Ecological humanities

The ecological humanities are a recent development by Deborah Bird Rose and colleagues in the humanities which has grown out of the concerns of radical ecocentric political theory. The aim of the ecological humanities is to bridge the divides between the sciences and the humanities, and between Western, Eastern and Indigenous ways of knowing nature. Like ecocentric political theory, the ecological humanities are characterised by a connectivity ontology and a commitment to two fundamental axioms relating to the need to submit to ecological laws and to see humanity as part of a larger living system.


Connectivity ontology

One of the fundamental ontological presuppositions of ecological humanities is that the organic world and its inorganic parts are seen as a single system whereby each part is linked to each other part. This world view in turn shares an intimate connection with Lotka's physiological philosophy and the associated concept of the "World Engine". When we see everything as connected, then the traditional questions of the humanities concerning economic and political justice become enlarged, into a consideration of how justice is connected with our transformation of our environment and ecosystems. The consequence of such a connectivity ontology is, as proponents of the ecological humanities argue, that we begin to seek out a more inclusive concept of justice that includes non-humans within the domain of those to whom rights are owing. This broadened conception of justice involves "enlarged" or "ecological thinking", which presupposes the enhancement of knowledge sharing within fields of plural and diverse ‘knowledges’. This kind of knowledge sharing is called transdisciplinarity. It has links with the political philosophy of Hannah Arendt and the works of Italo Calvino. As Calvino put it, "enlarge[s] the sphere of what we can imagine". It also has connections with Leibniz's Enlightenment project where, the sciences are simultaneously abridged while also being enlarged.

The situation is complicated however by the recognition of the fact that connections are both non-linear and linear. The ecological humanities therefore, require both linear and non-linear modes of language through which reasoning about justice can be done. Thus there is a motivation to find linguistic modes which can adequately express both linear and non-linear connectivities.

Axioms of ecological humanities

There are two axioms of ecological humanities:

1. The axiom of submission to ecosystem laws
2. The axiom of ecological kinship, which situates humanity as participant in a larger living system

Put another way, the connections between and among living things are the basis for how ecosystems are understood to work, and thus constitute laws of existence and guidelines for behaviour (Rose 2004)

The first of these axioms has a tradition in social sciences (see Marx, 1968: 3). From the second axiom the notions of “ecological embodiment/embededness” and “habitat” have emerged from Political Theory with a fundamental connectivity to rights, democracy and ecologism (Eckersley 1996: 222, 225; Eckersley 1998).

Contemporary ideas

Political economic ecology

Some theorists have suggested that the inclusion of non-humans in the consideration of justice links ecocentric philosophy with political economics. This is because the theorising of justice is a central activity of political economic philosophy. If in accordance with the axioms of ecological humanities, theories of justice are enlarged to include ecological values then the necessary result is the synthesis of the concerns of ecology with that of political economy: i.e. Political Economic Ecology.

Energy systems language

The question of what language can best depict the linear and non-linear causal connections of ecological systems appears to have been taken up by the school of ecology known as systems ecology. To depict the linear and non-linear internal relatedness of ecosystems where the laws of thermodynamics hold significant consequences (Hannon et al. 1991: 80), Systems Ecologist H.T. Odum (1994) predicated the Energy Systems Language on the principles of ecological energetics. In ecological energetics, just as in ecological humanities, the causal bond between connections is considered an ontic category (see Patten et al 1976: 460). Moreover as a result of simulating ecological systems with the energy systems language H.T.Odum make the controversial suggestion that embodied energy could be understood as value, which in itself is a step into the field of Political Economic Ecology noted above.