connecting Nature and People,” Current Opinion in Environment Sustainability, Vol. 14 (2015).
Dickens, P. Society and Nature: Towards a Green Social Theory. London: Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1992.
Dizard, J. Going Wild: Hunting, Animal Rights, and the Contested Meaning of Nature. Massachusetts: University of Massachusetts Press, 1994.
Dunlap, R.E & Catton, W. “What Environmental Sociologists Have in Common (Whether Concerned with ‘Built’ or ‘Natural’ Environments),” Vol. 53, N° 2-3, Sociological Inquiry (1983).
Dunlap, R.E. & Mertig, A.G. American Environmentalism: The U.S. Environmental Movement, 1970-1990. Washington, DC: Taylor and Francis, 1992.
Dunlap, R.E. “Paradigms, Theories, and Environmental Sociology”, In R.E. Dunlap, et al, Sociological Theory and the environment. Classicals Foundations, Contemporary Insights. Lanham: Rowan and Littlefield Publishers, 2001.
Durkheim, É. Les formes élémentaires de la vie religieuse. Paris : Presses Universitaires de France, 2003.
Freudenburg, W.R. Frickel, S & Gramling, R. “Beyond the Nature/Society Devide: Learning to Think About a Mountain,” Sociological Forum, Vol. 10, N° 3 (1995).
Geertz, C. The Interpretation of Cultures: Selected Essays. New York: Basic Books, 1973.
Goldblatt, D. Social theory and the environment. Cambridge: Polity Press, 1996.
Greenberg, J.B. & Park, T.K. “Political Ecology,” Journal of Political Ecology, Vol. 1, N° 1 (1994).
Hayward, T. “What Is Green Political Theory?” In I. Hampsher-Monk and J. Stanyer, Contemporary Political Studies 1996, vols. 1-3. Belfast: Political Studies Association, 1996.
Hobart M. (ed). An Anthropological Critique of Development: The Growth of Ignorance. London: Routledge, 1993.
Jacobs, M. The Politics of the Real World. London: Earthscan, 1996.
Kluckhohn, C. & Leighton, D. The Navaho. Garden City: Doubleday and Company Inc., 1962.
Lander, E. “Eurocentrism, Modern Knowledges, and the ‘Natural’ Order of Global Capitalism,” Nepantla: Views from South, Vol. 3, N° 2 (2002).
Latour, B. Nous n’avons jamais été modernes. Essai d’anthropologie symétrique. Paris : La Découverte, 1997.
–––. We Have Never Been Modern.Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1991.
Lee, K. Social Philosophy and Ecological Scarcity. London: Routledge, 1989.
Macnaghten, P. and Urry, J. Contested Natures.London: Sage, 1998.
Marx, K. Manuscrits de 1844. Trad. E. Bottigelli. Paris: Éditions Sociales, 1968.
Merchant, C. The Columbia Guide to American Environmental History. New York: Columbia University Press, 2002.
Milton, K. Environmentalism and Cultural Theory: Exploring the Role of Anthropology in Environmental Discourse. London: Routledge, 1996.
Murphy, R. Sociology and Nature, Social Action in Context. Oxford: Westview Press, 1997.
Nelson, M.K. & Shilling, D. Traditional Ecological Knowledge: Learning from Indigenous Practices for Environmental Sustainability. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018.
Norgaard, R.B. Development Betrayed: The End of Progress and the Ecoevolutionary Revisioning of the Future. London and New York: Routledge, 1994.
Pirsig, R. Zen and the Art of Motor Cycle Maintenance. London: Transworld Publishers, 1974.
Plato, The Dialogues of Plato. Translated by B. Jowett. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1924.
Plumwood, V. Feminism and the Mastery of Nature. London: Routledge, 1993.
Rose D.B. et al., “Thinking Through the Environment, Unsettling the Humanities,” Environmental Humanities, Vol. 1, N° 1 (2012).
Sahi, J. The Child and the Serpent. London: Arkana, 1980.
Sahlins, M.D. The Use and Abuse of Biology. An Anthropological Critique of Sociobiology. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 1976.
Schoon, M.L. & Leeuw, S. van der. “The Shift Toward Social-Ecological Systems Perspectives: Insights into the Human-Nature Relationship,” Natures Sciences Society, Vol. 23, N° 2 (2015).
Singer, P. Ethics. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994.
Skolimowski, H. Living Philosophy. Eco-Philosophy as a Tree of Life. London: Arkana, 1992.
Stauffer, R.C. “Haeckel, Darwin, and Ecology,” The Quarterly Review of Biology, Vol. 32, N° 2 (1957).
Swallow, E. Sanitation in Daily Life. Boston: Whitcomb and Barrows, 1910.
Szerszynski, B., Lash, S. & Wynne, B. “Introduction: Ecology, Realism and the Social Sciences,” In S. Lash, B. Szerszynski and B. Wynne (eds). Risk, Environment and Modernity. Towards a New Ecology. London: Sage, 1996.
Tester, K. Animals and Society. The Humanity of Animal Rights. Routledge: London, 1991.
Warren, D.M. “Linking Scientific and Indigenous Agricultural Systems,” In J. Lin Compton, The Transformation of International Agricultural Research and Development. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 1989.
Weizsäcker, E.U. Von. Earth politics. London and New Jersey: Zed books, 1994.
White, L. The Science of Culture. New York: Farrar, Strauss, 1949.
Whitehead, A.N. Science and the Modern World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1926.
Williams, R. Keywords: A Vocabulary of Culture and Society. New York: Oxford University Press, 1985.
Worster, D. The Wealth of Nature: Environmental History and the Ecological Imagination. New York: Oxford University Press, 1993.
How to Cite
Hajij, Hassan. 2023. “Green Social Theory As a Bridge Between the Social Sciences and Natural Sciences”. Tajseer Journal 5 (2):9-32. https://doi.org/10.29117/tis.2023.0137.
Section
Articles in Arabic