Democracy  &  Nature, Vol. 6, No. 1

 

The Meta-Industrial Class and Why We Need It

Ariel Salleh 

 

Abstract: The paper suggests that the appropriate 'agents of history' in an era of globalisation and ecological crisis are 'meta-industrial' workers. This hitherto nameless class carries out hands-on reproductive labours at the interface of 'humanity' and 'nature' using 'holding skills', a grounded epistemology and ethic consonant with genuine democracy and local sustainability. Pointing to the unexamined neo-liberal assumptions of many environmental philosophers, the author suggests that only an 'embodied materialist' epistemology and ethic can do justice to class, race, gender, and species diversity.

 

 

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