Abstract
In this chapter, the author tries to suggest that social sciences can help the understanding of current critical socio-ecological dynamics. Social sciences have always been suspicious of idea that social phenomena can be investigated from a materialist point of view. Despite the idea that in every society there is a clearly determined group of phenomena separable from those that form the subject matter of other sciences of nature, this reflection suggests that social scientists developed significant analysis of the relationships between society and nature. Here the author tries to show that a social look could cast new lights upon the connections and interdependences between economic crisis and ecological crisis. The basic idea is that the decreasing natural fertility ofcapital is the cause of the decreasing global rate of profit of global economy and consequently the cause of theacceleration of new ways of nature appropriation, which can only deepen the current crisis.
Highlights
F r decades s ci gists i vestigated the s ciety as if ateria ity did t atter 1 The dec up i g f s ciety a d ature h wever had t be writte i the ev uti f s cia scie ces ar arx gr u ded a his a a ysis f capita ist s ciety–starti g fr c dity a d e di g with fictiti us capita – the dia ectic f s ciety a d ature
The global economy depends on energy for the purposes of value creation, profit maximisation and capital accumulation, this material and energy regime seems to be completely unsustainable, and increasingly untenable
As Marx wrote: “There is just one thing to be noted here: the natural wealth in iron, coal, wood, etc., which are the principal elements used in the construction and operation of machinery, presents itself here as a natural fertility of capital and is a factor determining the rate of profit irrespective of the high or low level of wages” [10]
Summary
F r decades s ci gists i vestigated the s ciety as if ateria ity did t atter 1 The dec up i g f s ciety a d ature h wever had t be writte i the ev uti f s cia scie ces ar arx gr u ded a his a a ysis f capita ist s ciety–starti g fr c dity a d e di g with fictiti us capita – the dia ectic f s ciety a d ature. The most important one is the decreasing “natural fertility of capital”, in other words the availability of cheap fossil energy and raw materials needed to capture living labour. This dynamic shapes the ratio between dead labour and living labour, between carriers of value and valorising labour, or, in other words, the organic composition of capital. Fluctuations in the price of such materials affects the rate of profit, falling and rising inversely to the price of the raw material This shows, among other things, the importance of the low price f raw ateria s f r g ba i dustry. The st critica aspect f such dy a ics is the avai abi ity f the f ssi e ergy a d raw ateria s eeded t abs rb w r supp rt va ue a d eep a ive the achi e f capita accu u ati A sec d critica aspect is the i evitabi ity f givi g up f ssi fue s
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