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Ecology for Survival
Joan Martinez-Alier, Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar, 2002.
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Reviewed by Sylvia Bowerbank
The Environmentalism of the Poor by economist and activist Joan Martinez-Alier makes a major contribution towards building an international environmental justice movement.
Martinez-Alier distinguishes three crosscutting currents of environmentalism. First is the cult of the wilderness, a movement based on a deeply felt attachment to wild places, which radiates its power from wealthy northern capitals, such as Washington and Geneva, towards Africa, Asia and South America by means of well-organized bodies that act internationally to reserve the remnants of pristine nature outside the interests of producers and consumers.
Second is the gospel of eco-efficiency, the credo of engineers and economists, which treats ecology as a managerial science and considers sustainable development to be producible by means of strategic interventions (such as eco-taxes and emission permits) and technological efficiencies (such as new materials and energy-saving devices).
Then there is the environmentalism of the poor, the livelihood movement of the majority of...