Green Ideology: The Concept of Green Politics - Essay Example

Green Ideology: The Concept of Green Politics (Affiliate) TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION…………………………………………………………………………………DISCUSSION……………………………………………………………………………………… A. THE GREEN IDEOLOGY AND GREEN POLITICS……………………………………. B. HISTORY………………………………………………………………………………….. C. CORE PRINCIPLES OF GREEN POLITICS……………………………………………. NON-VIOLENCE………………………………………………………………….. GRASSROOTS DEMOCRACY………………………………………………….. SOCIAL JUSTICE………………………………………………………………… ENVIRONMENTALISM ………………………………………………………… D. CONCLUSION……………………………………………………………………………. Green Ideology: The Concept of Green Politics Introduction The Enlightenment advocated for reason as a mechanism for establishing an authoritarian system of ethics, aesthetics, government, as well as religion. The primary reason was to provide human beings with an objective truth about the entire issue of reality. Most of these reasons were based on the foundational values and interests documented in early American constitutions and other global guiding documents (Withers, 2007, p. 2). Thus, the legacy and prospects of the Enlightenment has had a substantial consequence in the modern world (Zafirovski, 2011, pp. 304-307). Post-enlightenment, therefore, broadly refers to the end of this enlightenment period that begun at the end First World War. It marks an end of the Age of Reason or ‘Universal Reason as some term it. Some philosophers call this Post-enlightenment period ‘post-modernism since it refers to the negation of all the Enlightenment ideals and values. In current studies, this denial is recognized as value nihilism or ‘The Revolution of Nihilism. As such, most critics argue that this value destruction epitomizes todays post-modern conditions. Post-enlightenment has unquestionably played a critical role in defining much of the political, social, and cultural life of the Modern Era (Alison, 2011, p. 285). Therefore, according to proponents of the post-enlightenment, a majority of the Enlightenment ideologies have played a significant role in the current global issues (Mishra, 2013, p. 168). It primarily implies that without these Enlightenment Ideologies, the world will have been different today. For a fact, there are several post-enlightenment ideologies in today’s social, political, and economic contexts. But, this assignment will primarily focus on the ideology of green politics, including nonviolence, grassroots democracy, social justice, and environmentalism. Discussion A. The Green Ideology and Green Politics According to Feinstein (2014), Green politics is critical to post-modern ideologies that aim at creating an ecologically sustainable community rooted in grassroots democracy, social justice, non-violence, and environmentalism (Wallerstein, 2003, pp. 5-10). Today, the concept of green politics is widely recognized, and major global bodies and superpowers are finding the issue thorny and delicate due to a couple of reasons. Today, the world is no longer a haven for dictators and tyrants like Saddam Hussein, Muammar Gaddafi, and Omar Al-Bashir. These are lucid signs that the world is changing, hence the need for a green ideology. The term ‘Green in politics is a translation of the German word Grun that was coined by a Green party member, die Grunen, in the late 1970s. The phrase initially restricted to certain academic circles and European politics but is currently a critical interdisciplinary that includes chemical engineering and chemistry. Proponents of green politics share several ideas with conservation, ecology, environmentalism, peace movements, and environmentalism. Besides ecological issues and democracy, environmental politics looks into social justice, civil liberty, nonviolence, and democracy issues. It primarily tends to advocate for social progressivism, a particular ideology that asserts the essence of advancement in science and technology to improving the human condition. The concept of progressivism became profound in Europe during the Age of Enlightenment with a firm conviction that the society could advance in civility through reinforcement of the basis of knowledge. Advocates of the process felt that progress had broad implication to all communities and that these proposals would spread across the globe from Europe (Garner, 2011, p. 1). B. History Green politics derives its ethical position from many sources, ranging from the values and virtues of the indigenous societies to the ethics of Spinoza, Gandhi, and Uexkull. These individuals influenced the new Ideology in their campaign for a long-term ‘Seventh Generation’ foresight. Besides, they also advocated for personal responsibility in decision making that critically affected the morality of choice (Wall, 2003, p. 2). Early developments of the ideology of green politics can be traced back to the Netherlands in 1970, when a group of Kabouters, Dutch anarchist, won five elective seats of the possible forty-five on the Amsterdam city council. They also won one seat in The Hague and another in Leeuwarden. Besides, they scooped a place a piece in Leiden, Alkmaar and Arnhem. The Kabouters, being an outgrowth of Provo’s solid White Plans, principally proposed the ‘Green Plans.’ However, the United Tasmania Group was the first political party with its roots enshrined in the environmental issues. The Group was created with a principal purpose of fighting deforestation, a major environmental issue. Even though it received a mere three percent in the state elections, it mostly inspired the emergence of Green parties globally (Wallerstein, 2003, p. 7). The German Green Party to date is an emblem of green politics worldwide. Even though, it is not the first Green Party in Europe to win elective seats in national elections, its media attention and prominence creates that impression. The party participated in its first national elections in 1980 but saw their breakthrough in the 1983 federal elections where it won 27 seats in Bundestag (Garner, 2011, p. 2). C. Core principles of Green Politics Advocates for the Green Ideology feel that there are four primary tenets of Green politics, including social justice, ecology, non-violence, and grassroots democracy. However, in 1984 in the United States, the Green Committees of Correspondence expanded the four principal pillars into ten other critical values. Besides the four mentioned above, they added: decentralization, next focus and respect for diversity, global responsibility, community-based economics, and feminism. In 2001, the Global Greens sought to expand its wings globally. Its charter identified six leading principles, including respect for diversity, ecological wisdom, social justice, nonviolence, sustainability, and participatory democracy. The following discussion tries to explain in detailed fashion some of the key tenets of green politics (Torgerson, 1999, pp. 1-5). Non-violence Since its inception, Green politics has always played a central role in promoting the idea of non-violence, a critical ingredient in reducing global wars and fighting. Non-violence in sociology refers to the lack of desire to kill or harm. It merely entails that practice of causing harm to self as well as others regardless of the situation. It originates from the suggestion that hurting people, and the environment or animals are uncalled for to achieve an outcome. However, the general principle of abstinence comes from religious, moral, or spiritual dogmas. To some, the idea of non-violence is rooted in the belief that God does not cause harm (Freeden, Sargent and Steers, 2013, pp. 429-433). In many instances, the term nonviolence synonymously implies peace (Johnson, 2006, p. 360). However, advocates of nonviolence habitually find it difficult to express the word because it necessitates choice. As such, an individual can choose to harm or not, a factor that is shaped by a couple of social, political or religious beliefs. For example, if two people are arguing and fighting, it is one’s choice to intervene by fighting the helpless or just separating the two without harming anyone. It is also critical to understand that the hard concept of non-violent actions is to create centrally an elaborate platform that calls for national dialogue. The process effects a social change without winning over the hearts of those who want to maintain and retain the status quo (Torgerson, 1999, p. 8). Currently, active non-violent methods are considered by many as critical to social protests and revolutionary political and social change. There are quite some incidences where it has substantially been applied. For example, the Mahatma Gandhi non-violent protests produced one of the popular and longest struggles against the British rule perpetrated in India. In the 1960s, Martin Luther King, and James Bevel adopted some of these non-violent techniques to reject the mistreatment of farm labour in California. Besides, the Velvet Revolution in 1989 in Czechoslovakia saw the removal of the Communist regime is considered by experts as one of the memorable and largest non-violent campaigns of the 80s. Most recently, the nonviolent protests of Leymah Gbowee and Liberian women brought peace after 14 years of civil war (Gilk, 2008, pp. 21-26). Grassroots Democracy Grassroots Democracy is another key component of Green Politics. Since its inception, the green politics ideology has advocated for consistent local, grassroots-level political involvement as well as decision making. As such, adherents of the philosophy feel that successful democracies have a devolved system of decision-making whereas much of the choices are shifted to the lowest possible social or geographic level. The opinion is that for democratic power to be exercised it must be vested in a local or regional society. Typical members are critical as opposed to isolated, atomized people at the helm of the organization. Therefore, environmental politics primarily seeks to enhance the role of deliberative democracy, with its roots based on direct citizen participation and consensus decision-making. For example, according to Nguyen (2014, p. 72), the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) embraced grassroots democracy in 1997 as a critical tool to rising inequality that was causing farmers to demonstrate in Thai Binh. Besides, Carter (2007, p. 116) feels that green politics promotes political action at a particular individual level like ethical consumerism or purchasing goods that are produced according to environmentally ethical regulations. As such, governments institute very stringent laws against counterfeits or small primary goods principally to protect its citizens. Many green parties in the world insist on grassroots action, particularly at local and regional levels. Traditionally, most of the new parties have managed to institute the concept of democracy by conducting local elections. Social Justice Today, Social Justice is an equally crucial new ideology just like any other previously proposed that marked an end to the Post-enlightenment era. It advocates for justice or equality concerning the distribution of opportunities, wealth, and privileges within a community. Traditionally, corrective or distributive justice ensured that people fulfilled their societal obligations and received their rightly earned dues from the society. This principle was the basis of communism where social duties were split and delegated. There was no room for lazy individuals as everyone had a particular assignment to accomplish (Leach, 2015, p. 263). The idea of social justice dates back to the Ancient and Renaissance western philosophy where thinkers like Spinoza, Socrates, Thomas Aquinas, and Thomas Paine made greater contributions (Becker and Becker, 2003. P. 146). The term became common in the 1840s and Luigi Taparelli, a Jesuit priest, is mainly credited for coining it. The idea went viral during the 1848 revolutions, especially with the work of Rosmini-Serbati (Iqbal, 2010, p. 13). As such, it is now a prerequisite for organizations to include the aspect of social justice in their operations. For example, the United Nations (2003, p. 53) embedded the concept of social justice in 2003 in its document ‘Social Justice in an Open World.’ It refers social justice as a practice that distributes the fruits of economic development in a fair and compassionate manner. Many UN advocates for social justice viewed the term as possible replacement for the preservation of human rights and social progress document prepared earlier in the 1960s. It is also critical to note that social justice is deeply rooted in the religious doctrines. For example, the Catholic social education comprises of many aspects of the Roman Catholic dogma that highlights the need to respect particular human life. Besides, it shows concern for the disadvantaged and most vulnerable in the society. Also, Hinduism is currently making critical adjustments for many reasons, including social justice. The wide inequality gap in the social behavior of the Jatis is the primary cause of the shakeup (Murugan, 2014, p. 19). In the Islamic teachings, the Quran provides the basis for various elements of social justice. For instance, Zakat, one of Islam’s five crucial pillars, advocates for charity and assistance to underprivileged in the society. Moreover, the Islamic faith has historically respected the aspect of social justice (Gorder, 2014). Environmentalism The last major component of green politics is environmentalism. It is a broad ideological, social movement that principally concerns environmental protection and conservation. The philosophy incorporates the concerns of non-human factors to accomplish the established goals efficiently. Environmentalists press for the proper conservation and restoration of the natural environment, and many refer to it as a movement to regulate pollution or protect animal and plant diversity. Thus, concepts like environmental ethics, biodiversity, land values, biophilia hypothesis, and ecology figure predominantly in all discussions surrounding environmentalism (Nixon, 2011, p. 128). At its heart, environmentalism attempts to balance relations between human beings and natural processes on which they critically depend on, but in such a manner that all the participants are assigned a proper degree of sustainability. However, the actual measures and results of this balance are not clear because of the diversity and complexity of the environmental concerns. Environmentalism is primarily represented by the green colour. However, this relationship has been appropriated by many marketing firms for the reason known as green-washing. Environmentalists in the contemporary world seek to influence political processes by lobbying, education, and activisms to protect ecosystems and natural resources (Fredriksson, Neumayer, Damania and Gates, 2005, p. 343). D. Conclusion In summary, it can be argued that Green politics is one of the critical ingredients of the green ideology, a major concept of the Post-enlightenment period. It is decisively concerned with designing an ecologically sustainable society rooted in grassroots democratic systems, social justice, non-violence, and environmentalism. Grassroots democracy is majorly concerned with creating institutions that practice local or low-level member participation in the decision-making process. Social justice, on the other hand, proposes for equality when it comes to resource and wealth distributions. Non-violence politics relates to peaceful demonstrations and campaigns to enforce a social or political agenda. Finally, environmentalism proposes better mechanisms to manage the environment and other natural resources through policies. As such, green politics is crucial to current and future generations. References Becker, L. C. and Becker B. C., 2003. A History of Western Ethics. 2nd ed. New York: Taylor & Francis Group. Carter, N., 2007. Power Switch: Energy Regulatory Governance in the Twenty-first Century. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 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The International Forum for Social Development: Social Justice in an Open World: The Role of the United Nations. The Department of Economic and Social Affairs Division for Social Policy and Development, 1-93. Wall, D., 2003. Green History: A Reader in Environmental Literature, Philosophy and Politics. London: Routledge. Wallerstein, I., 2003. The Decline of American Power. New York: The New Press. Withers, C. W. J., 2007. Placing the Enlightenment: Thinking Geographically about the Age of Reason. Chicago: The University of Chicago. Torgerson, D., 1999. The Promise of Green Politics: Environmentalism and the Public Sphere. Duke University Press. Read More