Anton Pannekoek: The Destruction of Nature

ICC introduction

This article written by Anton Pannekoek (1873-1960), published in 1909[1], is a resounding refutation of the allegations – inspired by the lies of Stalinism, which has been fraudulently defined as communism – that marxism has no concern for nature and the ecological question; that – like the capitalist system it claims to be fighting – it is marked by the same “productivism” which is so destructive of nature. The exact opposite is true!

In this article Pannekoek develops, in a condensed and very accessible way, the same approach that Marx has already put forward in Capital. He reaffirms that only the advent of communism offers a realistic alternative to the destruction of nature.

Today, the ideological campaigns of the ruling class quite consciously place the responsibility for the ecological disaster on “Man” in general, the better to hide the fact that, as an integral part of nature, the human species inter-acts with nature through the intermediary of the different forms of social organisation which have succeeded each other in history. All of them, since the end of primitive communist society in prehistory, have been systems of exploitation based on the division of society into social classes. It’s not “Man”, but the capitalist system, which is solely animated by the maximum extraction of profit, which is vampirising the whole of nature, and subjecting it, just like the labour power of the proletariat (these being the two sources of its wealth) to a ferocious exploitation, resulting in exhaustion and annihilation. This is why capitalism has no solution to the ecological question, and why really solving it goes hand in hand with solving the social question. 

In 1909 Pannekoek was already underlining that the ravages of deforestation posed a vital question for humanity. After more than a century of the decadence of capitalism, where the devastation of nature during this period has reached such proportions that its effects (heating of the climate, collapse of overexploited eco-systems, deforestation resulting in zoonotic diseases…), combined with the effects of the economic crisis and imperialist wars, are making the threat of the destruction of humanity more tangible than ever. This dramatic situation demands that the proletariat raises itself to the level of its historic responsibility as the gravedigger of capitalism, because only the society which it carries within itself, based on the abolition of the law of the commodity and of social relations of exploitation, the creation of a society without classes geared towards the satisfaction of human need, will make it possible to achieve a real balance between nature and the human species.

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There are numerous complaints in the scientific literature about the increasing destruction of forests. But it is not only the joy that every nature-lover feels for forests that should be taken into account. There are also important material interests, indeed the vital interests of humanity. With the disappearance of abundant forests, countries known in Antiquity for their fertility, which were densely populated and famous as granaries for the great cities, have become stony deserts. Rain seldom falls there except as devastating diluvian downpours that carry away the layers of humus which the rain should fertilise. Where the mountain forests have been destroyed, torrents fed by summer rains cause enormous masses of stones and sand to roll down, which clog up Alpine valleys, clearing away forests and devastating villages whose inhabitants are innocent, "due to the fact that personal interest and ignorance have destroyed the forest and headwaters in the high valley".

The authors strongly insist on personal interest and ignorance in their eloquent description of this miserable situation but they do not look into its causes. They probably think that emphasising the consequences is enough to replace ignorance by a better understanding and to undo the effects. They do not see that this is only a part of the phenomenon, one of numerous similar effects that capitalism, this mode of production which is the highest stage of profit-hunting, has on nature.

Why is France a country poor in forests which has to import every year hundreds of millions of francs worth of wood from abroad and spend much more to repair through reforestation the disastrous consequences of the deforestation of the Alps? Under the Ancien Regime there were many state forests. But the bourgeoisie, who took the helm of the French Revolution, saw in these only an instrument for private enrichment. Speculators cleared 3 million hectares to change wood into gold. They did not think of the future, only of the immediate profit.

For capitalism all natural resources are nothing but gold. The more quickly it exploits them, the more the flow of gold accelerates. The private economy results in each individual trying to make the most profit possible without even thinking for a single moment of the general interest, that of humanity. As a result, every wild animal having a monetary value and every wild plant giving rise to profit is immediately the object of a race to extermination. The elephants of Africa have almost disappeared, victims of systematic hunting for their ivory. It is similar for rubber trees, which are the victim of a predatory economy in which everyone only destroys them without planting new ones. In Siberia, it has been noted that furred animals are becoming rarer due to intensive hunting and that the most valuable species could soon disappear. In Canada, vast virgin forests have been reduced to cinders, not only by settlers who want to cultivate the soil, but also by "prospectors" looking for mineral deposits who transform mountain slopes into bare rock so as to have a better overview of the ground. In New Guinea, a massacre of birds of paradise was organised to satisfy the expensive whim of an American woman billionaire. Fashion craziness, typical of a capitalism wasting surplus value, has already led to the extermination of rare species; sea birds on the east coast of America only owe their survival to the strict intervention of the state. Such examples could be multiplied at will.

But are not plants and animals there to be used by humans for their own purposes? Here, we completely leave aside the question of the preservation of nature as it would be without human intervention. We know that humans are the masters of the Earth and that they completely transform nature to meet their needs. To live, we are completely dependent on the forces of nature and on natural resources; we have to use and consume them. That is not the question here, only the way capitalism makes use of them.

A rational social order will have to use the available natural resources in such a way that what is consumed is replaced at the same time, so that society does not impoverish itself and can become wealthier. A closed economy which consumes part of its seed corn impoverishes itself more and more and must inevitably fail. But that is the way capitalism acts. This is an economy which does not think of the future but lives only in the immediate present. In today's economic order, nature does not serve humanity, but capital. It is not the clothing, food or cultural needs of humanity that govern production, but capital's appetite for profit, for gold.

Natural resources are exploited as if reserves were infinite and inexhaustible. The harmful consequences of deforestation for agriculture and the destruction of useful animals and plants expose the finite character of available reserves and the failure of this type of economy. Roosevelt recognises this failure when he wants to call an international conference to review the state of still available natural resources and to take measures to stop them being wasted.

Of course, the plan itself is humbug. The state could do much to stop the pitiless extermination of rare species. But the capitalist state is in the end a poor representative of the good of humanity. It must halt in face of the essential interests of capital.

Capitalism is a headless economy which cannot regulate its acts by an understanding of their consequences. But its devastating character does not derive from this fact alone. Over the centuries humans have also exploited nature in a foolish way, without thinking of the future of humanity as a whole. But their power was limited. Nature was so vast and so powerful that with their feeble technical means humans could only exceptionally damage it. Capitalism, by contrast, has replaced local needs with world needs, and created modern techniques for exploiting nature. So it is now a question of enormous masses of matter being subjected to colossal means of destruction and removed by powerful means of transportation. Society under capitalism can be compared to a gigantic unintelligent body; while capitalism develops its power without limit, it is at the same time senselessly devastating more and more the environment from which it lives. Only socialism, which can give this body consciousness and reasoned action, will at the same time replace the devastation of nature by a rational economy.

[1] Published: Zeitungskorrespondenz, no. 75. July 1909. An English translation first appeared in Socialist Standard no. 1380, August 2019.