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socialism would appear. If the new society maximized planning,
then how would this be possible without national state institutions?
(Frankel, 1987, p. 55)
In response to these questions, there is a definite trend in green think-
ing now towards an understanding that environmental problems need
to be dealt with at all the levels at which they occur, and that political
institutions must both correspond to these levels and integrate between
and across them (Paehlke, 2003; Thomashow, 1999). Edward Goldsmith
(above) argued that there are good ecological reasons for decentraliza-
tion; this position recognizes that ecologies are regional, national and
international as well as local, and seeks to match this ecological diver-
sity with political-institutional diversity. So Robyn Eckersley writes that
the ecoanarchist defence of local sovereignty provide[s] no firm insti-
tutional recognition of the many different layers of social and eco-
logical community that cohere beyond the level of the local community
(Eckersley, 1992, p. 182). From this point of view, the state plays a vital
role in controlling the operation of market forces and in laying down
the framework for a socially just and ecologically sustainable society
(ibid., p. 194). This is all part of the state s rehabilitation in green polit-
ical thought that has taken place in recent years. From being clearly
seen as part of the problem (Carter, 1993, 1999) it is now most com-
monly regarded as part of the solution (Barry and Eckersley, 2005;
De Geus, 2002; Eckersley, 2004).
The sustainable society 101
Indeed, the state has moved from being something of a bête noire in
green political thought to playing a more positive role in any putative
green society s institutional design (Eckersley, 1995). Green state theor-
ists are keen to steer a course between outright endorsement of cur-
rently existing states and outright rejection of them. So Eckersley writes
that By green state I do not simply mean a liberal democratic state
that is managed by a green party government with a set of program-
matic environmental goals. . . . Rather, I mean a democratic state whose
regulatory ideals and democratic procedures are informed by ecological
democracy rather than liberal democracy (Eckersley, 2004, p. 2). Com-
ing at it from the point of view of markets, Bob Paehlke reaches a
similar conclusion. He points out the ways in which unfettered markets
can result in ecological disaster and that the state can and should act
as a democratizing force aimed at producing ecological as well as
accumulative rationality (Paehlke, 2003, p. 5). So green endorsement of
the state seems conditional on its ecological democratization, and this
move is best seen as part of a growing tendency towards visionary
pragmatism as far as green institutional design is concerned. As
Eckersley puts it, those concerned about ecological destruction must
contend with existing institutions and, where possible, seek to rebuild
the ship while still at sea (Eckersley, 2004, p. 5). As far as democratiz-
ing the state is concerned, she writes that the regulative ideal or ambit
claim of ecological democracy is that all those potentially affected by
ecological risks ought to have some meaningful opportunity to partici-
pate, or be represented, in the determination of policies or decisions
that may generate risks (Eckersley, 2004, p. 243). There is resonance
here with the move from ethics to politics that we saw in the work
of hybridity theorists such as Plumwood and Latour near the end of
Chapter 2.
States, of course, do no exist in isolation and it is clear that many
of the global environmental problems with which we are faced are
international in nature. Sometimes these are best dealt with through
negotiations between sovereign states, sometimes through international
agencies such as the United Nations, and sometimes through supra-
national bodies with supranational powers such as the European Union.
The (tenuous but relevant) relationship between the green statist view
and Sale s bioregionalism is that they both seek to match political
forms with ecological realities, but the statist view differs in retaining
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