Ecological economics, Marxism, and technological progress: Some explorations of the conceptual foundations of theories of ecologically unequal exchange

- “Technological progress” is a cultural category constraining our visions of sustainable development.
- Our industrial world-view does not recognize “technology” as a social strategy for redistributing labor time and natural resources.
- Photovoltaic power will not create an egalitarian and sustainable world.
- Marxism and some ecological economics share the ambition of grounding notions of economic value in physical parameters.
- Notions of economic value and physical processes should be kept analytically distinct, rather than one being defined in terms of the other.

Almost regardless of ideological persuasion, the seemingly self-evident concept of “technological progress” inherited from early industrialism is resorted to as an article of faith serving to dispel the specter of truncated growth. The increasingly acknowledged threats of peak oil and global warming are thus generally countered with visions of a future civilization based on solar power. I discuss this technological scenario as a utopia that raises serious doubts about mainstream understandings of what “technology” really is. Technological utopianism raises difficult but fundamental analytical questions about the relation between thermodynamics and theories of economic value. While Marxism and some ecological economics share the ambition of grounding notions of economic value in physical parameters, notions of economic value and physical processes should be kept analytically distinct.