Research On The Ecological Poverty Of China From The Perspective Of Marxism

Poverty is a concomitant problem with humanbing. It has always been plagued mankind since the beginning of humanity. People experience poverty to varying degrees in ervery historical period from primitive society to socialist society. Although, the poverty of human society has been eased to some extent and in a certain range since the establishment of the capitalist system, and the Chinese people led by the Communist Party of China have agained plentiful and substantial achievements in anti-poverty in socialist construction more than 60 years, the poverty stated above is only material povety, not involved the ecology dimension of povety. While the continuous development of human society, the ecological problem and the poverty problem constantly intertwined, which made the ecological poverty (hereinafter referred to as EP) gradually exposed, and become a global problem should be solved by the current human. In the contemporary China, EP has become an important cause of many social contradictions, and anti ecological poverty must be fully resolved by Chinese government and people in the course of pursuiting "Chinese dream", and realizing two goals of one hunderd years.Tracing the reasons of EP in China at present, we found that the complex reasons are including both historical reasons, but also realistic reasons; both internal factors, but also external reasons. In external reasons, one of the important causes is the ecological colonialism policy implemented by the old capitalist countries. With the continuous development of capitalism and the crazy chase to profits of capital, the consequence, that is EP, gradually emerged and spread to the whole world like infections. The EP will take place all over the world in varying degrees or deferent time as long as there are capital activities. After reform and opening-up, the liberalization ideas and ecological colonialism policy of western developed capitalist countries flew into China like flies, resulting in inevitably and seriously EP in China. Therefore, in order to solve the EP of China, we must not only make efforts through the domestic anti EP, but but also through extensively international cooperation, especially with the developing countries and the progressive forces all over the world to jointly resist and oppose the ecological colonialism policy implemented by the developed countries. Only by these methods, we can eventually eliminate the EP.This thesis, along the above mentality, makes step by step analysises on the appearances, roots and appearances of the contradictions of EP and methods of anti EP in China.(1) Combing and commenting the relevant research at home and abroad. This part is divided into four aspects.1) The first is a review of foreign scholars’ studies on poverty, EP, ecological crisis, and studies from the perspective of ecological economics.2) The second is a review of the theory of ecological crisis of the western Marxism, including the Frankfurt school representative viewpoints and standpoints of Ecological Socialism.3) The third is a review of domestic scholars’ studies on EP, including EP of the poor areas and the urban, as well as the applications of the relative theories and models in ecological economics and environmental economics, and so on.3) The fourth is a brief evaluation of those studies. The author affirmed the western scholars’achievements in studying on ecological problems and ecological crisis, and pointed out their lacks in studying on Marxism and scientific socialism. Although the domestic scholars had carried on the efforts and innovation on the concept, characteristics, classification of EP and so on. But a complete theoretical system has not been established. On the one hand, the most domestic studies were introductions andevaluations on the western scholars and their views. On the other hand, the most domestic studies were checks and verifications of foreign theories though econometric methods.(2) Summaring and concluding the related concepts and the basic theories, including ecology, poverty and its classification, basic theories (concepts, characteristics, classifications and ecological returning to poverty) of EP, main theories in ecological problems of classical Marxism and ecological Marxism. On this basis, this paper further discusses the the concept of EP from the perspective of Marxism, and viewed that there are differences between Ecological poverty and general material poverty, the former includes three aspects at least:1) People can not meet their basic demand of the ecological resources in EP; 2) Material poverty become more poor because of ecological degradation, and fall into an "ecological poverty trap" (EPT); 3) Some rich population in material wealth may return to the material poverty due to ecological problems. In short, EP can be poverty in ecological wealth, or EPT, or a complex combination of poverty in ecological wealth and return-poverty in material wealth. It can exist both in developing countries (or regions), and developed countries and (or regions); both in rural areas and cities.(3) Analyzing the situations of EP after reform and opening up from normative and positive perspectives. This part is devided into two sections:1) The first are discussions of main apperances of EP in China after reform and opening up. These main apperances includes the reduced of natural resources and the increasing destruction of ecological environment, EP existing economic development and ecological degradation, EP existing economic backwardness and ecological degradation, EP existing recession economic coexist and ecological degradation.2) The second is a verification of EKC in China. The authors mainly studied the types of EKC of industry three discards, and made a criticism on the results, which is the result could not reveal the nature of the problem, because there are some shortcomings need further discuss in EKC theory. If we want to make a clear understanding of the current EP in our country, we must carry on a thorough analysis on the current productivity, production relations and their interactions from the classic Marxism perspective.(4) Revealing the roots of contradictions of EP in China at present. This part made an analysis though two aspects, the imbalance of production relations and the failure of market mechanism in China at present.1) The first is the imbalance of production relations, which mainly reflected in the imbalance of the ownership, income distribution, industrial structure, consumption structure and so on.2) The second is the failure of market mechanism, which mainly apperenced in the the imbalance of supply and demand, the externality and opportunism; the disorder of market competition. The author revealled the roots of contradictions caused EP of China at presnt by using the principle of contradictions between productivity and production relations and the methods of contradiction analysis in the classical Marxism.(5) Analyzing the specific appearances of contradictions caused EP of China at presnt from the two aspects of domestic and foreign.1) Firstly, from the domestic perspective, the contradictions mainly included three aspects, which are the obstruction and destruction to the productivity and production relations caused by the "three movements" after the founding of the PRC, the alienation of production, public servant, distribution and consumption, brought about by the distorted development mode after the reform and opening up, the alienation between urban and rural areas, industry and agriculture caused by urbanization in the new era.2) Secondly, from the abroad perspective, the contradictions mainly also included three aspects, which are the developed capitalist countries’ policies towards China, like ecological colonialism, technological blockades and trade restrictions. Therefore, we must not only notice our own lows in the social, economic and ecological environment, but also pay close attention to the difference in ideology between the western capitalist countries and socialist China, and inequality means applied on China by the hostile western forces. Ecological environment problems are not only serious consequences of their ecological colonialism applied on China, but also their important means of smearing and subvert China.(6) This article has carried on the scheme design of anti EP in China at present from four aspects through the interpretation of the classic Marxism and the ecological Marxism. The classical Marx thought that, in order to realize the coordinated development between productivity and production relations completely, we must abolish private ownership, and establish the public ownership. But our country’s socialist system was set up on the semi colonial and semi feudal society, this reality determines a quite long period of our backward state, which also determines the socialist construction of our country is still at the primary stage, and the construction of this phase would cost us a long time from 1950’to 2050’. Therefore, starting from the basic national condition of current our country, the solution of EP must be set up on the development of productivity and ecological environment restoration.1) From the alienation theory of classic Marxsim, the author concludes that the solution of EP in China at present must ① have a correct understanding of the relationship between man and nature and strengthen the education and popularization of ecological concept; ② strengthen the construction of socialist harmonious society, and reasonably control the size of the population; promote moderate consumption and green consumption;③ dialectically treat the theory of ecological capital and improve the ecological resources.2) From the degrowth theory and "new normal state" theory, the author concludes that the solution of EP in China at present must ① unswervingly adhere to the socialist system;② further consolidate the position of public ownership, while we develop the non-public ownership economy;③ Based on the perfection of the socialist market economy, strengthen the central overall on the sociaty, economy and ecology.3) From the ecological scocialism theory, the author concludes that the solution of EP in China at present should ① strengthen the construction of socialist ecological culture;② encourage social organizations and volunteers to participate in anti EP;③ strengthen international cooperation to anti EP.