The Capitalist World-Ecology: Theory & Method on the ‘Real Ground of History’

Cover: The Three Gorges Dam in the final phases of its construction

In this lecture, environmental historian Jason W. Moore introduces the world-ecology conversation as an knowledge movement aimed at synthesizing intellectual and political struggles for socialism in the 21st century. Drawing on Marx and Engels’ historical materialism without rigid orthodoxy, Moore critiques dominant eco-socialist concepts like metabolic rift and fossil capital, advocating instead for an open dialectic grounded in historical praxis. He emphasizes how historical materialism centers the labor process as socio-ecological, uniting production and reproduction, humans and the “rest of nature.” Moore demolishes bourgeois ideologies of Man and Nature, situating them in the imperialist dynamics of accumulation and class struggles in the web of life. Essential viewing for those interested in Marxism, ecology, climate change, and radical theory. Subscribe for more discussions on the Capitalocene and eco-socialism.

Jason W. Moore lecture, Universidad de Murcia, 12 May, 2025.