Toward an Ecological Way of Life.

• Author: Van Meter, Kevin
• Position: Book review

Toward Climate Justice: Perspectives on the Climate Crisis and Social Change, by Brian Tokar, Communalism Press: Porsgrunn, Norway, 2010,124 pages, $14.95.

As I begin to read Brian Tokar's most recent work, a short book titled Toward Climate Justice: Perspectives on the Climate Crisis and Social Change, it is a cold and rainy Sunday afternoon in the Pacific Northwest. This is a typical March day here, though it reached above 60[degrees] last week, and across the continent in Vermont, where Tokar lives, they are expecting another snow storm. But while the changing weather patterns caused by climate change are not affecting him nor me at this particular moment, the planet is being scarred by rising sea levels, desertification, and erratic weather.

Climate change, as part of a larger ecological crisis, finds its origins in human behavior and can be particularly attributed to the ravishing appetites of capitalism and the nation-state. So says Tokar, and I certainly agree. This point is furthered by linking hierarchy--a fundamental attribute to both capital and the state--and the exploitation of working class and poor peoples, to ecological destruction. Tokar's thinking is situated within the radical philosophy of Social Ecology.

In five quick chapters, only 124 pages, Tokar explores the politics of climate change, green politics, the relationship between climate and social justice, as well as the barriers to Isocial change. The book has circulated well, reaching number nine on AK Press Distribution's best sellers of 2010 list. It is the importance of this crisis, as much as Tokar's readable approach and presentation of complex subject matter, that has led to this popularity. As a short text it is not without its faults.

A discourse has been developed around the supposed environmental benefits of driving a hybrid car, eating organic food, living "sustainably," purchasing energy efficient appliances, buying carbon offsets to accompany airplane tickets, and yes, craft beer and bicycling. Capital has created a new consumer market utilizing the desire among a particular sub-set of the population to protect the environment and prevent climate change.

This sub-set of the population, predominantly white and middle-class, are then provided new lifestyles and identities through this association, where the act of consumption results in a smug sense of self-satisfaction, superiority and a false sense of certainty in their actions. Here capital profits off...