1st Edition

Green Liberalism The Free And The Green Society

By Marcel Wissenburg Copyright 1998

    This is an agenda-setting exploration of the relationship between green politics and liberal ideology. Ecological problems provide unique challenges for liberal democracies.; This challenge is examined by the author who aims to fill the gap between short-term ecological modernization and the politically infeasible longer term utopian approaches.

    Chapter 1 Liberal democracy; Introduction; Preferences; Rights ***; Democracy; Equality; Liberty; An overview; Chapter 2 Green political theory; Introduction; Metaphysics – nature and the universe; Ethics – humans in nature; Politics – the shape of a green society; Policies; Compatibility; Chapter 3 The possibility of green liberalism; Introduction; Classical and sensualist liberalism; The greening of liberalism; The green problems of liberalism; AIDS, women and deforestation; Intermezzo; Chapter 4 On value; Intrinsic and external value; In the eyes of the beholder; Substitutability; Inclusion and exclusion; Chapter 5 The distribution of rights; Spheres of rights; The restraint principle; 5.3 The savings principle and the restraint principle; Chapter 6 Population policies; Strategies of sustainability; The idea of a sustainable population; Procreative rights; The attribution of procreative rights; Alternative strategies and parameters; Chapter 7 Distributive solutions; Introduction; Internal justice; ‘International’ justice; Intergenerational justice; Interspecies justice; Dynamics and uncertainty; Chapter 8 Supply-side politics; Tactics; 8.2 Green technology; Biodiversity and policy diversity; The shape of things to come; Chapter 9 Beyond sustainabilityThe limits of sustainabilityRelaxing conditions, strengthening tiesEconomic liberalismDeliberative democracy and the last tabooConcluding remarks;

    Biography

    Marcel Wissenburg