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Deep Ecology and Sustainable Ecosystems

September 24, 2008

Developing an appreciation for deep ecology and land ethic goes far beyond our traditional focus in environmental management. By placing an emphasis on preserving the inherent value of complex ecosystems, regardless of the human benefits derived, we are able to protect nature with an effort that we’ve thus far reserved only for the betterment of our own species. To do so will require us to view ecosystems as entities unto themselves, with varying degrees of health, and possessing a need to be protected akin to the needs of individual species, ourselves included.

Holmes Rolston describes an ecosystem as “a kind of field with characteristics as vital for life as any property contained within particular organisms” and “not fully explained by an understanding of its components” (394). As conservationists, however, we often focus on particular organisms, with a bias towards ensuring the survival of large vertebrates. This mentality has thus far been self defeating as we pour money and resources into species preservation while simultaneously negatively altering or destroying the very ecosystems necessary for their survival. If we would instead focus on the health of soils, waterways, flora, and fauna collectively, the unnatural decline in any one species could be avoided.

Rolston adeptly illustrates this point when he explains that “a rabbit with a lucky genetic mutation that enables it to run a little faster has no survival advantage to be selected for, unless there are foxes and coyotes reliably present to remove the slower rabbits” (396). This scenario illustrates the fact that ecosystems perform important evolutionary functions that facilitate the very progression of life itself. By neglecting this role, we are dually harming species in the present, but even more gravely, stifling the rise of new species in the future. Rolston further explains that our current relationship with the land is analogous to valuing a goose that lays golden eggs “only instrumentally and not for what it is in itself” (394). To truly make progress, we’re going to have to define a new relationship with the planet that is radically more broad and nuanced.

There is no denying that the health of humanity is intrinsically linked with the broad health of the planet. Global warming, water contamination, and soil degradation have negative implications for human welfare but are simply preventable symptoms of a human-induced malaise. Ecocentric goals are therefore a benefit to traditionally anthropocentric goals and paradoxically anthropocentrism as an outlook cannot be pursued without an emphasis on ecocentric principles. The land ethic is a vital tool in this blending of sociopolitical priorities as we seek to facilitate a “respect for life, rather than exclusively focusing on humans” (393).

To embrace the land ethic will require us to first radically shift our focus from resource management, which emphasizes the potential human-derived value of land, to a viewpoint that attributes essentially equal value to all land. This approach is a natural progression built on the development of human ethics that often focus on the fair treatment and respect of all people. As we expand this philosophy to include a respect for all life, rather than just all people, we are reaching the furthest extremities of our human potential. In this way, the land ethic and deep ecology perspective are something of ethical frontiers that may allow us to finally become “mature human beings” rather than a “cancer on the world system” (405).

Filed under: Perspectives on the Environment