Socialism & Sustainability

You cannot have environmental (or ecological) sustainability without socialism, and vice-versa. That’s because sustainability requires that we — human society — consciously regulate our own activities to stay within Earth’s planetary boundaries, such as the carbon cycle. The only way to achieve that sort of collective self-regulation is to reorient human activities away from the ceaseless pursuit of infinite profit growth and towards meeting human needs in an equitable manner.

This transition will require collective ownership of the means of production (i.e., the infrastructure, tools, machinery, knowledge we use for production) so that workers and others who have been marginalized under capitalism are given the power to democratically determine what is produced and how to redistribute those products in a just and equitable manner. It will also require large-scale, collaborative economic planning which is not possible in a free market economy hellbent on profit.

And you cannot have socialism without ecological sustainability because reorienting society to meet basic human needs in an equitable manner (for current and future generations) is only possible if we are living in harmony with the natural ecosystems that we depend on for survival. Life relies on life. If we continue to deplete and/or pollute Earth’s natural resources (or their ability to replenish themselves) it will only make meeting human needs more difficult and reproduce the unequal distribution of harm that many already experience under capitalism.

A socialist society must recognize the interdependence of the human world on the entire web of life — of which we are a part — and should seek to achieve a harmonious balance with nature that respects the right to life for all our non-human relatives.

Sustainability is impossible under capitalism.