Ecological Ethics: An introduction

Ecological Ethics: An introduction

Article Type: Books and resources From: Management of Environmental Quality: An International Journal, Volume 23, Issue 3.

Edited by Patrick CurryWileyBognor Regis, Sussex, LondonJuly 2011280 pp.ISBN 9780745651255£60.00

The book is a second edition from the first book, published in 2006, intended for anyone wishing to understand ecological/environmental ethics. In this revised, updated and expanded new edition, Curry argues that a new and truly ecological ethic is both possible and urgently needed.

With this point in mind, the book introduces and discusses the major concepts needed to understand the full range of ecological ethics: light green or anthropocentric ethics with the examples of stewardship, lifeboat ethics and social ecology; the mid-green or intermediate ethics of animal liberation/rights; and dark or deep green ecocentric ethics. Of the last kind,particular attention is given to the Land Ethic, the Gaia Hypothesis, and Deep Ecology and its offshoots; Deep Green Theory, Left Biocentrism and the Earth Manifesto.

The new edition emphasises the importance of virtue ethics and its close relationship with ecocentrism. Other chapters discuss ecofeminism, green citizenship, green ethics as post-secular, moral pluralism and pragmatism, and human population in the light of ecological ethics. All chapters in this revised edition have been updated and are joined by new discussions, from an ecocentric perspective, of climate change, wind power and energy, capitalism, sustainable economies, green education, traditional ecological knowledge, the treatment of animals as an ecocentric issue, vegetarianism, the food system, Buddhism and animism as integral to a green virtue ethic.