The Return of Nature: Socialism and Ecology
672 pp, $28 pbk, ISBN 978-1-58367-928-9
By John Bellamy Foster
Reviewed by Dominic Alexander
“This is a complex array of themes to pursue, particularly given that the scientific and social dimensions of sexual politics in the lives of many of these figures is highly relevant as well. Bellamy Foster rightly emphasises the importance of such issues within the overall picture, as a genuinely dialectical understanding of society and nature could hardly avoid confronting the alienated character of gender relations in class societies. The agenda makes for a long and detailed book, but one in which the analysis captures a strong sense of the social milieu of the people he discusses, as well as the scientific and philosophical questions in which they were engaged. Whatever the variety of views to be found, and the strengths and limitations of each figure, they ‘all sought to connect the materialist conception of nature and the materialist conception of history through an examination of the complex, changing material interconnections between nature and human history.”
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