Ecology

écologie

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Summary

Dominique Pagani consistently distinguishes ecology, or concern for the environment, which he shares, from ecologism, which he opposes as a discourse: he calls himself "anti-ecologist, not anti-ecological"1. He points out that oikos means the house, a human world, which is also where the word economy comes from2. In his view, ecologism makes nature, and no longer man, the supreme value, and he sees this as a counter-revolution3. He argues that the idea of a natural balance takes up theological providence and joins the invisible hand of the market. There is no normal state of nature, and the environment must be protected for the sake of man4. This discourse also justifies a capitalism in crisis abandoning productivism and full employment5, as well as arguments against the development of Africa6. From 2020 onward, he compares it to the Churches: he sees in it a form of guilt-inducing, "the opium of the people." Against it he sets a rational, democratic and planned ecology, in which an assembly would decide what should be produced more and what should be produced less7.

Summary produced automatically from 23 of the passages below, to be reviewed; the numbers link to the moment in the session.

Series · 13 Jun 2025Our former savagery? An Illumination by Arthur Rimbaud

12:39He is anti-ecologist, not against ecology: oikos means the house, a human world, whence also "economy." He fights a discourse, not concern for the environment.

Talks · 23 Mar 2024Sahelian Africa and imperialism: Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger

1:28:35He is anti-ecologist, not anti-ecology; ecologist discourse becomes an argument for preventing development.

Season 11 · 7 Aug 2023Niger special: should we “blacken the corpses”?

39:44Against degrowth advocates, children in Niger die for lack of treated water; he is interested in the environment, not in naturalism.

Season 11 · 26 Apr 2023Worldliness in Clouscard, or “the dominant ideology”

9:52He is anti-ecologist, not anti-ecological: ecologism is a discourse, distinct from the real problems.
1:25:53He rejects punitive ecology; the value is not the planet but the humanity that inhabits it.

Season 10 · 7 Jul 2022#16 Michel Clouscard: “There are no holidays in the concept!”

34:09Speaking of "climate disruption" presupposes a rule and a harmony of nature: this is a religious, not a scientific, viewpoint.
35:49It is not the planet that must be protected but the world, that is, the relation of men to one another within a given environment.

Series · 31 Mar 2021“Red-browns”, “decolonial”: should we use the dominant language?

35:51The natural balance parallels the invisible hand of the market. There is no normal state of nature: the environment must be protected for man's sake, not for nature's.
1:40:39The idea that the colonized should have been left without electricity or hospitals, a far-right argument, is taken up today by environmentalists.

Series · 31 Mar 2021A balance in nature?

19:03He calls for a rational, democratic and planned ecology, distinct from ecologism.

Talks · 16 Jan 2021The world before, the world after (part 2)

21:37Forty years of environmentalism prepared the bringing to heel of an unruly people in the name of their health.
50:28He distinguishes true friends of the environment from an environmentalism that spreads an ideology of degrowth useful to capital.

Talks · 4 Oct 2020Calves and Things: the preface

16:03A serious ecology would be rational and democratic: an assembly would define priorities, since too much of some things is produced and not enough of others.
41:30Speaking of environment rather than exploitation removes man from the center of debate. The word subtracts and obscures more than it adds.

Season 8 · 23 Jul 2020#15 Return to the logics of the subject

5:36Ecologism is the final stage of capitalism, to be distinguished from attachment to the environment.
18:29Ecologism takes over from the guilt-tripping of the Churches: it is the opium of the people.

Talks · 18 Jun 2016At the bistro (part 1)

31:50Ecology never offers a solution: under the guise of science, it is a hatred of the modern world.
35:31Ecological discourse comes to justify capitalism's abandonment, in crisis, of productivism and full employment.

Series · 8 Jan 2015Y for Yonville

10:55Ecological distress is sincere, but it attributes the misfortune to the reasons that the dominant power blows about, so as to mask the real causes.

Series · 21 Dec 2014G for Gauche (the Left)

6:54Naturalist ecologism makes nature, no longer man, the supreme value: this is a counter-revolution.
7:41He distinguishes concern for the environment, which is unanimous, from the prescribed discourse on the environment.

Series · 26 Sept 2014#4 Neo-fascism and the ideology of desire: on the thought of M. Clouscard

42:35Ecologism, not ecology, takes up theological providence; the balance of nature only makes sense through a human measure.
45:47Antiproductivist discourse justifies the reduction of production and the strike on financial capital's investment.