Kohei Saito's Ecological Interpretation and Reconstruction of Marxist Political Economy: On Alternative Solutions to “Degrowth Communism”
XU Tao;
Abstract：
Kohei Saito believes that the unfinished aspect of Marx's critique of political economy is ecological criticism, which reprsents a rediscovery of Marx's political economy through careful study of Marx's natural science notes and important texts in his later years in MEGA~2. On the one hand, Kohei Saito borrowed and absorbed the previous statements of Foster and others in the theory of “Metabolic Rift”. On the other hand, he further explained the formation and transfer of “Metabolic Rift” from the natural material cycle, space, and time levels, pointing out the increasingly emerging ecological crisis of capitalism in the “Anthropocene” era. Based on this, Kohei Saito constructed a “Degrowth Communism” aimed at finding a post-capitalist social system that transcends the capitalist system, in order to address the alienation of metabolic rift between humans and nature. Kohei Saito's ecological interpretation and reconstruction of Marxist political economy enriches and develops ecological Marxism, but he also fails to properly handle its relationship with historical materialism, lacks class analysis methods, and therefore cannot avoid being utopian.
Key Words： Marxist political economy;ecological criticism;Kohei Saito;degrowth communism
Foundation: 天津市社会科学规划青年项目“当代西方激进左翼的人民话语研究”（TJKSQN23-001）;; 天津市习近平新时代中国特色社会主义思想概论协同创新中心重点课题“‘习近平新时代中国特色社会主义思想是21世纪马克思主义’研究”（JJSZKZ202313001）的资助
Authors: XU Tao;
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- (1)物质变换裂缝,学界也译作“新陈代谢断裂”“物质代谢断裂”,本文采用“物质变换裂缝”这一译法。
- (2)“人类世”,由尤金·斯托默(Eugene Stoermer)在20世纪80年代初创,后经本世纪初诺贝尔化学奖得主保罗·克鲁岑(Paul Crutzen)与斯托默发表的《人类世》一文真正进入公众视野。该观点认为,人类活动已经对地球本身造成了不可逆转的影响,“如果没有火山爆发、流行病、大规模核战争、小行星撞击等这样的重大灾难,人类将在数千年内仍然是一股主要的地质力量”。
- (3)“去增长”是一种激进的经济理论,诞生于20世纪70年代。“去增长”要求经济体放慢发展步伐,以缩减人类对日益减少的自然资源的消耗。
- (4)care work,译为“关爱劳动”,根据大卫·格雷伯的定义,护士、清洁工、幼儿教师、社工等的劳动都属于care work。