Los últimos acontecimientos que han conmovido al mundo demuestran fehacientemente un fenómeno que viene siendo expuesto y discutido desde hace varias décadas. El agotamiento de un modelo productivista y predatorio que amenaza cada vez con mayor intensidad las bases materiales de la vida sobre el planeta. El cambio climático es un hecho que a estas alturas no podemos negar. Aunque existe un acuerdo casi global entre el mundo científico sobre su inevitabilidad, aún subsiste bastante incertidumbre sobre las consecuencias efectivas que éste puede acarrear. En América Latina se estima que los mayores impactos de estos cambios se abatirán especialmente sobre la agricultura, la pesca y el acceso al agua potable. Tal situación hace aún más evidente la segunda contradicción del capitalismo, es decir, aquella que además de la contradicción entre capital y fuerza de trabajo, implica una preeminente contradicción entre las fuerzas destructivas y predadoras del capital y la naturaleza.
La temática de los límites ecológicos al crecimiento económico y las interrelaciones entre desarrollo y ambiente fueron reintroducidas en el pensamiento occidental(1) en los años sesenta y principio de los setenta por un grupo importante de teóricos, entre los cuales se pueden destacar Georgescu-Roegen, Kapp, Naess, Sachs y Schumacher. For example, in a pioneering work of Ernst F. Schumacher "Small is Beautiful" (Small is Beautiful) published in 1973, Germano-British economist made a strong criticism to the productivist model of Western societies that would lead to environmental collapse and life itself, to try to understand how humanity whole problem and start seeing new ways to develop new production methods and consumption patterns in a lifestyle designed to last and be sustainable. Despite differences in approach and more or less militant position of each of these thinkers, what is looming as one aspect in common to them all is the vehement criticism of the model production and consumption inherent to capitalist development.
This model, which has generated an exponential increase in exploitation of natural resources and encourages reckless spending, especially in the northern hemisphere countries, is responsible both for causing a depletion of resources and produce tons of waste contaminated daily water, air and earth (2). Each year we lose 14.6 million hectares of forests and thousands of species, reducing and irreversibly eroding biodiversity. Continues the devastation of forests, which the world loses annually about 17 million hectares, equivalent to four times the size Switzerland. And no trees to absorb excess CO2, the greenhouse effect and global warming worsen. The ozone layer, despite the Montreal Protocol, will not recover until mid-century. Carbon dioxide in the atmosphere (370 parts per million) has increased by 32% compared to the nineteenth century, reaching the highest concentrations of the last 20 million years ago, and today the atmosphere we add annually to more than 23,000 million tonnes of CO2, accelerating climate change. It is expected that carbon dioxide emissions increase by 75% between 1997 and 2020. Each year we issue about 100 million tons of sulfur dioxide, 70 millones de óxidos de nitrógeno, 200 millones de monóxido de carbono y 60 millones de partículas en suspensión, agravando los problemas causados por las lluvias ácidas, el ozono troposférico y la contaminación atmosférica local.
En definitiva, un conjunto de indicadores medioambientales estudiados en las últimas décadas parecen revelar cada vez con mayor claridad que si la humanidad no cambia su estilo de desarrollo, en menos de un siglo colocaremos en serio riesgo la supervivencia del planeta y del género humano. Como nos recuerda Mészáros, a cada nueva fase de postergación forzada, las contradicciones del sistema del capital sólo se pueden agravar, acarreando consigo un peligro aún mayor para nuestra propia sobrevivencia.
Las sucesivas catástrofes ambientales y "climáticas” que viene sufriendo el planeta desde Chernobyl y la reciente tragedia de la planta de Fukushima, permiten sustentar sin exageración que nos encontramos en un estadio avanzado de riesgo fabricado o de crisis estructural, no sólo del capital, sino de la sustentabilidad de la especie. E l siglo XXI se ha inicia do con una impronta catastrófica, con un grado de desastres ecológicos y naturales sin precedentes en la historia mundial(3). Ante este panorama incierto y desolador han surgido diversas iniciativas (como la Conferencia Mundial de los Pueblos sobre el Cambio Climático) que buscan construir alternativas al modelo productivist currently prevailing predatory and exploitative. Contemporary Ecosocialism arises precisely as a response to this self-destructive dimension of capitalism and is seen as a rational and feasible alternative to the synthesis of civilizational crisis facing humanity.
As stated in the manifesto written by Kovel Ecosocialist and Löwy, "the ecological crisis and the crisis of social impairment are deeply intertwined and should be viewed as different expressions of the same structural forces that shape the dynamics and expansion of the global capitalist system. This crisis would have its origin, firstly, in the process of accelerated industrialization in excess the ability of land to process, dampen and contain, and, with it, as part of the globalization process, with all the consequences and disintegrative effects on societies where it imposes. (...) The current capitalist system can not regulate the crisis that he has launched, much less overcome. The system can not solve the ecological crisis because to do so requires setting limits to the accumulation, which is an unacceptable option for a social system supported on the imperative to grow or die. In short, the capitalist world system is historically bankrupt and in ecological terms is deeply unsustainable; must be changed or replaced, if aims to make the future worth living. "
Thus ecosocialism seeks to break dramatically with destructive practices and predatory forms derived from a mode of production and consumption of highly demanding natural and human resources. Ecosocialist response represents a break with the model expansion of capitalism as productivist perspective of 'real socialism'. For ecosocialists, whether the logic of market and profit, as well as bureaucratic productivism vulgar economistic Marxism, are considered as models may be incompatible with the pressing and urgent need for environmental preservation. Some critics
of this trend have pointed out that the concept is an eco-socialist utopia, a fantasy, literary non-scientific creationism and viability to be put into practice. However, even if we do a quick read on the future of the planet, we can arrive directly to the conclusion that there is an urgent rethink in the first place, the current energy mix used to "flush" the soil. The excessive use and dependence fossil fuels not only have disastrous effects on ecosystems directly, but also cause permanent and bloody conflict over control of oil resources. Then necessarily incorporates ecosocialism a proposal for clean energy sources and renewable myth and radically alter the relationship of domination / enjoyment / destruction of man over nature.
addition, the use of alternative energy (geothermal, solar, wind, etc..) Should be accompanied by a broad debate about the very notion of progress / development based mainly on economic growth (4). The idea of \u200b\u200bthe decrease can also be considered illusory, a kind of naive and retrograde philosophy, but recent evidence of the devastation of the planet may point in another direction: the alternative for the decline and discussion power and unequal distribution of natural resource use must be securely indispensable part of any agenda that seeks to discuss the future of humanity. In that sense, the debate about the decline may also be considered part of building a environmentalist and socialist, since it includes in its heartwood conception of the need to move toward a different mode of operation of the society more democratic, egalitarian, participatory and drastically redefine the current model of production and consumption, trying to reach the welfare of all within the framework of a new relationship between humanity and nature.
Thus, both socialism ecological decline and the prospect of representing a reorganization of life in many areas, involve giving up artificial consumer to undertake a self-limited use and appropriate to the real needs of people, involve thinking about the use of alternative energy and clean, mean ecological footprint through local activities and more equitable relations between members of a community.
In short, eco-socialism, decrease or Sumak Kawsay seek centrally reflect on the strategies that have been built in function to reverse the deleterious consequences of the current pattern of production and consumption to make a change level of civilization that allows hope for a "good life" in a framework of respect for people and nature.
Notes:
(1) We refer to the reintroduction, since we believe that the origin of these concerns is the proactive work of a contemporary of Marx, William Morris, which had already introduced eco-socialist elements of vision in his writings, especially in his utopian novel News from Nowhere.
(2) For example, estimates that if the average energy consumption of the United States was generalized to the entire world population's known oil reserves would be exhausted in only 19 days.
(3) A report of the International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (ISDR) United Nations agency, said that 2010 was the year when there were as many natural disasters over the past three decades, with the number of people who were killed in these accidents amounted to 300 000 victims.
(4) Over the past decade, there was a debate that has been gaining ground in academic circles and civil society about the urgent need to replace the current growth pattern in effect for a model of 'decline' sustainable.
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