Rethinking Development: Interrogating China’s Ecological Civilization Initiative

In China, the last two decades have seen a pivot toward building an Ecological Civilization, initially in response to pollution problems. Ecological Civilization is the overarching vision that redefines development from ‘growth at any cost’ –mimicking the logic of capital – to ‘harmony between humanity and nature.’ In Ecological Civilization, the practices that link humanity to the rest of nature are reconceptualized as ‘new quality productive forces’ which supplant the ‘black productivity’ of resource extractivism with ‘green productivity’, decoupling development from environmental degradation. The scope of China’s Ecological Civilization initiative is very wide. In addition to its prominence in political doctrine and law, it has been fully integrated into the 14^th and 15^th Five-Year Plans and now is at the core of national strategy and planning. The initiative’s aesthetic aspect frames ‘Beautiful China’ is a key goal, encapsulated in the aspiration for ‘blue skies, clear waters, and lush mountains.’ Ecological Civilization is also a salient aspect of China’s approach to global cooperation and governance. This session invites papers that take up the prospects and challenges in the Ecological Civilization initiative, both within China and in the wider global context. How is China’s initiative situated within a deepening ecological crisis that is spurring other projects such as Green New Deals, Degrowth, Climate Capitalism and eco-fascism? What social forces are aligned with these projects and how might Ecological Civilization articulate with (or against) them in struggles for hegemony?