Monthly Review | Return of the Dialectics of Nature Debate
, 2022-09-01 08:01:40,
Thank you for the invitation to discuss this fine book [The Return of Nature: Socialism and Ecology] of John Bellamy Foster, which I characterized in my blurb as “a monumental work, a genealogy of ecosocialism,” which is a worthy winner of the Isaac and Tamara Deutscher Prize.
Whenever this prize is mentioned, it brings to mind my time in the Communist Party of Ireland in the 1970s, when I was reading and admiring the writings of Isaac Deutscher, which was not done in such circles. Towards the end of my time in the party, when in London in company of Ralph Miliband, Marion Kozak, and Monty Johnstone, they brought me to the home of Tamara Deutscher, where I was warmly welcomed and spent a most stimulating evening while wondering what the general secretary of the party would say if he knew I was there. If anyone has a romantic image of European left intellectual salons, this evening lived up to that and is still a fond memory for me.
There is a better atmosphere between sections of the left these days, manifesting itself in many ways, not least in Historical Materialism conferences.
Bad as the relationship between communist parties and Trotskyist parties was in those days, one thing we tended to agree on was the dialectics of nature. At that time, the dominant position in academic Marxism and social movements was that of Western Marxism, which was hostile to the idea of the dialectics of nature. It was also making inroads into Marxist parties, and it was very strong in…
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