Editors: Ali Ekber Doğan – Ecehan Balta
The Unifying and Distinguishing Force of Ecosocialism as a Political Movement
Ecehan Balta – Mustafa Bayram Mısır
In this article, the writers discuss the contribution of Marxist argument on the “natural limits of Capital” to the anticapitalist movements by following the path opened by Ecosocialist Manifest written by Michael Löwy and Joel Kovel in 2001. The main argument of the article is to show the central importance of Ecosocialist Manifest as an adscititious work by reproducing the point of view of Marx on the “real democracy / Communism”; or transcending the “political” to Communist Manifest for social movements including workers’ movement. The meaning and limits of this importance will be determined by the real capacities of the movements themselves.
Keywords: Ecological crisis, ecosocialism, Ecosocialist Manifest, ecological movements, Marxism.
Ecology in the Spiral of Modernism and Capitalism: State, Capital, Civil Society
Gözde Orhan
This study seeks to scrutinize the positioning of ecology in the processes of modernization and capitalism. Both the ecology’s story of being a discipline and its transformation to a new area of
politics among the state, capital and civil society are handled together. In this context, while the philosophical approach has focused on the relation of nature and human, ecological politics of states have become evident, diverse and harmonious with the interests of the hegemonic ideology. This study points out Turkey’s relation with ecology in order to offer an example. In Turkey’s integration process to capitalism, the politics of ecology and the perception of ecology of the state have some specialties; internal politics determine them to a large extent. By the time, ecology has
gained the interest of the capital and civil society apart from that of the state; however, it has been no more the subject of negative externalities of industrialization, it has rather been an area creating new sectors. Needless to say, it also leads to new resistance practices…
Keywords: Ecology, ecosocialism, environmental sociology, ecological movements, ecological civil society.
The Crisis of Industrial Agriculture and Cuban Agriculture
Özgür Kanbir
This article discusses the relationship between ecological crisis and agriculture. The capitalist style of agricultural production is one of the reasons of ongoing ecological crisis. In this study, the capitalist form of agricultural production, what are ıts effects on ecological crisis, how it occurs and unsustainable mode of this production structure is discussed. meanwhile , controversial approach of orthodox economics to subjects such as agricultural production, the usage of natural resources and ecological crisis, then as an alternative production model, agricultural production
in Cuba is mentioned. Cuba is implementing consistent policies in protection and sustainability of natural resource against the ecological crisis. in Cuba by Implementing a structure of agricultural production which is in the form of urban agriculture , an important solution is found to the problem of producing food with low chemical and low fossil fuel usage by eliminating the rural-urban separation which is deepened in the rest of the world by capitalist production, and ıt is an important example of alternative agricultural production against ecological crisis.
Keywords: ecological crisis, green capitalism, capitalist agriculture, Cuba, urban agriculture.
About Watermelons and Peoples: Towards the Political Ecology of Seasonal Agricultural Work and Neoliberal Transformation of Agriculture in Turkey
Ethemcan Turhan
Despite the fact that neoliberal globalization, which may be understood as compression of time and space, and global environmental change induced by the understanding of “modernization through consumption” are often studied seperately, we can observe a deep interlinkage among these. Moreover there exists a visible class differentiation in relation to their causes and the intersection points of the impacts of these changes. An example of this can be observed in the relative deficiency of research on risks and struggle opportunities faced by seasonal agricultural workers who are in some way forced to join the agricultural labor force in other people’s lands through dispossession at the intersection of global environmental change and neoliberal globalization. In this vein, this article will first present political ecology as an approach at best ignored or even
misunderstood in Turkey, followed by its necessity in study of human dimensions of ecological struggles and provide a research agenda over seasonal agricultural work.
Keywords: Political ecology, seasonal agricultural work, migration, social vulnerability, double exposure.
Geographical Indications and Localized Agricultrual Products in Global Markets: A Field Study Beyond The Logo of Aegean Cotton
Derya Nizam
In the last decade, geographical indication (GI) has emerged as one of the important instruments of intellectual property protection in agriculture sector. Geographical indication is a sign indicating the origin of a product that possesses a specific quality, reputation or other characteristics attributable to the place, area, region or country of origin. In the post liberalization process, pressure of economies of scale in the production of standardized and simplified products over small or medium sized producers has been increasing in agriculture sector. Along with this pressure, farmer’s share of the added value of the final product decreased over time. Basically, geographical indications offer an important setting to local actors for a struggle to capture a high proportion of
added value derived from local characteristics. In that context, the case study of Aegean Cotton.
Keywords: Geographical Indication (GI), intellectual property in agriculture, liberalization of agriculture policies, governance, localized production.
Renewable Energy vs. Non – renewable Nature: Carbon Trade
Selim Yılmaz – Gaye Yılmaz
Ironically Kyoto Protocol which fomulated international enforceability of renewable energy has strongly been supported by social and environmental movements on one hand, the great opportunities granted by the Protocol have also become the subject of deep debates among capitalist corporations on the other. It is apparent that the traces of commodification hiden between the article lines of Kyoto Protocol have been overlooked by social movements. Therefore this study aims to re-consider, discuss and make visible the impacts of commodification of all natural resources which is something enshrined as the primer target in the Protocol. The second aim of the study is to help a healthy decomposition inside social movements which have a highly blurred image under given conditions of strong collaboration with capitalist classes.
Keywords: Renewable energy, carbon trade, nature, commodification, social movement.
Identity Politics and Its Relation with Leftist Movement
Evren Kocabıçak
The article aims to define and investigate the effects of identity politics on the left movement and the critiques generated by the left movement about ‘identity politics.’ Firstly, criticism about the Marxist notion of identity and the criticism of the left groups have been discussed. Following to this issue, critiques about identity politics have been grouped under the titles of economical blindness, reification of identities and the difficulties of the alliance with the left groups. Although the inefficiency of identity politics at the field of economy and its negative effects to the left movement, it is argued that identity politics have an important view about racism, sexual discrimination, colonization and cultural imperialism. As the result, deriving benefit from this view has been indicated as a tool for the left movement to reach the masses.
Keywords: identity politics, cultural studies, left movement.
Capitalist State and the Historical Stream of Social Policing: An Attempt of Periodisation of State – Security Relations
Evren Haspolat
The state has been become the center of security since it became the center of power. But in its traditional form it was satisfied with dominating severely because of its despotic power and it could not really penetrate the society. However the modern state got a capacity, that it could actually penetrate civil society and implement the political desicions logistically throughout the realm, with the administrative apparatus which it built thanks to capitalism. Thereby in its capitalist phase the state starts watching the society rather than before and thus it starts distraint the society. However, simultaneously and pradoxically the society gain a life in which it was protected and secured by the state. Accordingly the state, which turns into a real security/distraint apparatus in capitalist phase, built a social policing which composed of different components in order to establish bourgeois social order and social security during promoting itself by restructuring and transfiguring along different accumulation strategies of capitalism. In liberal state phase, which free market economy was executed, the capitalist state developed police and in interventionist state phase, which interventionism was executed, it developed social security, and in authoritarian statism phase, which neoliberal accumulation strategy was executed, it developed private security as a specific security/distaint apparatus. Consequently, in today’s phase (in authoritarian statism phase) capitalist state built a social policing which components are police that was being rised+social security that was being losed ground private security that was being rised.
Keywords: Capitalist state, security/capture dialectics-security/capture apparatus, police, social policing, social security, private security.
