On ecological politics and political ecologicalization
Modern industrial civilization has brought great progress to mankind, but at the same time, due to human's incorrect understanding of nature and itself and blind development behavior, it led to the global ecological crisis in the 1960s and 1970s. The emergence and development of ecological crisis has become the motive force and foundation of the rise of ecological political movement. On this basis, it has promoted the ecological development of national politics and international politics. The emergence and development of ecological politics is the premise and foundation of political ecologicalization and political ecologicalization. Political ecologicalization is the inevitable trend and result of eco-political development, one of the indispensable fundamental measures to solve the current global ecological crisis, an inevitable choice for the coordinated, sustained and healthy development of global economy, society, culture and ecological environment, and one of the trends of future political development.
I. Introduction
Since the 1960s, with the emergence of global environmental problems, the ecological crisis has attracted more and more attention from all countries in the world. From a certain point of view, it has gone far beyond the contradictions and conflicts among countries, regions and nations. Human beings pay more and more attention to their own ecological environment and their home-the earth. The concern for ecological crisis forces human beings to re-examine their relationship with nature, their original mode of thinking, production and consumption, development model, ideology, ethics and development concept, and the future and destiny of economic, cultural and political development in all countries of the world. The emergence of global environmental problems has brought any country, whether developed or developing, socialist or capitalist, together again.
Based on the global environmental problems and the emergence of ecological crisis, since the late 1960s, countries all over the world, especially some developed countries in the west, have set off a vigorous and surging ecological politics. Since the 1970s, every country in the world has taken the opportunity of "Earth Day" and "World Environment Day" to keep growing, and it is still in the ascendant. In 1980s and 1990s, under the impetus of eco-politics, various eco-organizations and eco-green organizations were established in developed and developing countries. As a result, the combination of ecology and politics has formed new interdisciplinary subjects such as ecological politics and political ecology, and the traditional political development concept has changed to the political ecological development concept.
Second, the rise, development and significance of ecological politics
(A) ecological crisis-the motivation and foundation of the rise of ecological politics
The so-called ecological crisis refers to the degradation of the structure and function of the natural environment or ecosystem on which human beings depend for survival and development, and the unreasonable development and utilization lead to a serious imbalance of the ecosystem.
Since the industrial revolution, especially in the last 50 years of the 20th century, the global environment has suffered unprecedented serious damage and pollution. Some ecologists and politicians call it one of the three stupid acts committed by human beings in the 20th century and the "Third World War". Gaylord, the founder of Earth Day & middot Nelson once said brilliantly: The threat from nature (ecological crisis) is a more dangerous challenge than war. From Germany and Japan, we know that a country can recover from the trauma of war, but no country can rise rapidly from the destroyed natural environment. Since 1950s, there have been ten global environmental problems in the world, such as "greenhouse effect", destruction of atmospheric ozone layer, increasingly serious acid rain pollution, spread of toxic chemicals, population explosion, soil erosion, sharp decline of forests, expansion of land desertification, pollution and shortage of water resources, and sharp decline of biodiversity. The serious destruction of the global ecological environment is cruelly tearing up every good wish and dream of mankind for the future, which will not only affect one or two generations, but also affect the survival and reproduction of several generations or even dozens of generations.
Global environmental problems and ecological crisis can be seen from the following data and facts. For example, at present, the rate of animal and plant species disappearing on the earth is 1000 times faster than at any time in the past 65 million years, and about1000 species disappear from the earth every day. Since the 20th century, 1 10 species and subspecies of more than 3,800 mammals in the world have become extinct, and more than 600 animals and 25,000 plants are on the verge of extinction. Ecologists point out that it will take at least 1 100 million years for human beings to restore biodiversity naturally so far. Water pollution makes people's living environment worse and worse, especially in third world countries. According to statistics, more than 654.38+07 billion people do not have proper safe drinking water supply, and more than 3 billion people do not have proper sanitation facilities. According to the survey of the United Nations Environment Programme, diseases caused by water pollution in the Third World cause an average of 25,000 deaths every day. Another example is the severe drought in Ethiopia from 1983 to 1984, which caused 1 10,000 people to starve to death. 19 1 ~ 1992, there was a persistent drought in Africa 12 countries, which caused about 35,438+02 people to starve to death. Due to soil erosion and desertification, the Yellow River, the birthplace of China ancient civilization center, is currently cut off for 227 days a year. At the same time, due to the acceleration of sediment deposition in Dongting Lake, the area and capacity of the Yangtze River are also decreasing year by year, from about 6,000 square kilometers in 1825 to 4,360 square kilometers in 1949. By 1998, the area of the lake was only 2653 square kilometers during the "extraordinary" flood of the Yangtze River. According to this reduction, Dongting Lake is likely to become another Lop Nur in less than 200 years, and disappear from the physical geography atlas of China. At present, the flood control levees in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River are also increasing year by year. Quot The tragedy of how the water of the Yellow River moves out of the sky is likely to be repeated in the Yangtze River in the near future. This year, the rare sandstorms in China, Beijing, Tianjin and Shanghai once again made China people feel the depth and distance of environmental damage.
The direct consequence of global environmental deterioration is economic loss. It is estimated that the economic loss caused by environmental pollution and destruction in China is as high as 200 billion RMB per year, which is equivalent to the economic loss caused by 20 Tangshan earthquakes. In 1998 alone, the Yangtze River flood caused direct economic losses of160 billion RMB, and the annual economic losses caused by environmental pollution and destruction in the world were not less than 2.5 trillion US dollars. Therefore, ecologists point out that the earth's ecosystem is suffering from the most serious pollution and destruction in the history of the earth. Ten global environmental problems have directly threatened the survival of all mankind and the sustainable development of civilization. The ecological crisis has transcended local areas and is global. The threat of ecological crisis has far surpassed war and plague. It is urgent to protect the earth's homeland.
Ecological theory holds that human beings, like any other creatures, must take a certain ecological environment and a specific ecosystem as the basis for survival and reproduction. In the most basic and important ecosystem of the whole earth biosphere, although human beings play a special role in the whole biological world on the one hand, they are always "transforming" and "conquering" the natural ecological environment; On the other hand, human beings have been dependent on other creatures and natural ecological environment since their birth. At the same time, it is closely related to national and international political life, and politics has never existed in isolation. Politics is the politics of human society and politics is the politics of human beings. Since the ecological crisis has been related to the life and death of all mankind, politics is bound to have an inevitable and profound internal relationship with the ecological crisis, and it will inevitably extend to the natural environment outside the society. Therefore, the ecological crisis caused by global environmental problems poses a great threat to the global human beings, and the global ecological crisis can not become a political issue at this time, and politics and political behavior have an unshirkable responsibility for it. Driven by the ecological crisis, politics must seek a new political development view: the ecological political development view.
(B) the rise, development and significance of ecological politics
The aggravation of ecological crisis makes people realize that society is in the natural environment, and there is a dialectical dual interaction between social environment and natural environment. The natural ecological environment is the foundation of the social environment, and society has a profound positive and negative impact on the natural environment. Therefore, in the 1950s and 1960s, global environmental issues have become sensitive and important political issues in western developed countries, and eco-political theory came into being. Eco-political theory holds that human beings are not only social people, but also people restricted and bound by the natural environment. If political behavior only grasps the social attribute relationship between people and between people and society, but ignores the influence of natural ecological laws on people, or even violates the laws of natural ecological operation, and realizes the political and economic interests of minorities, classes and countries at the expense of human ecological environment and resources, then the whole mankind will eventually dig its own grave and go to self-destruction. How can there be eggs under the nest? Therefore, the theory of ecological politics is based on the survival interests of all mankind to guide the orderly progress of ecological politics. To some extent, it transcends the boundaries of class, nationality, race and country.
The original ecological politics was mainly limited to the spontaneous movement of the people. At the end of 1960s, the most obvious signs of eco-politics directly triggered by eco-environmental problems were "the emergence of eco-movement", "the emergence of eco-political parties" and "the improvement and strengthening of the role of international environmental organizations". This marks the rise and development of global eco-politics.
In the late 1960s, the global ecological environment became the focus of public attention in western developed countries. In 1970s, the purpose of eco-politics developed from single to multiple. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, eco-politics has become a diversified global movement of environmental protection, peace and women's rights. The most famous ecological movement is 1970, which broke out in the United States on April 22, with more than 20 million people participating. It was this movement that led to the birth of Earth Day and the convening of the first United Nations conference on human environment in 1972. Since 1990s, eco-politics has developed from the public's concern about eco-environmental issues to the public's and government's concern about "sustainable development". Quot global environmental problems. The "ecologicalization" of the public decision-making process makes the ecological movement truly become ecological politics. At the same time, since the late 1960s, world ecologists, economists, politicians and popular science scientists have jointly published a series of reports on the development and prediction of ecological environment. For example, Carlson's Silent Spring, Midus's The Limit of Growth, gabor's Beyond Wasted Time, and 152 world-famous ecologists, economists and politicians from 58 countries wrote There is only one earth.
With the expansion and in-depth development of eco-politics, the "Green Party" organizations all over the world came into being, and their status and influence in national political life are increasing day by day. The first Green Party in the world was born in New Zealand from 65438 to 0972. Since then, the green party organizations in Western Europe have reached their peak in 1970s and 1980s, among which the German green party organizations have exerted great influence and promoted the global green party organizations. By 1983, the German Green Party won 27 seats unexpectedly for the first time with 5.6% of the votes, which marked that the Green Party officially entered the historical stage in the national political life. Because the German Green Party is presented to the public with a brand-new political style, its party platform closely combines ecology, economy and politics, opposes the nuclear arms race, seeks international peace, women's rights and human rights, and puts forward a fairly complete sustainable development plan. Therefore, in the parliamentary election of 1987, the vote rate exceeded 8% and 42 federal seats were obtained. By 1994 after the reunification of Germany, the Green Party had occupied 49 seats in the Bundestag and became the third largest political party in the Bundestag. By 1998, the leader of the Green Party, Fischer, became the German foreign minister and became an important leader in the national government for the first time. At the same time, since 1980s, Belgium, Austria, Italy, Britain, France, Sweden and other European countries, as well as Eastern Europe and other developing countries with multi-party system in 1990s have been established one after another? Quot green party "organization. According to statistics, from 1979 to 1989, 1 17, green party members from five countries in northwest Europe 1 1 national parliaments,1.
With the establishment of green organizations in various countries and the flourishing of folk eco-politics, such as UNESCO, MAB, UNEP, UNDP, WCED, IUCN, WWF, IIED, Friends of the Earth, etc. Greenpeace government and non-governmental international ecological protection organizations have also been established. So far, more than 7,000 non-governmental and government environmental protection organizations have been active in the world political arena. They use ecological ideas, environmental awareness, ecological ethics, ecological philosophy and sustainable development to solve international disputes, conflicts and wars, and ultimately safeguard international peace, promote the coordinated development of international economy, culture and politics, and rationally develop and utilize transnational resources.
In the 1960s and 1970s, the spontaneous eco-political significance of the western people had three aspects: First, under the influence of the ecological movement, "eco-environmental protection" became the mantra of politicians in various countries in their election and governance. Even the most arrogant politicians must first advocate environmental protection and consolidate their campaign strength and political status with "ecological cards". For example, Carter 1976 of the United States was successfully elected president, and one of the important reasons was that he made a commitment to ecological protection; Second, under the pressure of public opinion, western governments have to directly or indirectly intervene in the protection and governance of the ecological environment, formulate corresponding strict pollutant discharge standards and environmental laws and regulations, and increase the proportion of environmental expenditure; Third, under the propaganda of public eco-politics, western developed countries have gradually transitioned from the era of industrial civilization to the era of ecological civilization. In 1990s, especially after 1992 Rio United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, new changes have taken place in public ecological politics. Not only in developed countries, but also in developing countries and underdeveloped countries, the public has changed from simply paying attention to environmental issues to the government and the public paying attention to global environmental changes and sustainable development. Eco-politics touches almost every field of politics, economy, culture, military affairs and human rights in all countries.
To sum up, global environmental problems lead to global ecological crisis and become the root and foundation of people's ecological politics. It is an epoch-making change in global political life and strategy to bring environmental issues into politicians' field of vision and replace military and economic alliances with global environmental alliances. Due to the participation of the Green Party in the world and the deepening and expansion of people's ecological politics, national politics and international politics have taken on a new development direction, which is the current ecological trend of international and domestic political development.
Third, the inevitable trend of eco-political development-political ecologicalization.
(A) the connotation of political ecology-political sustainable development
At present, the word "ecologicalization" often appears, such as economic ecologicalization, education ecologicalization and science and technology ecologicalization. "Ecologicalization" means to infiltrate ecological principles and principles into all human activities, to think and understand economic, social and cultural issues with the idea of coordinated development between man and nature, and to optimally handle the relationship between man and nature according to the specific conditions of society and nature. Politics is people's politics, and people's survival and development can not be separated from the coordinated development with the natural environment for a moment, so political development has an inevitable internal relationship with people and nature.
The concept of "political ecologicalization" is rare at home and abroad. The so-called political ecologicalization, its essence is to raise the ecological environment problem to the height of political issues, and then integrate the development of politics and ecological environment, organically and dialectically unify politics and ecology, and finally promote the sustained, healthy and stable development of global politics and ecological environment. Environment affects the structure and function of political regions and the interaction between political regions, and restricts the operation of political regional system and the political actions of high-level government decision makers. Therefore, the proposal of political ecologicalization is to correctly solve the relationship between politics and environment, and bring environmental issues into the process of government decision-making, citizens' political participation, international political behavior and political education, so that the political process and the development of ecological environment can be organically coordinated. In this way, the internal relationship between politics and environment has become the core content of political ecology research. Political ecologicalization follows the basic ecological principles and principles such as fairness, sustainability, coordination, ecosystem self-regulation, circular regeneration and ecological balance. In the process of the transformation from industrial civilization to ecological civilization in today's world, it will become a historical turning point in the development of traditional politics, thus forming a new political ecological view adapted to the era of ecological civilization, so as to promote the coordinated development of world economy, culture, politics and ecological environment, and enable mankind to overcome the ecological crisis and move towards? Quot The shadow of anthropocentrism has become "eco-centrism" and entered the era of ecological civilization.
(B) the basic requirements of political ecology for national and international political development
The author thinks that the core problem of understanding and solving political ecologicalization is the ecologicalization of political process. Broadly speaking, the political process includes not only the process of government behavior within a country, but also the dynamic process of international political environment and political order. The specific requirements of the eco-political process for political development are as follows:
First of all, political ecologicalization requires the ecologicalization of government decision-making. Government decision-making behavior plays an important role in solving ecological and environmental problems. Government policies, decrees, rules and regulations, and education methods directly interfere with environmental protection, while their influence on economic development mode and public behavior indirectly affects the protection of ecological environment. Therefore, in the process of promoting the sustainable development of the ecological environment, the government's decision-making behavior is in a dominant position. It can effectively combine various rights and means, improve the public's environmental awareness and scientific quality, and adjust the population quantity and quality. Through the implementation of educational projects by the government, people's consumption concepts and consumption patterns of unrestrained pursuit of material enjoyment will be changed, and a brand-new political ecological view will be cultivated.
In fact, all countries in the world have caused serious ecological and environmental problems because of government decision-making mistakes. The ecological crisis facing the world today is so severe that a considerable number of developing China countries are still continuing the old road of western developed countries-pollution first, then treatment. The destruction of the ecological environment and the population problem in China were also caused by the serious mistakes made by the government in the 1950s and 1970s. In a sense, if there were no wrong government decisions such as "Great Leap Forward", "Big Steelmaking" and "Educated Youth Going to the Countryside", there would be no desertification and sandstorm in northern China. Without Ma Yinchu's criticism, China might not have such a heavy population burden today, and the ecological environment losses caused by these mistakes in political development concepts and government policies cannot be measured by mathematical concepts. This kind of damage is rapid, lasting, long-term and even irreversible, which cannot be repaid by several generations, and often needs the unremitting efforts of dozens of generations to change. If such efforts fail, thousands of years of human civilization may be wasted. This can be proved from the ancient civilizations that have disappeared: the once glorious ancient country of Loulan, the ancient Babylonian civilization in the two river basins, the ancient Egyptian civilization along the Nile River and the rise and fall of the ancient Indian civilization in the Indus River basin have all provided lessons for the ecological crisis facing mankind today. One of the important tasks of future politics is to reshape the harmony of the ecological global village. Government and politicians will face more and more pressure from social groups and the public, and government officials and politicians must also use more financial, material and human resources to maintain the sustainable development of the ecological environment, so as to promote the coordinated development of political, economic and social development and the global ecological environment, which is the inevitable trend of national politics and world politics in the future. Therefore, countries around the world urgently need a group of politicians with environmental awareness, imagination and creativity. It is urgent to list environmental protection knowledge and basic knowledge such as law as one of the contents of the examination and assessment of national government civil servants, and at the same time assess economic achievements equally when assessing political achievements, so as to promote the ecologicalization of government political behavior.
Secondly, the ecologicalization of political democracy and citizens' political participation is the inevitable requirement of the ecologicalization of political environment. When the ecological environment problem is transferred from the natural field to the social field, endangering the survival and development of human beings, the ecological environment problem is consciously transformed into a political problem. The government is a citizen's government, so citizens' political participation will have an extremely important impact on government decision-making. On the one hand, the emergence of ecological environment problems and ecological crisis unconsciously promoted the public's political participation, which mainly played a role in the government's environmental policy and environmental management through political elections, voting, and public publicity activities on ecological environmental protection. On the other hand, public political participation can promote the protection of the ecological environment. Therefore, extensive public political participation and the enhancement of political ecological consciousness are one of the effective ways to solve the ecological environment problems, thus changing the traditional negative concept that the economy depends on the market and environmental protection depends on the government. Extensive political participation in solving ecological and environmental problems is mainly manifested in the following aspects: political participation helps to solve ecological and environmental problems peacefully and avoid social unrest; Political participation helps to realize the supervision of the government and avoid the failure of government decision-making; Political participation is conducive to scientific and open political decision-making; Political participation helps to realize citizens' environmental rights, which is the basic right of environmental survival.
Political democracy and ecological political environment are one of the important goals of world political development today. Comrade Deng Xiaoping once pointed out that without political stability in any country, there would be no stability in national and social order, and there would be no orderly and healthy economic development. Unstable society makes people put too much material resources, talents and financial resources into the struggle for rights and wealth, so without a peaceful environment and sustainable supply of natural resources, the economy will stop or even go backwards. In fact, his exposition expounds the cross-century strategic goal of coordinated development of politics and environment from the height of ecological and political environment. This has already experienced a painful lesson. Not only has the economy regressed for 20 years, but the instability of the political environment has also led to the destruction of environmental resources and the expansion of population, resulting in consequences and environmental debts that are difficult to repay for decades or even hundreds of years. On the other hand, the emergence of ecological environment problems will in turn affect the stability of the political environment and political democracy. For example, a series of ecological crises, such as serious food shortage, land desertification, water pollution exhaustion, population explosion and environmental carrying capacity exceeding, will inevitably lead to political panic and social instability. Therefore, the instability of the political environment will inevitably lead to the degradation of the ecological environment, and then affect the political instability, thus forming a vicious circle. At the same time, political democracy and economic development are also closely related. The rapid economic growth based on environmental sustainable development not only provides an economic foundation for promoting political democratization, but also provides a solid material foundation for protecting the ecological environment. The acceleration of the process of political democracy will in turn promote economic development and political stability. Therefore, political democracy and ecological political environment play an irreplaceable role in solving environmental problems and survival crisis.
Third, the establishment of a "global village federation" with a new international political order of equality, harmony and peace between countries and regions is another basic requirement of political ecology. At present, the world political order is still power politics and hegemonism to a great extent. The Kosovo issue 1999 is a strong proof. The direct consequences of power politics and hegemonism are conflicts, wars and nuclear arms races among regions, countries and nations, and the ultimate consequences of these military and political actions are the greatest pollution and destruction to the ecological environment. Due to the chaos of the old international political order, regional conflicts have been expanding and escalating since the 1960s. The most fundamental purpose of this conflict is their own "narrow ecological interests". The root of perennial wars in the Middle East is that the competition for water resources is an indisputable fact all over the world. All countries in the world, especially the nuclear powers, must disarm and reduce nuclear weapons. Power and hegemonic politics not only aggravate regional turmoil and ethnic conflicts, but also are not conducive to the sustainable development of the environment. At present, the global annual military expenditure exceeds 1 trillion dollars, of which one tenth is used for the environment, so nature reserves in all developing countries can be effectively protected.
Ecology believes that any living thing has its rationality of existence, and all species, regardless of strength, size and evolution time, have equal status in the ecosystem. Therefore, all countries in the new international political order should follow this principle of equality, reduce or eliminate power and hegemonic politics, avoid conflicts between regions and countries, and the nuclear arms race that poses the greatest threat to the earth's ecological environment, so as to ensure the sustainable development of the global ecological environment.
Therefore, in order to establish a new international political order and promote the international political ecology, it is necessary to establish a new global partnership. This new global partnership requires not only promoting international cooperation in maintaining and restoring the earth's ecological environment, but also promoting international cooperation in the economic and social fields. This new global partnership must include environment and development, and improve the international economic environment to help all countries, especially developing countries, achieve the sustainable goal of coordinating environmental protection and economic development. This new relationship must be fair and equal, based on the equal norms of international relations, and realistically consider the responsibilities of different countries that have caused the deterioration of the earth's ecological environment, and determine the corresponding obligations accordingly. When formulating relevant measures, we must take into account the different economic development levels and capabilities of countries, and should not disregard history and reality and demand countries and regions with different development levels with the same standard. This new relationship must involve the effective, active and pragmatic participation of the international community. When assuming this responsibility, countries must also stop quarreling endlessly, because the global natural ecological environment is a whole, and this "new global partnership" can only be established with the participation of developed and developing countries to ensure the sustainable development of the global ecological environment.
Fourth, political education is ecological. Education is a practical activity for human beings to transform themselves. The relationship between human beings and themselves, and the relationship between human beings and nature outside the body are all contained in the process of education. The transformation and influence of education on human nature is based on the transformation of human nature outside the body. Therefore, education is not a pure spiritual and cultural phenomenon, it is not far from nature, on the contrary, it is a practical activity to transform nature with human nature as the object. Political education is no exception. The purpose of political education is to improve citizens' political culture and political awareness. The ecologicalization of political education is to infiltrate the basic principles, knowledge and principles of ecology into political education, and promote the political culture and consciousness of the educated to the survival culture and consciousness of all mankind, thus promoting the improvement of the environmental quality and consciousness of the educated. Therefore, under the severe situation of global ecological crisis, it is inevitable that modern political education will develop in the ecological direction, which will push political education into a brand-new era of ecological education. Through the ecological process of political education, people realize that the era of industrial civilization has ended and the arrival of the era of ecological civilization is the general trend.
To sum up, global environmental problems and ecological crisis are the fundamental reasons for the rise of global eco-politics, and the establishment and development of eco-politics and eco-green parties in various countries have become the basis for the ecological development of politics. Political ecologicalization has become an important measure and way to solve today's global environmental problems and ecological crisis and promote the coordinated and sustainable development of world politics, economy, society, culture and ecological environment. Political ecologicalization has become a new trend and inevitable choice for future political development.
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