Earth Justice: Emergency Ethics in the Age of Climate Catastrophe
Conférence par/Conference by Jay Bernstein (New School for Social Research)
Quand/When : 4 avril/ april 4 2025 @ 15:00 – 17:00
Où/Where: J.W. McConnell Building, 1400 De Maisonneuve Blvd. W.
Room 362
Résumé/Abstract : In the 21st Century, all foundational political philosophy, all theories of social justice must simultaneously address climate change and the ongoing destruction of the environment. In this paper, I argue that late capitalism, fossil fuel capitalism is a global ecocidal practice. By ecocide is meant the destruction of Holocene normative nature. The worst consequences of ecocidal practice are visited upon the most vulnerable citizens of the Global South. Capitalism is thus a slow genocidal ecocide. To acknowledge this formation of moral harm and offense entails that an ecocide convention must become the foundational ethical norm for a post-capitalist form of life. An ecocide convention would be the Grundnorm, the basic norm, for international law and governance.