Charbonneau's Environmental Thought

"A civilization based on the goal of an indefinite development faces two risks which Charbonneau has encapsulated in two sentences; first, indefinite development is impossible in a spatially and temporally limited world: it will result in chaos. Second: the more power grows, the stricter must be the order: indefinite development calls for a total if not a totalitarian organization"-(Cerezuelle 314)

The quotation above captures one of the key concerns that the authors we have been recently reading have expressed. While Charbonneau's concerns are largely about freedom, here I wish to discuss his commentary on the relationship between different levels of societies and nature. Cerezuelle's discussion of Bernard Charbonneau's writings explicitly demonstrates the importance of philosophic thought for modern society and its policy making. In the selected quote and elsewhere (326), Charbonneau points out that the key motivation or goal of modernity is unending progress/growth/development. We can see this in the language of Western politicians who have latched onto the word "sustainable" and use it as a vague distraction. Charbonneau resonates with Nietzsche, Heidegger, and Berry in his proposal for rejecting previous systems of thought as inadequate answers to the issues of modernity. Charbonneau's main criticism of our modern industrial civilization is that we have misconstrued mankind's vocation. He argues that our highest human achievement is not intellectual understanding of the contemplative life that Aristotle proposed, nor the conquest of nature in search for usefulness that Bacon spoke of. Charbonneau's proposal is similar to Heidegger's; both encourage an interaction with the land and a change in the way we think about the world and ourselves. Both also advocate for caution towards technological thinking and both warn that our freedom and existence is threatened by rapid development, organization, and turning all being into "the standing reserve".
      I found it very interesting that Charbonneau identified growth as "the very principle of industrial civilization"(326). This was surprising because Aristotle and other authors we have read have argued that growth/movement is an aspect of nature/life, and this seems so intuitive. Are Aristotle and Charbonneau talking about the same thing or is there some distinction? Do you think Charbonneau's statement that only a worldwide organization/state is correct? Is it even plausible? What do you think of Charbonneau's understanding of civilization/society as an escape from nature?