Ecofeminism

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Ecofeminism

Ecological feminism (ecofeminism) emerged in the 1970s predominantly in North America, although the term was coined by Françoise d'Eaubonne in Le Féminisme ou la Mort (1974). In 1975 feminist theologian Rosemary Radford Ruether suggested that there can be no liberation for women and no solution to the ecological crisis within a society whose fundamental model of relationships is one of domination (race, class, gender, sexual orientation, etc.). Ruether describes ecofeminism as the symbolic and social connection between the oppression of women and the domination of nature, grounded in a union between the radical ecology movement and feminism. Specifically she suggests that the women's movement must unite with the ecological movement to envision a radical reshaping of the basic socioeconomic relations and the underlying values of society.

The foundational perception is that connections exist between the oppression and domination of women and the oppression and domination of the Earth—or nature. In particular the mistrust or hatred of women (misogyny) and a fear of dependency on the natural world are the interlocking forces that ecofeminism is exposing and challenging. Ecofeminism expanded rapidly between the 1970s and the 1990s from numerous origins such as social and ecological activists and academics and from such diverse fields as feminism, social ecology, antiracism, and ecology. Ecofeminism is a convergence of the ecological and feminist analyses and movements. Like ecology and feminism, it is heterogeneous and has distinguishable components and orientations.

As Euro-Western societies developed, the combined influences of the rise of science, the dualisms of the Christian worldview, the philosophy of modernity, and the industrialization of the economy became the cultural forces that entrenched the feminizing of nature, the naturalizing of women, and their mutual entanglements in theoretical, historical, and cultural webs. The influence of what are called hierarchical dualisms is central to the development of the Western worldview and to ecofeminist critiques. Examples of such dualisms are men/women; heaven/earth; spirit/matter; mind/body; thought/emotion; culture/nature; order/chaos; rational/irrational; light/dark; and divine/demonic. These are hierarchical because the first receives a priority value over the second. They are dualistic because they are understood as opposites. However, there are also connections among the corresponding halves of the dualisms, such as among women, earth, matter, body, emotion, nature, chaos, irrational, dark, and demonic. Carolyn Merchant's study of the development of Western ideas and beliefs about the world has shown that these dualisms were, and continue to be, foundational to Western thought, values, and attitudes. They remain most often unconscious, yet they are fundamental to the Western world-view and belief systems, and they operate in every discipline and course of action. Ecofeminism challenges this hierarchical and dualistic worldview and holds that the domination of the Earth is enmeshed with the oppression of women. Ecofeminists claim that all oppressions, such as those based on class, race, gender, orientation, ableism, and the natural world, are interconnected within a logic of domination.

Ecofeminism is a third wave of feminism, meaning a convergence of ecology and feminism into a new social theory and political movement that addresses gender relations, social and economic systems, the use of science, the formation of cultural values, and human self-understanding in relation to the natural world. As feminism evolves into different branches, ecofeminism has embraced distinct feminist positions. Feminist theorists originating from liberal, cultural, social, socialist, radical, and postmodern critiques reflect distinctively on the relationship between women and the natural world and between misogyny and the ecological crisis. In addition, ecofeminist positions embrace distinct ecological paradigms, including resource-based environmentalism, social ecology, deep ecology, and/or cosmology. Many ecofeminists, such as Vandana Shiva, place a priority on action rather than theory. As ecofeminist philosopher Karen Warren remarks, the varieties of ecofeminism reflect not only the differences in the analysis of the woman/nature connection, but also differences on such fundamental matters as the nature of and the solutions to women's oppression, the theory of human nature, and the conceptions of freedom, equality, and epistemology on which various feminist theories depend.

What makes ecological feminism feminist is the commitment to the recognition and elimination of male-gender bias and the development of practices, policies, and theories that do not reflect this bias. What makes it ecological is an understanding of and commitment to the valuing and preserving of ecosystems, broadly understood. Far from being reductionist or simplistic, ecofeminism is a textured field of theoretical and experiential insights encompassing different forms of knowledge and embodied in the concrete. It is an interdisciplinary discourse within academia, a critique and a vision, spawning myriad books, articles, workshops, conferences, retreats, rituals, art, activism, and politics. There are publications covering ecofeminist philosophy, spirituality and religion, science, psychology, sociology, political thought and activism, economics and animal rights. Some specific problems addressed have included the history of the ideologies of women and nature, ecological degradation, ecological stress and human health, biodiversity, population, militarism, globalization, and exposing the players in ecological disasters. Ecofeminism is international in scope and connects women from around the world. It is analysis, critique, vision, and action.

Ecofeminism and Religion

Ecofeminist perspectives have had an impact on all aspects of religious understanding. The accumulation of work bringing ecofeminist analyses to bear on religious histories, systematic theologies, scriptural interpretations, spiritualities, and ethics is creating both unique viewpoints and substantial challenges. Religions are very influential in the formation of world-views, and some promote positions that are anti-women, antinature, or both. This may be evident in the teachings or is a consequence of how religions have engaged with cultures.

The ecofeminist challenge to religion is profound and permeates all layers of religious reflection and praxis. Ecofeminist religious perspectives are developing within classical religions such as Judaism, Buddhism, Christianity, Islam, within new movements such as Wicca, Goddess, or New Age, and in some indigenous traditions. Some ecofeminists are examining their religions for insights, redeeming what could be helpful and negating detrimental aspects. Others are reclaiming ancient or obscured traditions or creating new ones. The issues are different in each case. The extent of the ecofeminist challenge to and confrontation with classical religions is in the initial states of articulation, most evident in the works of Rosemary Radford Ruether, an American Christian ecofeminist theologian.

As Ruether points out, the cultural-symbolic level of the relationship between sexism and ecological exploitation is the ideological superstructure that reflects and sanctions the social, economic, political, and religious order. Ecofeminist religious perspectives hold in tension the relationships between religion and culture, ethics of nature and history, and theory and praxis. One goal is to become conscious of the cultural effects of religious traditions and systems.

Current work involves the reinterpretation, expansion, or creation of particular doctrines, symbols, and metaphors that include and honor women and the natural world. Challenging foundational presuppositions and reshaping the infrastructure of religion remain the substantive and more difficult work. Although there are both continuities and discontinuities with classical religions, there are cherished notions in some traditions that need to be rejected, such as the inferiority of or the need to control women. Religious ecofeminists are also claiming that the Earth is sacred, and this is neither explicit nor accepted in some traditions. Yet a sense of the sacredness of the Earth and of all life has been central to spiritual awareness from time immemorial.

Given that ecofeminism embodies diversity and is evolving continuously, the implications of any ecofeminist theory or praxis are impossible to delineate. There are lively debates within ecofeminism concerning essentialism, romantic or utopic dreams of a harmonious past or future, apolitical spiritualities, and the relationship between theory and social transformation. Yet ecofeminists desire to heal the wounds caused by the splits between nature and culture, mind and body, women and men, reason and emotion, spirit and matter, theory and action, and ultimately between humans and the Earth.