Ecofeminism

Hello,

This assignment is about one interesting topic: Ecofeminism. And it's taken from the perspective of seeing feminism in the context of Ecofeminism.

Personal Information 

Name:- Mansi B. Gujadiya

Roll Number:-12

Enrollment Number:-4069206420220013

Batch:-M.A SEM -3( 2022-23 )

Email ID:- mansigajjar10131@gmail.com

Paper Number:-204

Paper Code:-22409

Paper Name:- Contemporary Western Theories and Film Studies 

Submitted to:- English department MKBU

Topic:- Ecofeminism 

Introduction 

Ecofeminism, like the social movements it has emerged from, is both political activism and intellectual critique. Bringing together feminism and environmentalism, ecofeminism argues that the domination of women and the degradation of the environment are consequences of patriarchy and capitalism. Any strategy to address one must take into account its impact on the other so that women's equality should not be achieved at the expense of worsening the environment, and neither should environmental improvements be gained at the expense of women. Indeed, ecofeminism proposes that only by reversing current values, thereby privileging care and cooperation over more aggressive and dominating behaviours, can both society and the environment benefit.

The notion that women's and environmental domination are linked has been developed in a number of ways. A perspective in which women are accredited with closer links with nature was celebrated in early ecofeminist writings, by, for example, Carolyn Merchant in the United States and Val Plum wood in Australia. These advocated ‘the feminine principle’ as an antidote to environmental destruction, through attributes, which nurture nature. This ‘essentialist’ perspective, often adopting an ideal of woman as earth mother/goddess, has, however, also discredited ecofeminism and led to disaffection among some early protagonists (see, for example, Janet Biehl). In addition to being critiqued for its essentialism, this view of ecofeminism has also been charged with elitism through its provenance in a white, middle-class, Western, milieu. However, Vandana Shiva's consistent and persuasive ‘majority world’ voice has been a counterpoint to this, and arguably, gender and environment have been articulated together more powerfully, and been more influential, in majority world settings (see, for example, Wangari Maathai in Kenya), although how this has been done has been questioned by writers such as Cecile Jackson and Melisssa Leach.

Ecofeminism:-

Ecofeminism, especially as formulated in the 1970s and 1980s, received much criticism from feminist scholars for its essentialist leanings placing women as closer to nature. Scholars and activists critical of ecofeminism found the continued association of women with nature (as opposed to culture) as problematically reinforcing existing patriarchal structures that oppress women. Third World feminist scholars criticised the essentialist leanings of ecofeminism for creating a single unified image of woman, ignoring the differences among women and the intersections of gender with other social structures such as class, age, and ethnicity.

Feminist geographers and geographers interested in the political ecology of resource access and control likewise have found ecofeminism to be a problematic basis for understanding the gendered aspects of nature and environments. Vandana Shiva has been the foremost shaper of ecofeminist thought with respect to Third World women and environments, and for political ecologists working in the rural Third World her theoretical position has been particularly problematic. For example, Shiva’s 1988 publication, Staying Alive: Women, Ecology and Survival in India, explored the negative effects of the Green Revolution in India on both rural women and the environment and identified a feminine principle which she argued is necessary for maintaining humanity’s balance with nature. This feminine principle represents rural Third World women’s distinct spirituality and relationship to the environment that is crucial for the realisation of a just and sustainable development. Many geographers view Shiva’s argument as a romanticization of both the feminine and the indigenous as antidotes to a destructive modernist and capitalist development.

More recently, there have been several scholarly attempts to reclaim the promise of ecofeminism for addressing gender-based oppression and environmental destruction. In 1999, two ecofeminist theorists (Catriona Sandilands and Noel Sturgeon) issued important calls for salvaging ecofeminism, specifically as political action, distinguishable from a theoretical and analytical tool. One body of work (Sandilands) attempts to move ecofeminism forward as a project in radical democracy, with the potential to destabilise hegemonic categories, identities, and discourses. In this effort, it draws upon the constructivist strand of ecofeminism, recognizing ecofeminism’s potential to destabilise, but also identifying significant risks in the strategic application of essentialism for political activist purposes. As argued by many feminist scholars, essentialism reifies existing identities and discourses, in effect legitimising and bolstering them.

A second body of work (Sturgeon) takes a critical look back at the role played by ecofeminism in international debates during the 1990s around women and environments. It highlights the positive contributions of ecofeminism as an international political discourse, arguing that the intervention of scholars like Shiva into the discourse on women, environment, and development came at a crucial moment in time. Prior to Shiva’s intervention, international discourse had positioned poor women primarily as destroyers of the environment, through their role in population growth and in the necessary provision of basic household needs. This work argues that Shiva’s ecofeminist theory and feminine principle should be placed into a historical and political context that led to the transformation of women into agents for positive environmental change. In this perspective, ecofeminist intervention opened a political space for the participation of women in sustainable development and in environmental conservation as experts, instead of as villains or victims.

Nature and Gender:-

Ecofeminism and Peace

Analyses of the intersectionality of race, class, and gender oppression have been applied in the arena of environmental activism. Ecofeminism has developed as an international movement that includes academic feminists and first and third world environmentalists. Ecofeminism encompasses a variety of approaches to thinking about and acting on behalf of the environment, but all ecofeminists recognize the necessary linkage between a healthy ecology and healthy lives for women and children. Ecofeminists view patriarchy as responsible for both the oppression of women, the poor, and indigenous people and for systems of production and consumption which view nature as a commodity to be used and discarded. Vandana Shiva has argued that in pursuit of an illusion of progress, Third World development projects designed to promote industrialization on the Western model have enriched their Western sponsors while doing little if anything to alleviate the poverty of Third World people. Worse, they have tended to replace small-scale indigenous ecological practices with large-scale degradation of the environment. Shiva distinguishes between material poverty and spiritual poverty. While Third World material poverty is real and highly visible, it is also relative to the supposed superior standard of living of the developed nations. The spiritual poverty in the midst of material pleasures of the developed nations – demonstrated by high rates of mental illness, drug addiction, and personal violence – and the relation between spiritual poverty and estrangement from nature, is less visible to Westerners themselves, but still very real.

Sandra Harding and other feminist philosophers of science have argued that science and technology have played a leading role in worldwide patriarchal dominance. The supposed value-neutrality and objectivity of scientific method has cloaked science and its resulting technological advances in an aura of certainty and inevitability. In reality, science has been firmly in the control of and has conferred its benefits upon the wealthy and powerful. Its pretence to be a progressive force for all humankind has served to conceal such damaging results as destabilising and polluting military technologies, exploitation of natural resources, and unchecked consumption. Harding and others have argued that it is important to recognize the validity of non-Western and indigenous methods of acquiring knowledge. It is also necessary to acknowledge that social contexts and value systems influence all forms of knowledge production, including Western science, so that these practices and their results can be properly examined and critiqued. In the absence of these critiques, science and technology will continue to be a force for widening the gap between the richer and poorer nations, resulting in increasing misery and political instability.

Feminist Political Ecology:-

This approach draws on both feminist ecology and political ecology. It has been influential in human geography, perhaps more so than many other feminist ecological approaches. Ecofeminism is the lens through which many feminist geographies of Nature have been produced. While recognized as a broad church, this approach does not necessarily draw on ecology. Feminist political ecology questions the construction of identity, particularly as a basis for situating the researcher in relation to the research being undertaken. It recognizes multiple subjectivities and seeks to combine traditional geographical research techniques with feminist approaches of participatory mapping and oral histories. The approach also recognizes the gendering of environments. Recent work within this tradition has also noted the rural bias within political ecology, and attempted to address this issue.

Feminism, Environmental Economics, and Accountability:-

The basic principles of ecofeminism require the addressing of the key national and global economics' concerns including the ones created by the simplistic economics formula of inputs required for production being capital, land, and labour to produce outputs. This limited consideration of inputs, according to Henderson (1984) needs to be replaced by the new conceptualization of minimal entropy society with revised key inputs that are required and that cannot be excluded from the equation including capital, resources and knowledge.

Ecofeminism principles are based around nature being the central consideration for preservation and protection, requiring efficient use of natural resources, asking for the consideration of nurturing and community growth and development as important priorities and indicators of success (Henderson, 1984) rather than the conventional economic GDP measures which have been criticised for their lack of consideration of comprehensive performance, output, and impacts at the national level (Stockhammer et al., 1997). The conventional GDP measures are considered as inadequate and unreliable measures of social welfare (Van Den Bergh, 2009). This is a brief consideration of ecofeminism which has been provided here to establish that there is a strong link between environmental economics and ecofeminism and that these principles define the basic premise of environmental economics which entails broader environmental and societal oriented considerations and which encompasses a significant departure from conventional economics' considerations.

conclusion:-

 In sum, we can say that feminism grew out of radical, or cultural, feminism (rather than from liberal feminist or socialist feminism) … In the mid-1970s many radical/cultural feminists experienced the exhilarating discovery, through historic and archaeological sources, of a religion that honoured the female and seemed to have as its “good book” nature itself … We would not have been interested in “Yahweh in a skirt,” a distant, detached, domineering godhead who happened to be female.

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