A brief survey of Marx and Engels' views on the environment

Abstract

Marx and Engels' main environmental concerns can be collected under two closely connected concepts: waste or pollution, and soil degradation. These are dialectically related and for Marx are underpinned by what he called the "metabolic rift". Marx and Engels considered this state of affairs to be transhistorical, generated initially millennia ago by urbanisation, deforestation and over-exploitation of water resources and soil fertility. These developments accompanied all class societies' uncompensated appropriation of a social surplus. Capitalism simply extended and intensified environmental pollution and soil degradation - probably beyond what even Marx and Engels imagined.