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In the past year or so the membership of our Facebook group has grown substantially. This reflects the growing recognition of China’s pivotal role in protecting the environment and building a new, multipolar world.
Speaking as one of the founders of China Environment News, this may be an opportune time to reflect on the group’s history, its objectives and its motivations. Paul Rutherford.
* Our Facebook group was created in October 2019, and our website in May 2021.
Eco-socialist roots of Ecological Civilization [1,3]
One of the very first articles published on our website focused in detail on the importance of China’s notion of Ecological Civilization.
The concept of ecological civilization has become central to Chinese efforts to confront and deal with environmental problems. However, as professor Arran Gare argues, the notion of ecological civilization “establishes a tradition of socialist thought that now has the potential to challenge and replace global capitalism.”
Ecological civilization is a translation of the Russian notion of ecological culture, and it can be traced back in the history of ecology and the concept of culture in the Soviet Union, particularly in the 1920s.
The Chinese term for ecological civilisation first appeared in Chinese in 1987 after translation of an 1984 article written in Russian by Chinese agricultural economist Qianji Ye. Initially the term used was “ecological culture” and it was translated as “ecological civilisation” (shengtai wenming). In Chinese, the words for culture (wenhua) and civilisation (wenming) are sometimes seen as synonymous, and the way the word “civilisation” is used in China corresponds more closely to the way the word “culture” is used in Russia.
Ecological civilization is not only underpinned by fundamental principles of eco-socialism, it provides the means to clarify the meaning of socialism generally in a way that accords with deep assumptions of the Marxist critique of capitalism.
Our Editorial Perspective, then and now [2]
The aim of China Environment News is to provide rational and balanced news and analysis of China’s actions to protect the environment.
Too often news in the Western media on China’s environmental efforts is clouded by anti-China distortion, if not outright hysteria and racism.
Of course, it is not possible to understand China’s environmental policies and programs without understanding “socialism with Chinese characteristics”, and the efforts to build what the Chinese call “ecological civilization”.
In the global battle for ecological rationality and equity, China has increasingly emerged as the international leader for Green development.
China is now a key driving force in moving the planet towards ecological civilization and in redressing the effects of centuries of plunder and exploitation of the Global South by the West. A key element of this has been the Belt and Road Initiative.
China’s leadership is far more evident today than it was when we first wrote these lines some five years ago.
The global environmental crisis is a material reality, and is not something that can be reversed by adopting a few reforms aimed at the “environmental modernization” of international capitalism nor by a “Green New Deal” which appeals to and entrenches the privileges of the West.
Global ecological crisis is the product of centuries of largely unrestrained Western industrialization and colonial exploitation of the natural resources, land and labour of the Global South by imperialism and this continues under its current neo-liberal incarnations.
Our perspective from the start has been to recognise that seriously tackling the global ecological crisis must involve a global redistribution of power and wealth. We unequivocally acknowledge this will require nationally-appropriate forms of socialist state power.
We do not pretend to be neutral or impartial – we support China’s environmental efforts and we are openly partisan in support of the emerging multi-polar world as evidenced by the increasing global influence of the BRICS+ group of nations.
References
- The Eco-socialist Roots of Ecological Civilisation, originally posted on May 26, 2021. https://china-environment-news.net/2021/05/26/the-eco-socialist-roots-of-ecological-civilisation/
- Our Editorial Perspective, Then and Now, originally posted on May 24, 2021. https://china-environment-news.net/2021/05/24/our-editorial-perspective/
- The first academic paper in China defining ‘Ecological Civilization’ in 1987, posted on March 04, 2025. https://xueyingyingxue.substack.com/p/the-first-academic-paper-in-china
