The Critique Of “Capital Logic” And The Construction Of “Life Logic”: Study On Shigeru Iwasa’s Eco-marxism

Shigeru Iwasa, the professor of department of sociology of Hitotsubashi University of Japan, has created the most realistic and feasible Eco-Marxism, and thus been one of the most outstanding representatives in this field. He disagrees with the radical Eco-Marxism that is to overthrow the existing capitalistic system with the help of the fierce social revolution, disapproves the conservative Eco-Marxism that advocates green capitalism, and strongly opposes the pessimistic Eco-Marxism which is to claim the return to the pre-capitalistic society. His environmental thoughts belong to the realistic Eco-Marxism, and its core content is to realize the unification of the economic development and environmental protection under the guidance of Marxism. More importantly, he points out that the essence of environmental issue is economic issue. Human economic activity gives rise to environmental damage. Hence, the fundamental solution to environmental protection is to explore the way of economic activity which is helpful to avoid environmental destruction. On this base, human beings need to be under the guidance of Marxism,discard the existing production mode and life style of mass production--mass consumption--mass waste, practice the production and life mode following the living logic, and realize the transformation from capitalism to ecological socialism. The critique of capital logic and the construction of life logic are the main contents of Iwasa’s Eco-Marxism. So far, he proposes the most practical and operational strategy coordinating the economy and the environment. Meanwhile, by the dual dimensions of the critique of capital logic and the construction of life logic, he realizes the combination of environment protection and Marxism, expands the research scope of contemporary Marxism, and opens the new stage of Eco-Marxism.This paper is to objectively summarizes the results of Iwasa’s ecologicalMarxism, to put forward the Marxist solution to the issues of environment protection and economic development in contemporary China, and to provide beneficial enlightenment to the construction of the ecological civilization of socialism with Chinese characteristics.At the same time, the thesis adopts the methods as follows:the text interpretation method, the method of combining problem-based and thought-based, the comparative research method and the method of combining theory with practice.The thesis is divided into three parts: the introduction as the first chapter, the main body from the second chapter to the fourth chapter, the fifth and sixth chapter are the necessary extension of this thesis and the conclusion as the last chapter is to make the review of the core thoughts and concepts.The first chapter is the introduction. To mainly elaborate the background,purpose,and significance of doctorate dissertation, narrate the current research status quo, and state the train of thought and methods, and the innovation and deficiency of the paper.The second chapter is to sort out and outline the historical background,academic origin, core concept and theoretic characteristic of Shigeru Iwasa’s ecological Marxism. First of all, the environment destruction caused by capitalist industrialization, the increasingly serious industry pollution in post-war japan, the public campaign against hazard, and the reasons giving rise to hazard become the historical background of his ecological Marxism. Secondly, his thoughts of ecological Marxism origin from Marx and Engels ecological thoughts, the western Marxists thoughts( such as Reiner Grundman, Ted Benton and Foster), the western environmental ethics and Japanese Marxist environmental thoughts. The capital logic and the life logic are the two core concepts of his ecological Marxism, and also the key to and the logical starting point of accurately grasping his environmental thoughts. Finally, his study style is different from the theoretical research style ofEuropean and American scholars. To be exact, combining with environmental hazards of modern Japan, Iwasa does not only interprets the ecological theory created by Marx, but also applies it into social practice. Thus he forms one unique ecological Marxism that combines environment protection and Marxism, economic development and environment protection.The third chapter is the ecological critique of the capital logic. Firstly, Iwasa investigates the history of the environmental damage by modern industrialization.Secondly he strongly refutes the various errors of the roots of modern ecological damage such as modern technology theory, economic growth theory,anthropocentrism theory, humanity theory and production relation theory. On this basis, Iwasa intensively studies the reasons that social production mode and social life style under the domination of capital logic ruins the environment. Beyond a variety of the appearances of environmental damage, he profoudly reveals that the capital logic plays the decisive role in environmental destruction. Finally, Iwasa further analyzes and demonstrates the impossibility that human beings make great efforts to completely handle ecological environment issue under the framework of the capital logic and the illusion of green capitalism, thus makes the capital critique become the pursuit of the living logic.The fourth chapter is to establish the ecology of the living logic. On environmental issues, unlike the contemporary ecological Marxist scholars who pay attention to the critique of the reasons causing the environmental destruction,Shigeru Iwasa pay more attention to the exploration and designation of the specific solutions to environmental issues. He thinks that human beings can achieve the sustainable society combining economic development and environment protection only if his production and life follow the life logic. This demands that we human beings must establish the economic development concept of giving priority to environment protection and discarding the production mode and life style of massproduction--mass consumption--mass abandonment, build up the environment-friendly circulatory economy system and circular society, and thus realize the transformation from capitalistic system to ecological socialism. In one word, the environment protection theory under the guidance of the living logic is the core content of Iwasa’s Eco-Marxism.The fifth chapter is to evaluate and analyze Shigeru Iwasa’s Eco-Marxism. The important work he has done is to explore and tease the relationship between ecology and Marx’s theory so as to set up Marx’s ecology, which is one essential part of his Eco-Marxism. On the one hand, the contributions he makes to Eco-Marxism and the bright spot of his theory are to develop and deepen Marx’s production theory and social critical theory; to create the environmental ethics that is beyond ecological centralism and human centralism, is based on the symbiotic relationship between human and nature, and combines Marxism with economic activity. On the other hand,there are still the following disadvantages to his ecological Marxism whose research scope is narrow, whose natural view and ecological values have the limitations, and reveals he makes heavy concession to the capitalistic system. These shortcomings weakens his theoretical revolution in real life.The sixth chapter is the enlightenment drawn from Iwasa’s ecological Marxism to the construction of ecological civilization of socialism with Chinese characteristics. There will be gradually forming the government-dominating,market-leading and public-participating long-term mechanism of combining economic development and environment protection under the guidance of the living logic. The first step is to strengthen the ideas and the institutions of government environment administration; the second step is to establish the concept of corporate environmental responsibility, and to strengthen the construction of enterprise’s environmental legal liability and environmental responsibility ethics; the last step is to fully understand the significance of green public participation, to accurately graspthe issues of green public participation, and to actively explore the countermeasures of increasing the public green engagement.The last chapter is the conclusion. By studying Shigeru Iwasa’s ecological Marxism, we can make the following conclusions:(1)It is one wise choice for human beings to fulfill the ecological logic so as to realize the win-win situation of economic development and environmental protection because we are still living in such capital society as is dominated by capital logic and we are not able to manage to carry on the ecological social revolution.(2)We can regard Iwasa’s ecological Marxism as “the environmental philosophy of the living logic”because the most prominent feature and the bright spot of his ecological Marxism is to pursue the living logic.(3)We can think Iwasa’s ecological Marxism is one new stage of contemporary ecological Marxism because he expands the vision of modern Marxism study.