ABSTRACT
Domination is complex and reductionist attempts to see all of our problems as being related to a single form of domination consequently fail. Fox, a deep ecologist, has argued that it is impossible to locate the “real root” of contemporary ecological problems in patriarchy, class differences, racism, or imperialism. Societies in which these “human-centered” problems have been solved might still be ecologically destructive. Fox, responding both to Bookchin’s [Ne3, 9] attempt to link the domination of nature to
the domination of humans and to Salleh’s [Nc10] charge that deep ecology is insuffi ciently “deep” because it focuses its analysis on the generic human domination of nature rather than following ecofeminism’s critique of the specifi c androcentric domination of nature, writes,
In doing violence to the complexities of social interaction, simplistic social and political analyses of ecological destruction are not merely descriptively poor and logically facile, they are also morally objectionable on two grounds, scapegoating and inauthenticity. Scapegoating can be thought of in terms of overinclusiveness. Simplistic analyses target all men, all capitalists, all whites, and all Westerners, for example, to an equal degree when in fact certain subclasses of these identifi ed classes are far more responsible for ecological destruction than others. Not only that but signifi cant minorities of these classes can be actively engaged in opposing the interests of both the dominant culture of their class and those members of their class most responsible for ecological destruction. Inauthenticity, on the other hand, can be thought of in terms of underinclusiveness. Simplistic analyses are inauthentic in that they lead to a complete denial of responsibility when at least partial responsibility for ecological destruction should be accepted. Such theorizing conveniently disguises the extent to which (at least a subset of) the simplistically identifi ed oppressed group (e.g., women or the working class) also benefi ts from, and colludes with those most responsible for ecological destruction (e.g., consider the case of animal destruction for furs and cosmetics consumed by Western and Westernized women, or the case of capitalists and unionists united in opposition to the antidevelopment stance of “greenies”). [Na3: 116-17]
Fox’s critique of ecofeminism is partly justifi ed. Shiva, for example, distinguishes three different phases of colonialism, the fi rst being the “white man’s burden” to civilize non-whites, the second to “develop” the third world, and the third to “protect” the global environment by taking control of resources away from local communities [Nc13: 264]. While Shiva’s analysis is essentially accurate in its portrayal of how globalization threatens local control over resources, her unqualifi ed adoption of the expression “white man’s burden” and her characterization elsewhere of development as a project of “Western patriarchy” [Nc16] are clearly inadequate. Mies, who co-authored Ecofeminism with Shiva, makes a similar racist and sexist remark to the effect that the domination of both people and nature can be blamed on “White Man” [Nc5: 65]. While it cannot be denied that there are a high percentage of “white Western men” among the exploiters, such essentialist accounts fail to register the various ways in which nonWesterners and females are also implicated in imperialistic development schemes and the fact that there are also “white men” who are opposed to such projects.
