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Deep socialism? An interview with Arne Naess
Andrew Light
a
a
Assistant Professor of Philosophy , The University of Montana
Published online: 25 Feb 2009.
To cite this article: Andrew Light (1997) Deep socialism? An interview with Arne Naess , Capitalism Nature Socialism, 8:1,
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INTERVIEW
Deep Socialism?
An Interview with Arne Naess
By Andrew Light
This interview with famed Norwegian philosopher Arne Naess took
place in Edmonton, Alberta on March 5, 1996. Naess, the founder of
deep ecology, had been invited to the University of Alberta as a
distinguished visitor, primarily under a grant secured by graduate
students in the Department of Physical Education and Sports Studies.
While I had known Naess for a while, I had not previously had the
chance to sit down with him for a long chat over an extended period of
time. Rarely does anyone have the opportunity for such sustained
conversations with Naess these days. At 85, he is the best known
environmental philosopher in the world, now more in demand for
public appearances than ever before. Of late, however, Naess is rarely
called on to debate at length his own philosophical positions in the
field. In some sense this is a sign of respect for someone whose thought
has become the foundation for one of the largest worldwide ecological
movements today. For his work, it is thought, the important debates are
at the level of practice, not theory.
But it is probably a mistake to treat Naess with kid gloves. (Though
in a boxing exhibition on campus during his visit he demonstrated quite
literally that kid gloves are not required around him!) The fact that he
has held the position of "eminence grise" of the environmental
*I am indebted to Arne and Kit-Fai Naess for making this interview possible
and for working with me on editing the final draft. The Center for Political
Ecology generously supported the project to see it through to its conclusion.
Peggy Brackett was of invaluable service in helping with the preparation of the
original transcript of the interview.
CNS 8(1), March, 1997 69
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movement for so long is no reason to stop careful evaluation of his
work. Even though I don't count myself as a deep ecologist, I find much
of his recent work of great importance for ongoing debates in
environmental philosophy.
Given the interests of CNS, I tried to direct the conversation
toward political matters. Thanks largely to the critiques of social
ecologists, it is often thought that deep ecologists have no interest in
more pedestrian economic and social questions. Worse still, some in
the former movement characterize deep ecologists as exclusively
misanthropic, spiritualist, and anti-humanist. It is clear, however, that
for Naess at least, this is not the case. He is well aware of the political
issues involved in deep ecology, and more generally of the prospects of
forming a broader base for a radical political ecology. These views
shape not only his approach to the intramural debates of environmental
theorists, but also his own personal political affiliations as well.
1. Theory and Practice
Andrew Light: It's now been over 20 years since you published "The
Shallow and the Deep."
1
I think most people probably regard that as
your ground breaking article. It really launches deep ecology as a
coherent position, I guess, in environmental philosophy, and some
people would say that since this article came out only in 1973, you've
been incredibly successful in creating a philosophical argument that has
reached a very wide audience, compared to the reception of many
philosophical arguments. Are you satisfied with how this message has
been received, given the original motivations you had for writing that
paper, and the development of the work you've done since? Are you
happy with how your work has become disseminated?
Arne Naess: I think I'm happy with that. I don't feel I should complain
about any of that. On the other hand, in that summary speech in 1973 at
the World Congress on Philosophy, there is much too much of Naess in
1
Arne Naess, 'The Shallow and the Deep: Long-Range Ecology Movements,"
Inquiry 16, 1973. Widely regarded as one of the first major papers in
environmental ethics, this piece was originally presented as a talk at the XV
World Congress on Philosophy in Varna, Bulgaria that same year. Another
"classic" of environmental philosophy was also presented at the same
conference by the late Richard Sylvan (then Routley), "Is There a Need for a
New, an Environmental Ethic?" This paper is republished in Michael
Zimmerman, et. al, eds., Environmental Philosophy (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.:
Prentice Hall, 1993).
70
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it. It' s too specialized, for instance, in the appeal to the nature of egos
such as our own, defined relationally in a human sense the
terminology there is such that it would be natural to say that deep
ecology is something very very special, something very radical,
whereas later I would say this [the philosophy of deep ecology] is one
way of articulating something very important within the deep ecology
movement. Others in the movement find it too specialized, too "far
out," so to say. So I try now more to take a role as a supporter of the
deep ecology movement. The basic term for me in the last ten or 15
years has been to be "supportive" of the deep ecology movement. And
that support takes a somewhat different form and different terminology
than my earlier contributions like "The Shallow and the Deep."
A.L, So, what is really the relationship between the philosophy of deep
ecology and the deep ecology movement? I think it's commonplace
now in the literature, for example, if you read Michael Zimmerman's
book, Contesting Earth's Future, to make a strong distinction between
deep ecology as an articulation of a philosophical view and the deep
ecology movement (which actually is a distinction you've been making
a lot longer).
2
So what's the relationship between the two? I was going
to ask you if you consider yourself the founder of the deep ecology
movement as well as deep ecology as a form of environmental
philosophy, but I take it that you would say no, right?
A.N. When you are a supporter of the deep ecology movement, you
move up and down, back and forth between fairly abstract and general
sentences. For some decisions, and, in some particular situations,
philosophy is inadequate. We cannot underestimate the [role of]
empirical practice in the deep ecology movement. I dislike deep
ecology reduced only to philosophy in a narrow sense of philosophy,
because inspiration comes from direct actions where hundreds of
people are together protecting part of nature. Those people, what they
say, is for me important, and also what they do. Partly in the sense of
the Frankfurt School, I do not recognize the possibility of political or
social theory which does not say something about practice.
A.L. Do you think the Frankfurt School succeeded in that respect?
A.N. Temporarily. You must be able to say my theory is so-and-so, and
when asked, well, "what is the implication for this moment today,
Friday, this moment, what is the implication for us?" you can't answer
by linking up more abstract general statements with this particular
2
Michael Zimmerman, Contesting Earth's Future: Radical Ecology and
Postmodernity (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994).
71
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situation. Deep ecology, for example, couldn't be only abstract and be
an active social movement. If you represent a social movement you
have to connect theory and practice.
A.L. Okay, but take for example the point toward the end of Adorno's
life where he called the police to arrest some students who he was
convinced were trying to occupy the Institute for Social Research.
There is a wonderful exchange of letters between Marcuse and Adorno
where Marcuse criticizes Adorno by saying essentially, "look we
helped create this, we influenced these students now you can't
handle the results?"
3
I guess in some sense people might wonder the
same thing about you. Have you always been entirely happy with the
way that the practices and the statements of the deep ecology
movement have reflected on the philosophy of deep ecology?
A.N. I am very satisfied because from the very first moment I have
mixed the deep ecology movement with Gandhian forms of resistance
and even the most committed activists, like Sigmund Kval0y, got that
point completely.
4
The activists of the movement grasp these
statements, acting democratically and nonviolently. Frankfurt School
activism had a different, more aggressive character barricades and so
on. I deplore Adorno and others who said, "no no no that is going too
far." That is not going too far. We have to have conflict on that level of
intensity at least. It is so much different from war and class hatred, and
these things.
A.L. What about the way the deep ecology-social ecology debate got
off the ground? In that literature, it wasn't a question of tactics, non-
violent or otherwise that was problematic for the social ecologists, but
more a question of the statements concerning population and other
issues by Miss. Anthropoy, Dave Foreman, Edward Abbey, and some
of those other deep ecology activists.
A.N. Bookchin.
A.L. Yes, well, Bookchin was attacking the statements of these people
who were calling themselves deep ecologists, who were saying some
3
See Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History, Theories, and
Political Significance (Cambridge, MA.: MIT Press, 1994), pp. 633-634.
4
Kvaly, one of Naess's former students, has been described as the most
Marxist of the Norwegian philosopher-activists. He is largely credited with
having drawn Naess into environmental issues. For an overview of his work
and some examples of his writings, see P. Reed and D. Rothenberg, eds.,
Wisdom in the Open Air: The Norwegian Roots of Deep Ecology (Minneapolis:
University of Minnesota Press, 1993), pp. 113-154.
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very extreme things about closing the U.S. border, and how AIDS or
other plagues would be of benefit because they would decrease
population and....
A.N. But these critics could really only refer to one single man, Dave
Foreman. Foreman had a rather far rightist background when he was
young; he started out as a rightist in many ways and gradually drifted
away from that. But certainly I think that in his personal behavior, in
his youth, he had a conception of the deep ecology movement very
different from the sense that I understand it. He has been very hesitant
in saying that he has different opinions now. Most people are hesitant
about saying, "I regret certain statements" or "that's not what I really
meant." He says that, but not in his publications. That makes him not in
practice a supporter of the deep ecology movement. Foreman did not
write anything as bad as what you mention about AIDS and other
plagues. He seemed really to mean something like, to save Ethiopian
ecosystems is more important than to try to save Ethiopian babies from
dying of hunger. This point, expressed even cruder, made headlines all
over the world. In Europe they believed that Foreman was a deep
ecology theorist, a claim I believe he never, even indirectly, made. So
deep ecology was conceived as a movement which does not care about
humans. But to take more care about non-humans does not necessarily
imply to take less care of humans. Extreme suffering of humans must
be fought. Unfortunately, Europeans were reminded of Hitler when
they read more or less extreme renderings of what Foreman had
written.
2. Which Deep Ecology?
A.L. This is actually good to get into, because I wanted to ask you also
about how there is a proliferation of deep ecologies: there are so many
different versions, so many different practices. In thinking just about
the theories, it's hard, sometimes very hard, to pin down exactly what
deep ecology is as a philosophical position. This is in part because
you've got a different kind of perception of it in the U.S. with Bill
Devall and George Sessions, and different perceptions of it in Australia
with Warwick Fox, and I guess each country sort of shaped its own
version of the philosophy ....
A.N. It's a great overlapping....
A.L. But are you happy with this diversity? Are you satisfied with it,
because ....
A.N. Yes, because it means that really, people are moved by these
writings, and they of course will react in different ways, running things
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in somewhat different directions. That is so good; it means here is
something going on which is really social and political and it' s
important. So I think the versions are different and that is good, and we
should then disagree and agree, disagree and agree for the next years as
much as even now. But there will still be something we have in
common. What we have in common will have to be just a little different
every five years, let us say, even though something is there all the time.
A.L. But, do you sometimes worry about F m not sure how to put
this do you worry that the different formulations are so different?
Certainly there's a common core, but, for instance, there can be very
different ways of articulating a spiritual reconstruction of deep ecology,
or a more philosophical, for example, "Spinozistic" version. Do you
feel intellectually responsible for all these different versions since they
are all derivations of your system? I'm sure you don't agree with all of
these reconstructions of the theory.
A.N. Of course not, but if you think of what I wrote, think of the main
deep ecology area of opinions as being inside a circle, then you have
the circle bulging out at three points of a triangle, three points of a
circle are bulging out. One bulge is what I call the "nature-nature"
people, who say, "nature is excellent, wonderful nature, we should
follow nature," etc. And then we have another bulge, and that's a bit far
out from the center of my deep ecology, which I call the "spiritualists."
They start with the self, saying that we have lost religion, that this loss
explains the ecological crisis, etc. They call for a new religion, a new
religious consciousness. They use their opportunity in public to talk
about that all of the time. They don't disagree with the "nature nature"
people in a sense, but they don' t primarily talk about the same
concerns. And then the third bunch, those who only talk about the
political aspects, saying "all man's ecological problems are political." It
seems that they think that these problems are only political, and say
"sure we're politically different, we'll save the planet." The spiritualists
talk as if they think it's only spiritual things, and the nature-naturists
say we should just save nature for its own sake. But, it's a big circle
where there are lots of agreements, and you see it, it supports the same
kind of actions mostly. We denounce the same kinds of politics on the
whole. So, I feel the deep ecology movement is very alive. That means
a lot of different ways of focusing; they are the focus. Then certainly
they start quarreling a little: "you should come out to me, I am here in
the center of our circle," "no, you should come to me." This is a kind
of, I would say, friendly, very friendly fight.
74
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3. Pluralism, Social Ecology, and Centralism
A.L. I notice that every time I've heard you in the last few years, you
always say, when you're talking to an audience interested in
environmental philosophy, that "I'm a social ecologist" and "I'm an
ecofeminist," and I think actually once you even told me you were an
environmental socialist.
A.N. Yes, when you talked to me.
A.L. [Laughs.] Right, well, do you really consider yourself all of these
things?
A.N. [Laughs.] That means you think I am slippery.
A.L. No, no, I'm not going to take it that way! But then also, on this
last visit here, I also heard you say on a couple of occasions that you've
talked to leaders of corporations, and that you consider that they have
intuitions that are consistent with deep ecology.
A.N. Yes, yeah that's right. They agree with our general position on
man versus nature, and these things they are for, they are glad we are
working the way we do and so on and so on. And they would gladly
support ecology movements. But activism? They cannot participate in
that way. It's a really serious point; if they were really supporters they
would have to say "thank you very much, next year I am not the
chairman of the company."
A.L. Okay, Okay, that's fair enough. But about this compatibilism you
embrace the sense of being every kind of radical ecologist at once.
It's not that you're being slippery, but it is that you embrace a rather
extreme form of compatibilism, I think. It's a kind of tolerance, which
is good, but do you think it ends up thinning out your own position too
much?
A.N. I don't think so because, say, there was a quarrel about direct
action or some very practical thing, where the different views clashed,
then I would start taking much more seriously the differences. If there
was a serious clash on some issues with social ecologists, then I
would....
A.L. You would have to make a hard choice.
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A.N. Yes, that would be a warning. It would be threatening. But now,
with John Clark, the social ecologist, bridging gaps to us, things are
much better.
5
A.L. Yeah, but not everyone in social ecology circles is happy with
John Clark. In fact, Murray Bookchin, after Clark presented a paper on
this topic at the International Social Ecology meeting in Scotland last
summer, wrote up a denouncement of Clark and personally mailed it to
social ecologists all over the world.
6
A.N. Yes, John Clark was criticized by Bookchin and that's the first
social ecologist I've seen really criticized openly on this account. I
disagree very much with Bookchin, but I would never criticize him in
that way. What I say is that I am supportive of social ecologists but that
doesn't mean I agree with everything they say, and maybe I disagree
more with what their leaders say. The same with ecofeminism. Even
Karen Warren, where she says that if ecofeminism is successful then all
social domination would cease on this planet. You see, that's for me an
impossible statement. I think feminism, with its emphasis on caring as a
more central feeling, this is important. Genetically, I don't know if
there is any basis for it, but caring seems easier for them. It's a hard
topic. Nevertheless, I am a great supporter generally of them too, even
with my particular disagreements with some people.
A.L. I want to go back to what you just said about ecofeminism later.
But first I want to finish this thread on social ecology. Do you think
there really is an issue between deep ecologists and social ecologists?
Or....
A.N. Yes, priorities.
A.L. Priorities. All right. So what's the issue on priorities?
5
The reference is to John Clarks' recent work which has attempted to bridge
social ecology and deep ecology. These papers include "The Politics of Social
Ecology: Beyond the Limits of the City," which in 1995 was read at a world
gathering of social ecologists in Scotland. This paper will be published in
Andrew Light, ed., Anarchism, Nature, and Society: Critical Essays on Social
Ecology (New York: Guilford Press, forthcoming). Also see Clark's "How
Wide is Deep Ecology?" Inquiry, 39, 2, 1996.
6
This piece by Bookchin is called "Comments on the International Social
Ecology Network Gathering and the 'Deep Social Ecology' of John Clark." It is
also interesting to note that after this "exchange" between Bookchin and Clark,
Clark was dropped without comment from the editorial advisory board of the
social ecology journal Society and Nature (now Democracy and Nature), edited
by Takis Fotopolis.
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A.N. Well, the social ecologists, for instance, in Uruguay I was there
talking with the people, Uruguayans they are focused on the poor
population who are fishing, trying to revive the methods their
grandfathers used because that was a sustainable way. And this struggle
helps them to fight the influence of the North with their big boats. The
fight is against those who would make fishing a capital-intensive
industry. Where now, at the moment, in some parts of Uruguay fishing
is still somewhat labor intensive. So the social ecologists there are one
hundred percent immersed in that kind of work and when I discussed
the eight points [of deep ecology] with them, sure they agreed, but they
said, "that's not enough for us."
7
So they would say, all right we
support your deep ecology movement, but they also said that I should
say more about relations to poor people, social conditions, and so on.
They said those concerns should be added to the eight points.
A.L. And do you agree with them?
A.N. No, I don't agree with them. The Uruguayans said yes to the eight
points, but then they said that the eight points cannot be the core
without adding something about social relations.
A.L. And you didn't want to do that?
A.N. No, because there are three gigantic movements, three gigantic
tasks in the next century. You have the peace problems, we must
somehow solve this is too strong a word but we must get much
further in the peace movement. Then we have the movement against
7
The "eight points of deep ecology" are the backbone of the deep ecology
movement. They are: (1) The well-being and flourishing of human and non-
human life on Earth have value in themselves. These values are independent of
the usefulness of the non-human world for human purposes. (2) Richness and
diversity of life forms contribute to the realization of these values and are also
values in themselves. (3) Humans have no right to reduce this richness and
diversity except to satisfy vital needs. (4) The flourishing of human life and
cultures is compatible with a substantially smaller human population. The
flourishing of non-human life requires a smaller human population. (5) Present
human interference with the non-human world is excessive, and the situation is
rapidly worsening. (6) Policies must therefore be changed. These policies affect
basic economic, technological, and ideological structures. The resulting state of
affairs will be deeply different from the present. (7) The ideological change will
be mainly that of appreciating life quality (dwelling in situations of inherent
value) rather than adhering to an increasingly higher standard of living. There
will be a profound awareness of the difference between bigness and greatness.
(8) Those who subscribe to the foregoing points have an obligation directly or
indirectly to try to implement the necessary changes. See Naess' contribution to
Environmental Philosophy, op. cit., p. 197.
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unspeakable poverty. States of affairs that we cannot accept existing.
Then we have the ecological crisis. Those three we cannot compare in
importance, they are all important. But one thing with the ecological
crisis that's interesting, namely, is that for every year that we don't do
anything, the crisis deepens exponentially. Otherwise the poverty
problem, ethically, of course, central, is an unacceptable kind of misery
which we can do something about, ethically that's....
A.L. But then to the extent that you find all these movements
important, it would sound like there really wasn't much of a difference
between your view and that of those social ecologists.
A.N. No, not with those in Uruguay. Now many social ecologists
would point at what Dave Foreman and others have said on different
issues and object to them. Because they don't feel at home with some
deep ecologists, they call themselves social ecologists. But they don't
fight deep ecology as such. Not at all.
A.L. Well maybe those people in Uruguay don't, and maybe even
many North American social ecologists don't, but there certainly is
more of a theoretical wrangle at least that Bookchin is trying to raise
between deep ecology and social ecology....
A.N. Yes, I would say let him think that.
A.L. But according to Bookchin, there just is an unbridgeable divide
between social ecology and deep ecology. Is he wrong?
A.N. Yes, because social ecology is a movement, a social movement,
and not a definite theory. So, he's not right.
A.L. Okay, if it' s a movement he' s not right, but what about
Bookchin's definite theories?
A.N. The idea that in a movement you have to abide by more or less
one theorist, namely Bookchin, is of course outrageous. In the next 50
years you cannot expect that Bookchin's sort of special Utopian wish of
a future society will be a general one. I believe in lots of centralism in
the next century. Anarchism won't work.
A.L. What do you mean you believe in centralism: that it's going to
come about, or that we actually need it?
A. N. Again and again central authorities must coerce local
communities. Whereas ideologically, I'm all for local communities and
against central authority, it is clear now that for the environment we
have to have it. Like we have some parts of Alaska where central
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regulation is needed to protect free nature.
8
This is a terrible thing, but
nevertheless, central authority is necessary. More and more there will
be less free nature in Alaska. More also we have to really do something
about the Saumi people's use of Arctic Norway. Because, in order to
get to a higher standard of living, they only see one way there, namely
more reindeer, and more reindeer means [cutting sound].
A.L. But is the ground, the legitimacy of the central authority over the
local, is that....
A.N. Pragmatic only.
A.L. It's pragmatic only?
A.N. Completely pragmatic, and against the different feelings we might
have concerning the respect for the local community, the local market.
A.L. So the final court of inquiry is what is good for nature?
A.N. My book is Ecology, Community, and Lifestyle, not Ecology,
Society, and Lifestyle.
9
That' s interesting, especially in Europe.
Tennies, a German philosopher of the last century, wrote a book
which polarized Gesellschaft versus Gemeinschaft. Gemeinschaft is
"together," feeling together, coming together; Gesellschaft is a kind of
a feeling of society. So, anyhow, ecology, community, and lifestyle. We
certainly cannot have big societies the way we have today given our
environmental imperatives, but at the same time we need some
centralization.
4. Deep Socialism
A.L. Has anything good come out of this debate between social
ecologists and deep ecologists, especially as it has happened not only in
the professional philosophy and sociology journals, but also in the
popular media?
A.N. I think so because in the circle [of deep ecology], people are going
more in the direction of political thinking and somewhat less in the
spiritual and nature-nature direction. But most of the theorists of deep
ecology have a background in the wilderness wilderness ideology.
8
Naess prefers to speak about "free nature" rather than "wilderness." He says
that the goal in Europe is to try to protect those areas not obviously dominated
by humans. Such areas are mostly small (even though there are still thousands
of them) and are not generally equated with North American conceptions of
"wilderness."
9
Ecology, Community, and Lifestyle (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1989) is Naess' magnum opus on environmental issues.
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So that background pushes them toward the nature-nature side. But
what I am saying is that for us this is an imbalance; deep ecology
theorists do too much nature-nature and spiritual thinking. That's
imbalanced. We must point to what we mean politically, particularly
pointing to the green political theorists and the green economists who
we side with. It is parallel to deep and non-deep ecology. Parallel
distinctions must be made for economics. There are no great green
economists, no great green political theorists, but you have very good
ones of course.
AX, And capitalism? Does political ecology await its grand theorist
who will actually make a very strong statement, giving a fundamental
green critique of capitalism or the current nation-state system?
A.N. Yes, of course, of course. Capital is out, industrial society is out.
Industry, yes, yes, yes. But industrial society? Out. An ecological
community is impossible in the kind of capitalism you have, especially
the one you get in Eastern Europe and other places. In the United
States, capitalism is in some ways very civilized, at least compared to
Norwegian capitalism, the capitalism of the social democrats. Still,
Americans call the Norwegian social democrats "communists"....
A.L. Right, exactly, all social democrats are communists! [Laughs.]
A.N. [Laughs.] Basically. So capitalism is out, industrial society is out,
yes absolutely....
A.L. So, would you ground that claim again, on a pragmatic argument
that there is a need for some kind of a more redistributive paradigm
for economies which is based on what they do to nature?
A.N. Not only what it does to nature, because capitalism also has to do
with the problem of our strain on community. Even the Republican
party sometimes acknowledges this.
But, adding a couple of words about my own position. In Norway
there is a party called the Sosialistisk Venstre Parti (SV), it's a radical
socialist party, different from communism. That party got about seven
or eight percent of the vote, and I really agree with them and supported
them. There was a press conference where I agreed to come to support
their party. I was there helping them, and I supported them in public,
with reference to their "green socialism." But they are new socialists, so
different from twenty years ago. I think they are developing socialism
further. There is a continuity of socialism beginning last century to
today, and they are continuing socialism in a good way. I use the basic
statement in communism, "to everyone according to need, from
everyone according to abilities." Sadly, however, in our society, the
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ablest, to gain power and prestige may feel the least social
responsibility. The ablest in business are often the ablest in avoiding
paying taxes. The public thus expects able people not to serve their
communities more intensively than other people.
A.L. It' s really, I must say, wonderful to hear you talk about political
issues the way that you are now, because it seems that, unfortunately, in
philosophical circles at least, there is complete ignorance often of the
fact that there is any literature on environmental socialism. This is in
fact the biggest problem with Michael Zimmerman's new book.
10
His
book is about "radical ecology," and radical ecologies for him are just
deep ecology, social ecology, and ecofeminism, and that's it. I even
talked to him about this, and asked about the things that are being done,
for instance, in this journal, or by all the economists who work on this
topic, and he just didn't know anything about it. I found this quite
extraordinary.
A.N. No, that's right. Socialism is such a great movement, such a
fantastic movement in the last century; to say that's all over, that's
impossible. Practically all of my friends have been socialists and I'm
not a socialist because I'm so much for personal initiative. The kind of
socialism I have seen among my friends they all come together in
these long meetings. [Both laugh.] I never personally could feel at
home with their kind of [bureaucratic] socialism, but I voted socialist. I
mostly voted socialist even though I was never a party member.
A.L. But now you're a supporter of this environmental socialism that's
being talked about by the SV.
A.N. Well, I supported them, and gave them my vote, instead of giving
it to the green party because they are too much fundamentalists. I gave
my vote to the SV for pragmatic reasons. I still have difficulties with
how they write about socialism and some of their solutions to
distribution problems.
A.L. Hard to figure out the rationale for distribution: is that what you
mean?
A.N. I mean the [distribution] problems are central of course. The same
way as ecological problems in the narrow sense are central. I support
the welfare society because they have that in Norway. Arctic Norway,
for example, is uneconomical in the old sense; I mean it costs so much
to grow potatoes there because of the climate. I support that people live
in Arctic Norway. They should be able to live there and have their
10
See note 2.
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income, and that means some kind of income transfer to Arctic
Norway. And that's socialist. That's the best kind of socialism we have.
You see, they are at home in Arctic Norway, they were part of it and
the culture is so good there. It is so rich, so original. There is an
ecological behavior there. And we must see to it that it is possible for
them to stay there, and not make it impossible so they have to go from
Arctic Norway to somewhere else. That's a socialist policy. But as I
say, I don't feel at home with being a party member.
5. Ecofeminism
A.L. Let's go back to what you were saying about ecofeminism before.
There has been something of a debate in CNS about the relationship
between environmental socialism and ecofeminism. And the claim has
been very parallel, actually, to the ecofeminism-deep ecology debate as
it has occurred in journals like Environmental Ethics. Essentially the
debate in CNS has been whether the goals of ecofeminism can be taken
care of within a broader socialist paradigm. And in Environmental
Ethics, the whole debate between Warwick Fox, Jim Chaney, Deborah
Slicer, and others, has been this question of whether or not deep
ecology subsumes all the goals of ecofeminism. Warwick Fox wrote in
one of these exchanges, "in accordance with its extremely broad
ecocentric egalitarianism, supporters of deep ecology hold that their
concerns well and truly subsume the concerns of those movements that
have restructured their focus to the attainment of a more egalitarian
human society,"
11
and he's talking about anti-racist, anti-imperialist,
and feminist movements. The claim is that deep ecology subsumes
ecofeminism by subsuming its goals. Do you agree with those kinds of
arguments?
A.N. That's not a completely happy formulation, because the goals [of
ecofeminism] comprise a focus, and the focus is different [from deep
ecology]. The focus is fairly important. You must at the most say that
it's compatible being a supporter of deep ecology [and ecofeminism],
but not that we can express ourselves in the special terms of another
movement, no, no. It [ecofeminism] is compatible with a deep ecology
point of view. But it is not enough focused on the eight points. Just
saying, "we are deep ecologists, and we are social ecologists, and we
are ecofeminists and we focus in such and such a way," is compatible
with a deep ecology perspective. Deep ecology is a kind of umbrella of
the movement, where other forms of political ecology do not always go
11
Warwick Fox, "The Deep Ecology-Ecofeminism Debate and Its Parallels,"
Environmental Ethics, 11, 1989, p. 8.
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deep enough. For instance, Henryk Skolimowski says that human
evolution is so important for the future of the cosmos, and since he
thinks deep ecologists don' t emphasize that, he says he' s not a
supporter of the deep ecology movement. It's all right for him to say
that, but, I reply, "I class you as a supporter of the deep ecology
movement anyway." And he says, "Oh no you don't!" So I would say
the importance of the deep ecology movement is not greater in any way
than any other. It's vaguer, more ambiguous, unfocused, in a sense,
which I don't like. But it' s an umbrella undertaking, simply less
ambitious in it's aims than some think.
A.L. It would sound like, then, that you would think that the whole
deep ecology-ecofeminism debate has been miscast?
A.N. Not miscast. We had to work out these things.
6. The State of the Discipline
A.L. What do you think of the current state of environmental ethics,
mainstream academic environmental ethics? Because it seems to me
that for you, the foundation of the ultimate compatibility of different
environmental movements is found at the level of their practices. So
what about the current state of environmental ethics as an academic
discipline, which you had just as much to do with helping to establish
as environmentalism as a movement?
A.N. Today, many countries, Norway for example, give out millions of
dollars for environmental ethics, and I have a suspicion that it costs
much less than doing anything in practice. I'm happy that this is going
on with environmental ethics. But you see it's dominated mostly by
academics who do not really do ethics, but metaethics. They talk about
what is an ethic, and what you do when you have this sort of ethic, and
that sort of ethic. That is not normative ethics where you disagree very
much on what is right. So, I'm happy that there is such a flourishing
among academic ethicists, but it's very much metaethics and very much
trying to find a consensus, trying to find an ethical consensus in the
world, and a moral consensus. That for me is ultimately a sign of
passivity, because they say, for instance, we cannot do some thing now
before that consensus is reached. Sometimes, they even point to the
United States and say we can't do something before we have the United
States on our side, so then we just have to wait. But I see the future as
much more conflict laden, really bad, ugly conflicts. I'm afraid that
many who are in environmental ethics are not what I would call
activists on the front; they are not activists, they are discussing things.
A.L. Do you think that fact causes problems with their philosophy?
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A.N. Well, it must. But I don't participate in these fights [between the
different ethicists].
A.L. Yeah, you don't. You don't participate in these debates, I notice.
A.N. I am for what I call a focus on environmental ontology, how you
see the world, how you see it, how you can bring people to see things
differently.
A.L. Still, let me get your reaction on this: one of the more interesting
debates going on in the environmental ethics literature now is the
anthropocentrism/non-anthropocentrism debate. We know that
beginning with papers like Richard Sylvan's, "Do we Need a New, an
Environmental Ethic?" the field of academic environmental ethics has
focused on distinguishing itself philosophically by articulating a non-
anthropocentric ethic.
12
And then we have people like Brian Norton
who argue for a weak anthropocentrism, mostly on pragmatic grounds.
Do you think it's important to work out who's right and who's wrong
on this issue? Do we need to definitively settle whether or not
environmental ethics must rest on a non-anthropocentric foundation?
A.N. No, I think you don't see that language in any of my recent
articles. I don' t use terms like anthropocentrism or non-
anthropocentrism, because so many nice people belong in what I would
call the deep ecology movement and they say "I'm sorry Arne, I'm very
sorry, but I'm an anthropocentrist." That means they care for human
life first, and secondly for non-human life. They say, "of course, I am
all for the kind of policies you would like, but I feel nearer humans and
I don't even have a dog or a cat what's all this with lions and tigers,
I have no concern." I say to them of course that deep ecology as a
movement is open to everyone, even those who don't like insects, who
say, "I am not concerned about insects at all." Some of these so-called
anthropocentric people, who call themselves that, are of course still
with us. I don't like those terms, and of course most people in the future
will feel much much nearer to humans than other beings.
7. Untouchable Naess?
A.L. Okay, one final question and I'll let you go. This question is
directed to Arne Naess the philosopher. One of the fun things about
philosophy is the engagement, the joy of conflict, of really getting in
and arguing over a point. Well, it seems to me that now there's a
distinct lack of critical attention to your work. No one really wants to
get in there and intellectually spar with Arne Naess any more. They
12
See note 1.
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might want to go in the boxing ring with you, but they don't want to
take you on in the literature the way that people still do with, say Quine
and Habermas. How do you feel about that?
A.N. I feel badly about that. For instance, Paul Feyerabend, he was at
Berkeley at the same time as I was, and we had long, long discussions.
And he was very interested in my philosophical point of view, but
didn't seem to want to discuss it with me in public. Very strange. And
some others, they don't like to meet me to discuss these matters either.
I don't know why, but some think I'm too far out. But Feyerabend
would never think I am too far out because....
A.L. Right, because he's Feyerabend ! [Both laugh.]
A.N. Right, so that cannot be the reason. But, maybe I have not really
had such a great desire for argumentation either. I've not been happy
with the altercations I've had with these people Feyerabend, Lakatos
I also had discussion with him [Lakatos], he agreeing with me and
he said to me that his position on some topics was because of what he
had read in one of my articles. But he didn't really engage with it
either. And, of course, the grand old man, Sir Karl Popper, we had lots
of good times together. But he only speaks about nature to nie. We
were visiting professors together, but he didn't want to talk philosophy
with me, only about nature. One thing is, of course, the talent, the kind
of talent required for argumentation. I have an interest in interactions
more through my personal relations than through my arguments.
A.L. But sometimes I think that even when you're giving a public
lecture, you would like people to challenge you....
A.N. Of course.
A.L. And it seems like, especially, if you'll forgive me, but, for
instance your visit here the students who invited you here, they
adore you; they don't want to push you and challenge your ideas in any
way. This is troubling.
A.N. No, that's right. At the end of my talks, when they say, "and now
Professor Naess would you be so kind as to answer questions," I would
like it if someone would jump up and shout, "I'm against you!" That
would be great, but they don't do that. If someone just said, "I think
you are a hypocrite, and so on and so on," see, I would smile.
A.L. [Laughs.] That's good! I think that's a good line to end on.
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