Ist das Kapitalozän ein Patriarchozän? – Ursprünge der zerstörerischen Gewalt des Anthropozäns

Abstract

Around seventy-five years ago planet earth entered a new geological epoch: the Anthropocene. Although not yet officially certified, the Anthropocene as a concept entered the public discourse with a big bang and is increasingly used in political, societal and cultural discussions. However, critical scholars consider the chosen term Anthropocene as misleading, criticizing the sole focus on the Anthropos (Greek: human being), which attributes responsibility to humankind as a whole. Instead, they argue that it’s just a very specific group of humans that accounts for the ecological problems that we are facing. To concisely illustrate this using the example of carbon emissions: The industrialised countries of the world were and are still responsible for the biggest share of global emissions. In contrast the countries which did not profit from the gained material wealth of the carbon society have a historical and actual carbon footprint which is very low. Moreover, they are arguably not as able to adapt to the ongoing ecologic transformations as are the countries with a high material metabolism. As the Anthropocene is deeply connected to the rise of capitalism as the dominant global economic system, some critical scholars tend to use the term Capitalocene to be able to point at the core of the ecologic crisis. But trying to disentangle the dynamics of the Capitalocene another force can be found behind the developments that led to the extractivist society: patriarchy or the masculinist drive towards dominance over nature, women, and other men. This article discusses the origins of the Capitalocene in patriarchic society and asks if capitalism grew on the fundament of patriarchy or even needed the patriarchy to rise. Are capitalism and patriarchy interdependent – needing one another? The connection between those two destructive systems has long been examined by feminists and has yet to be definitely identified. Nevertheless, what merits further examination is the question of whether patriarchy or masculinity acts as a destructive force for the earth system. In this paper it is argued that the analytical lens of a ‘Patriarcocene’ could help to integrate those questions into the broader Anthropocene discourse in order to detect the toxic mechanisms of modern society which lead to the exploitation of the global ecology. I argue that ecology should be rethought through critical masculinitiy to be able to dismantle this destructive violence against humankind and nature.