Evolution of Socialist Ecological Civilization from Ideology …
85
of ethics. Ecocentrism, as its name suggests, is an ethical philosophy that extends
the scope of ethics from humans to ecosystems. Prominent scholars supporting this
position include Aldo Leopold and Holmes Rolston. Aldo Leopold puts forward
the idea of land ethics and the argument that human beings should see land as a
community to which they belong. He reminds people to pay attention to elements
in the land community that lack commercial value. With “capital” at the core, in the
early and middle stages of the industrial era when natural resources were plundered
and used without any caution and the linear economic model from raw materials
to waste was adopted to promote economic growth, Leopold’s view was obviously
prophetic. It reminds human beings to pay attention to the long-term interests of
mankind in the integrity of and balance with the land community. Holmes Rolston
was an influential philosopher in contemporary Western environmental ethics, and
the founder of the international academic journal Environmental Ethics. He had
deep influence on Mr. Yu Mouchang, a Chinese scholar in environmental ethics and
former president of the Chinese Society for Environmental Ethics. Holmes Rolston
proposed the theory of natural value in his books such as Philosophy Gone Wild
and Conserving Natural Value, which emphasized the intrinsic value and system
value of the natural world and recognized the instrumental value of non-human
nature as a means to human well-being. He also proposed the diversity of natural
values, pointing out that maintaining and promoting the integrity and stability of
the ecosystem is the responsibility of human beings. However, it is obvious that
the popularity of anthropocentrism confined to the inherent pattern of the industrial
civilization has contributed to the creation of unprecedented material wealth, but has
brought the Earth’s ecosystems on which mankind depends to survive to the brink of
a collapse; Pan-humanism gives meaning to all lives and affirms the value of nature,
but it may push humanity, who “knows the difference between nature and man,” back
into the jungle. It is meaningless and impossible to talk about the value of nature
without giving due consideration to mankind.
2 Logic Behind and the CPC’s Creative Contribution
to Human Civilization
The prominent conflicts between man and nature also attracted the attention of
Marxist theorists. In the 1970s, a combination of the Western environmental movement and socialist thoughts gave rise to eco-socialism, one of the most important
ten Marxist ideologies. Eco-socialism believes that capitalism is the root cause of
the global ecological crisis because (i) capitalism regards the pursuit of profit as
the ultimate goal and nature as the source of wealth; (ii) capitalism pursues capital
expansion, and in order to expand production and minimize production costs, capitalist countries had been trying to exploit natural resources in the third world to
the greatest extent, which caused an ecological crisis in underdeveloped countries.
Therefore, eco-socialism believes that the essence of environmental problems is
85
of ethics. Ecocentrism, as its name suggests, is an ethical philosophy that extends
the scope of ethics from humans to ecosystems. Prominent scholars supporting this
position include Aldo Leopold and Holmes Rolston. Aldo Leopold puts forward
the idea of land ethics and the argument that human beings should see land as a
community to which they belong. He reminds people to pay attention to elements
in the land community that lack commercial value. With “capital” at the core, in the
early and middle stages of the industrial era when natural resources were plundered
and used without any caution and the linear economic model from raw materials
to waste was adopted to promote economic growth, Leopold’s view was obviously
prophetic. It reminds human beings to pay attention to the long-term interests of
mankind in the integrity of and balance with the land community. Holmes Rolston
was an influential philosopher in contemporary Western environmental ethics, and
the founder of the international academic journal Environmental Ethics. He had
deep influence on Mr. Yu Mouchang, a Chinese scholar in environmental ethics and
former president of the Chinese Society for Environmental Ethics. Holmes Rolston
proposed the theory of natural value in his books such as Philosophy Gone Wild
and Conserving Natural Value, which emphasized the intrinsic value and system
value of the natural world and recognized the instrumental value of non-human
nature as a means to human well-being. He also proposed the diversity of natural
values, pointing out that maintaining and promoting the integrity and stability of
the ecosystem is the responsibility of human beings. However, it is obvious that
the popularity of anthropocentrism confined to the inherent pattern of the industrial
civilization has contributed to the creation of unprecedented material wealth, but has
brought the Earth’s ecosystems on which mankind depends to survive to the brink of
a collapse; Pan-humanism gives meaning to all lives and affirms the value of nature,
but it may push humanity, who “knows the difference between nature and man,” back
into the jungle. It is meaningless and impossible to talk about the value of nature
without giving due consideration to mankind.
2 Logic Behind and the CPC’s Creative Contribution
to Human Civilization
The prominent conflicts between man and nature also attracted the attention of
Marxist theorists. In the 1970s, a combination of the Western environmental movement and socialist thoughts gave rise to eco-socialism, one of the most important
ten Marxist ideologies. Eco-socialism believes that capitalism is the root cause of
the global ecological crisis because (i) capitalism regards the pursuit of profit as
the ultimate goal and nature as the source of wealth; (ii) capitalism pursues capital
expansion, and in order to expand production and minimize production costs, capitalist countries had been trying to exploit natural resources in the third world to
the greatest extent, which caused an ecological crisis in underdeveloped countries.
Therefore, eco-socialism believes that the essence of environmental problems is