The prevalent negligence of failing to incorporate gender as an essential aspect while analysing the major issues and challenges in the discourse of environmentalism and in its writing and policy formulations still exists. However, some literature has flourished under the tag of ‘ecofeminism’, having both Western and Indian variants, claiming to rightfully analyse and interpret the gender angle of the whole topic.
The truth, however, is that ecofeminism has considerably failed in proving to be a corrective to the already flawed system. This is exactly why we need an alternative theoretical framework in the environmental discourse that truly adopts an intersectional, inclusive and sensitive approach when discussing multi-faceted issues and challenges concerning the environment.
Bina Agarwal’s ‘Feminist Environmentalism‘ is such an alternative and we will see why. Therefore, this essay will be primarily focused on discussing the major differences between ecofeminism and feminist environmentalism, while also critiquing the former briefly. Further ahead, we will discuss why the shift from an ecofeminist perspective to a feminist environmentalist one is the need of the hour.
Ecofeminism
Ecofeminism consists of multiple varieties of discourses, a large part of them still waiting to be properly identified and defined. Most, if not all of them, clearly reflect the ideas dear to the Western feminist movement. Although as a conceptual framework, ecofeminism still has a long way to stride; it enjoys growing support and advocacy.
Ideologically, ecofeminism believes in a system underlined by such ideas and values that promote the superiority of men over women and the non-human world. It advocates that there exist important relations between the oppression of women, and domination and exploitation of nature because of which the environment is a feminist issue.
Although Carolyn Merchant, one of the first ecofeminists, argues that the nature-culture dichotomy is problematic and in fact untrue as it is based on the patriarchal construct that encourages gender hierarchy, at the same time, she seconds the view that women are ideologically placed proximal to nature because of their biology (fertility cycle, ability to conceive, childbirth etc.).
Ecofeminism, in its essence, also complies with the idea that because the domination of women and of nature have occurred simultaneously, women have a larger responsibility/stake in ending the domination of nature and healing it. They celebrate the relationship between women and nature through the popularisation of ancient rituals centred on the ‘Mother’ Goddess, the moon animals and the female reproductive system.
They also stand against the dominant view that women are restricted by being closer to nature because of their biological attributes. In fact, they opine that women’s biology and nature are sources of female power to be celebrated. Ecofeminists highlights some of the important conceptual interlinkages between the symbolic construction of nature and women. Ecofeminism also tries to emphasise the commonality between the goals of the women’s movement and the environmental movement, and propounds the view of n harmonious and egalitarian future.
Vandana Shiva is one of the most visible advocates of ecofeminism in India. She is sharply critical of the development model and its effect on the environment. She is of the opinion that the perusal of the development model has led to a shift from the traditional prakriti–purush philosophy, which sees nature as a living and creative process, the “feminine principle” from which life origins.
Critique Of Ecofeminism
The arguments that form the basis of ecofeminism are deeply problematic and perpetuate wrongful ideas on several counts. Firstly, it terribly fails in intersectionally evaluating women. Rather, it portrays women as a homogenous entity disregarding the differences in race, class, caste, ethnicity etc. In doing so, it also ignores the power hierarchy that exists within the female gender.
The ecofeminist discourse is also faulty in the sense that it locates the domination of nature and women just in ideology and conveniently turns a blind eye to the economic and material determinants of such a position. The ecofeminist argument also falls short in addressing the lived material relationships of women with nature in opposition to what others perceive it to be.
Ecofeminism is deeply essentialist in its view, especially in its ideas that trace the connection between women and nature to biology. Ecofeminism casts negligible light on the social, political and economic structures within which the ideological constructs are produced and transformed. The ecofeminism of Vandana Shiva is also problematic for ignoring the realities of hierarchies, subordination, violence and patriarchy within traditional communities.
Feminist Environmentalism And Why It Is A Better Alternative
Bina Agarwal’s ‘feminist environmentalism’ is grounded in the material realities and sees the connections between women and nature as constructed by structures of gender, caste, class, race etc., continuously producing, reproducing and distributing itself. As she mentions, women’s relation to the environment is historically and socially variable (1992).
Women coming from a rural background are both prey to environmental degradation as well as active participants in movements for the conservation of the environment. This framework, therefore, completely disregards the unquestionable ecofeminist acceptance of the woman-nature link. Feminist environmentalism, from what I have understood, is a theoretical perspective that traces both gender and class divisions of labour, power and property.
Unlike the Marxism or Gandhism ideologies, feminist environmentalism is beyond a set of identifiable groups of individuals. The particular environmental concerns of a poor woman peasant that are rooted in her material reality, when explained by other ideological streams, tend to have two strands. This can be seen as consistent with the feminist environmentalist network.
The Chipko movement is an example of the same. Although the movement was rooted in the Gandhian tradition, it gradually revealed some of the limitations of the approach that failed to address concerns of gender and class. The movement actually runs beyond the framework of the Gandhian tradition and comes close to feminist environmentalism in its essence.
This statement is made in the light of the small but significant efforts made by those women to confront the gender and class issues throughout the protest. Women, as in the Chipko movement, have in many instances, jointly stood against men and the development project in general, choosing the forest over short-term gains.
Feminist environmentalism locates the perspectives and responses of poor peasants and tribal women in their material reality based on their dependence on and the actual use of natural resources for survival, the knowledge of nature, and the broader cultural parameters that define the modes of thinking in these communities.
The basic intention of this approach, therefore, is to provide new perspectives that are rooted in the ideals of equality and not dominance over nature. Approaches such as ecofeminism and present development processes barely recognise the deep-rooted inequalities and destructiveness and hence are not well enough.
The reason why feminist environmentalism, for me, is that shift or the apt alternative is that it adopts a transformational rather than a welfarist approach marked by the mutual regeneration of development, ecology and redistribution. It has the potential to necessitate interrelated changes in the composition of what is produced, the technologies employed for the production, the processes involved and the knowledge structure on which these decisions are based along with the gender distribution of products and tasks.
Bina Agarwal’s alternative covers both thoughts and actions. It concerns both issues of how gender relations and relations between people and the non-human world are theorised and how they are further laid down in terms of power, knowledge, property and policy formulation.
On the feminist front, this framework not only demands a transformation in ideas about gender but also in the actual division of work, resources and political spaces between genders. From the environmental angle, the approach vouches for a shift in not just the perceptions about nature but also emphasises the need to adopt an intersectional approach while determining people’s interaction with nature.
Conclusion
Critically speaking, the essentialism that underlies ecofeminism defines biology as destiny and re-ascertains the problem that men will always be the destroyers of the environment and women will always be the Earth’s saviours. By characterising men as innately greedy, aggressive or competitive, it negates any scope for a politics designed to change them and put the entire onus on the women of the society, further burdening them with more challenges than what they already have to face thus freeing men off the hook.
Therefore, an in-depth analysis of ecofeminism would mean that in addition to re-affirming the notions of patriarchy, it also fails to incorporate the spectrum of sexual orientation or queer theory into account. Thus, in my personal opinion, I do not adhere to the idea propagated via ecofeminism that equates women to nature, thereby overlooking the infinite complexities and reinforcing multiple stereotypes. What we need right now is a shift to the conducive, inclusive and intersectional thought of feminist environmentalism as advocated by Bina Agarwal.
References
1) Rao, Manisha. (2012). Ecofeminism at the Crossroads in India: A Review. ISSN. Pp 125-138.
2) Agarwal, Bina. (1992). The Gender and Environment Debate: Lessons from India. Feminist Studies. Vol 18. PP 120- 142.
3) Agarwal, Bina (1998) Environmental management, equity and ecofeminism: Debating India’s experience. The Journal of Peasant Studies, 25:4, 55-95. Accessed on 17 Novemeber 2020.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03066159808438684
4) Agarwal, B., 1986a, ‘Women, Poverty and Agricultural Growth in India’, The Journal of Peasant Studies, Vol.13, No.4, pp. 165-220
5) Archambault, Anne. (2000). A Critique of Ecofeminism. Canadian Women’s Studies. Vol 13, Number 3. Pp 20-24. Accessed on November 16.
https://cws.journals.yorku.ca/index.php/cws/article/viewFile/10403/9492