why ecology and “eco- populism” are incompatible

Ecology provides a wide ranging, cohesive and evidence based explanation of the history of our planet and all living species. As such, it qualifies as a metanarrative. The Green Party Philosophical Basis and values are grounded in this ecological metanarrative.

What characterises Post Modernist ” eco populism ” is ‘an incredulity’ towards metanarratives and reality. Post modernist thinking is that all religions or philosophies – Rationalism, Empiricism, Pragmatism, Marxism, Humanism, or Freudian psychology – are essentially tools in the excercise of power; that is power used by Western, white and heterosexuel men to oppress other ‘ minority’ groups.

Paving the way for Identity Politics, Jacques Derrida (1930-2004) focused on language in the exercise of power which he argued was oppresssive, constructed by oppositions and always taking the form of a positive and a negative.

The duty of post modernist activists therefore is to deconstruct the opposition and overturn the hierarchy at a given moment.

If someone, for instance, says something that someone else may interpret as ‘offensive’, that “being offended” feeling must always be considered as “valid”, even if it clearly miscontrues what the speaker intended to communicate in the first place.

What is now considered to be ‘valid’ by our Post Modernist greens is not therefore so much the content and meaning of what a member might say, but what members at the receiving end make of it. In other words, the intention of the speaker becomes irrelevant against the impact of who actually says it from their position of any ‘privilege’, as perceived by a member of any ‘oppressed minority’.

Green oppressed minorities – formely known as Liberation groups and now going by the name of Special Interest Groups – have moved so far away from the basics of our ecological metanarrative and the Party’s green values of respect and tolerance where decisions were meant to be made by seeking to reach a consensus that we have seen a complete shut down of freedom of speech and a relentless silencing of ‘hateful heretics’.

What we are now witnessing with the internal elections is an embarrasingly damaging ideological division between self-proclaimed ‘eco populist’ Zack Polanski and Green MPs Adrian Ramsay/ Ellie Chowns. The battle for the 13 Executive posts with no less than 37 candidates is also predicted to be a bruising contest. As for our 4 newly elected MPs, cracks are emerging there too, albeit not in the public domain.

How long this descent into a dysfuntional state of affair will be tolerated by local party activists who hold the party together with such incredible dedication and hard cash and 65000 members about to be called upon to take part in the ballot for the 2025 internal elections remains unclear. Much may depend on the turn out.

‘Events’ however – such as the launch of a new left wing party ! – do have a habit of rapidly disrupting the best laid plans for some and thus potentially challenge any dominant narratives.

This is may not be “the end of History”, but the fierce battle for the leadership of the Green Party between ecologists and ‘eco populists’ may mark the beginning of the end of a decade of a captured green movement looking for direction.

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