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Green Glossary Green Politics - the four pillars of Green politics: ecology, nonviolence, social justice, and grassroots democracy. Green politics grew from a linking of social and environmental movements in response to the nation-states' cold war MAD (mutually assured destruction) nuclear policies, general environmental degradation worldwide, war, patriarchal top-down power structures, and civil liberties' issues. "Green" represents the color of the greatest mass of life on earth, and an easy umbrella with applicable connotations to help unify these diverse movements. Ecology's life focus and implications quickly became a central organizing principle. Additionally, from a Green perspective, the cold war nations' economic systems of socialism, communism, and capitalism represent growth economies incompatible with human and non-human nature. For example, the Communist Party of the USA (CPUSA) advocated nuclear fusion research and development as do many Democrats and Republicans. Generalizing from an ecologically informed perspective, such developments are irresponsible and environmentally unethical. One soon sees how Green politics develops from the idea that ecology is the "subversive" science because its implications undermine the intellectual, ethical, and moral standing of previous political and economic ideologies. One "lives" Green politics to some degree. For Greens, applying the lessons of ecology to individual and social responsibility issues within the context of holistic thinking and action creates an obvious need for participatory democracy. "Politics" in this sense becomes a daily activity, series of choices, and continuing social and life sciences education. Moreover, individual and social responsibility within an ecological context require this bottom-up approach to decision making. Noteworthy, although the most publicized, electoral politics under the Green umbrella represents but "one leg"of Green politics. (See Green Parties of the ASGP for an application of Green Politics in electoral politics.) Goals: Greens think that the dominant political and economic system will collapse (as it is ecologically) while ecological and political crises grow. Greens hope to create a Green society "parallel" to the dominant society and thereby mitigate the damages of collapsing ecological, economic, and political systems. (See The Ten Key Green Values and "A Green Political Philosophy" for more) The idea is to peacefully overgrow governments, the corporate state, and ruling ideologies in a peaceful, ecological manner. Greens are inherently pacifist. " In Green politics, we practice tenderness in relations with others; in caring for ideas, art, language, and culture; and in cherishing and protecting the Earth. To think Green is to build solidarity with those working for social justice and human rights everywhere, not bound by ideologies. -Petra Kelly"(return to What Greens Think) Habitat - Each organism and population in a natural community has a habitat, the place where it lives -- its address, so to speak. Habitats vary widely in size from an entire forest to the intestine of a termite. (Miller, Living in The Environment) Hierarchy - An important term in Green usage, especially Social Ecology. In nature, hierarchies have an ecological context for complex relationships. In society, hierarchy represents top-down power relationships. In this context, hierarchies are causes for and used to explain inequalities between humanity's various groupings and individuals. Because of the hierarchical nature of society, Greens make an effort to pursue "consensus" in decision making. (See consensus) Holistic - A form of thinking and perceiving that tries to focus on the totality (whole) of relationships of an act, event, or nature's processes. Greens look to ecology for examples. Ecology is said to be a way of thinking "holistically" because it seeks to find relationships within the totality, the total environment of an ecosystem (as far as humanly possible). This may include animal, plant, fungi, soil, weather, water, seasonal as well as predator/prey relationships. In this sense, Greens see humanity's place in nature and society "holistically." The idea of "process" or "becoming" belongs to this term as used by Greens. (return to What Greens Think)(return to Table of Contents) Homo-centrism - A controversial term among Greens. A human-centered view, perception, understanding of environmental ethics as well as humanity's place in nature. Humanism arising from the Enlightenment is thought to give homo-centrism its greatest source of ideological justification. Bio-centrism as articulated by Spinozo, Deep Ecologists, Eco-Feminists, and others give a contrary perspective of humanity's place in nature. In practice, Homo-centrism translates into words like these when growth plans falter for the sake of biodiversity. As found in local newspapers: Since when does the concern for animals manifest itself over the concern for human? It is absolutely ludicrous that a bunch of whacky conservationists cans cause these distractions. Hubert Peak (energy information) Humanism - Developing from the Enlightenment, humanism resorts to human-centered explanation for humanity's place in the universe, including humanity's relationship to nature. It represents, in one sense, a paradigm shift from thought dominated by Christianity during the middle-ages. This fact, coupled with the great increase in scientific investigation, aided the breakup of philosophy into the many different subjects that are taught in schools today. The Renaissance, the rise of humanism, and the Enlightenment laid the foundation for the way philosophy has developed since 1500. Obviously, the science of ecology represents one outgrowth of these developments; it is thought that ecology will slowly replace physics as the primary model for understanding nature. Among many Deep Ecology and EcoFeminist thinkers, humanism represents a mindset at war with wild nature. On the one hand, placing humanity at the center of the universe, over it in some ways, helps to justify domination of nature and its destruction. On the other hand, as an approach to nature, humanism will never achieve a full understanding of nature's complexity, in spite of scientific ecology. As a result, humanity's quest to manipulate nature to its wants and needs spells disaster for biodiversity as well as humanity's reverence for nature. Human Encroachment - Introduction of humans into the wild carries a monumental risk to indigenous (home) species. Besides building roads in the wild, human's tend to leave their waste products about. One small example: hamburger buns, fries, and more tend to attract generalized feeders (eat almost anything), such as crows. Eventually, these generalized feeders destroy the habitat of those bird (avian) species with specialized feeding (necessity food) needs. These birds often cannot coexist with the generalized feeders and are literally eaten "out of house and home" by humanity's introduced species. Specialized feeders become extinct (no more for all time). We see this very occurance today on the Galapagos Islands (one of Charles Darwin's laboratories) because of the introduction of dogs (generalized feeders). What's the value of a species-population? A new line of sport cars, Monday night football? Ideology - A system of beliefs that may include figures of speech, stereotypes, and social and cultural assumptions based upon the dominant culture's definitions of nature and social relationships. Ideological categories arise and subside as hierarchical power relationships change. Industrialized and postindustrial nation-states make wide use of publicity owned media to sustain power relationships for social, political, and geographic purposes, as did their predecessors use central forms of communicating ideas. Propaganda becomes a category of the dominant ideology as needs arise. The core of the dominant ideology remains intact until a paradigm shift over several hundred years obscures what was once the dominant ideology. Examples can be found in early Egyptian religions that justified their existence from Pharaoh's relationship to their deity. Papal justifications came to work in a similar fashion. Recall the flat earth and earth-centered solar system arguments based upon ideology and scholasticism. Sub-categories of the dominant ideology may change within years or even overnight (Nixon being the "only one who could go to China."). Hence, examples are commonly found in ideological shifts with US presidencies and text book editions. (return to A Green Philosophy) Mutual Aid - A phrase used by the 19th century Russian anarchist Prince Kropotkin to emphasize the high degree of cooperative and synergetic relationships in nature. This concept received little attention in scientific circles at the time. Charles Darwin's research in natural selection captured the interests of biologists and others. Kropotkin makes reference to Darwin's recognition of the many biologically beneficial relationships in nature, and in his manner, tried to overcome the use of natural selection to explain social relations, Social Darwinism. The social ecologist Murry Bookchin develops the idea of "mutual aid" further from a 20th century perspective. Bookchin applies the term mutual aid hypothetically and theoretically to social organization guided by insights arising from social ecology. "Helping one another" comes to mind. NIMBY - An acronym for Not In My Back Yard, arising from the reluctance of home owners to allow noxious activities near their homes. A term sometimes used to describe those recently converted to shallow environmentalism. Oil - Often referred to as a "petrochemical," many Greens understand that oil represents industrial society's ability to overcome and stretch carrying capacity. Greens also note that there is an environmental "snapback" pending because industrialized nations have "stretched "carrying capacity through oil's availability. Unfortunately, it is believed, nuclear energy will grow as an "alternative" while oil becomes less economically feasible for continuing the dominant lifestyle. Aldous Huxley's Island leaves readers to ponder the issue of global politics as inappropriate technology spreads the goo and technology of oil Worldwide See the Hubert Peak (energy information). Pacific Electric Railroad - A web-like, light-rail, mass transit system operating in Southern California until the mid-1950's. GM's marketing strategy to develop bus transit fit Firestone and Philip's Petroleum's marketing strategy to sell a greater number of bus tires. Once appropriated and destroyed, the Pacific Electric Railroad was eventually replaced by individual modes of transportation dependent on petrochemicals. Paradigm Shift - A concept for "model" used in science, social theory, art, and literature. "Paradigm" may also be thought of as a model for a conceptual scheme (consciousness reified) to understand nature and human relationships. In this way, some Greens explain how conceptual systems of thought change over generations.The "shift" represents a subtle, but profound change in the direction of human consciousness. Greens believe that humanity is now going through a paradigm shift from the mechanistic (Cartesian dualism) or physics model of reality to the holistic or ecological (organic) model of reality. Unfortunately, many Greens believe, this shift in human consciousness follows human experience and practice -- existence precedes consciousness. Pessimistically, irreparable damage to Earth will occur before humanity fully comprehends its place in nature's web of life's relationships. Consequently, the stage may be set for top-down authoritarian rule as a quick-fix and inadequate response to ecological catastrophe. Optimistically, humanity will one day learn the necessity of a democratic, ecological existence, if for no other reason than ecological necessity. (back to ideology) (return to Seventh Generation) Perpetual Motion Machine - As a brainstorming exercise like cold fusion and Ponce de León's Fountain of Youth, an idea for considering "what if?". Hypothetically, this machine creates more energy than it consumes - - creating "free" energy. However, such a technology also falls into the trap of promising a "solution" to social problems. Greens see no technological solution to social problems, because advances to date could have, would have, should have disposed of many social problems. For example, homelessness in the US arises as a political decision rather than an inability to provide housing for all who need shelter. The Manhattan Project (invention of nuclear weapons) and lunar landings are proof that homelessness need not exist in the US. Also, ownership is an issue. As personal property, such technology allows for continuous destruction of habitat for "free." As private property, the same issues arise along with a disenfranchisement of future generations from a technological resource (another form of alienation.) Domination of others and non-human nature by the privilege of ownership would/will grow in new directions. 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