Straw Dogs, Blind Horses and Post‐Humanism: The Greening of Gray?

Abstract

John Gray’s recent ‘post‐humanist’ turn can be seen as a shift in his thinking in a more ‘Green’ direction, accepting as it does central tenets of the Green critique of unfettered markets and the unsustainable pursuit of orthodox economic growth amongst others. However, the ‘Greening’ of Gray’s thought is limited to a narrowly ‘ecological’ and scientistic analysis – prominent within which is Gray’s fulsome embracing of Lovelock’s ‘Gaia hypothesis’ – rather than any real engagement with the progressive social, economic and political aspects of Green political thought. While this renders Gray, at most, an ‘ecological’ rather than a ‘Green’ thinker, there is still much that Green thinking can learn from Gray’s analysis – and also vice versa.