THE flame of green politics burned bright in Europe for a brief period
between the mid-1970s and the late 1980s. People鈥檚 disillusion with
traditional political parties and the search for new spiritual meaning in the
market-oriented West drew disparate strands of opposition, including
anarchists, anti-nuclear campaigners and animal rights advocates, into
unstable alliances of varying political potency. In general terms the basis of
their politics was (and still is, where the flame sputters on) essentially
about ideals of ruralism, decentralisation, globally equitable resource use
and pacifism. Heavily indebted philosophically to the Romantic and
transcendentalist movements, their more immediate ideological underpinnings
were based on books such as Small is Beautiful and The Limits to Growth.
Dependent on grassroots support, committed to local activism and naturally
wary of national leadership, the European green parties nevertheless rallied
to the call of charismatic leaders.
The dust jacket of The Fading of the Greens promises a 鈥渨itty and
controversial analysis of the failure to create a new politics鈥�, but while
delivering on the controversy, this is a decidedly mirthless book. Anna
Bramwell sets herself the task of charting the decline of Green political
parties, but in trying to do so becomes somewhat tangled in a more complex web
of environmental politics. Focusing on the intellectual forces that have
moulded green politics in the US, Britain and Germany, her most coherent
analysis is of the German greens. The discussion of the leftist political
roots of Die Gru篓nen, the inevitable split between the fundamentalists and
the realists, and the impacts on the party of the fall of communism and the
reunification of Germany, make for fascinating reading.
Petra Kelly, leader for so long of Germany鈥檚 Die Gru篓nen, was the most
charismatic leader in the most successful green party. According to Bramwell,
the tragic double death in 1993 of Kelly, and her partner, army general turned
green-pacifist Gert Bastien, provides the 鈥渟addest footnote鈥� at the end of
what she rather contemptuously dubs the era of 鈥渟unflowers and banjos鈥�.
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Bramwell goes on to link the decline of other European green political
parties with their having modelled themselves too closely on the left-leaning
and culturally inimitable German greens, with the political changes in Eastern
Europe, and the appropriation of many green ideas by mainstream parties. She
says correctly that 鈥渢he gap between support for environmental issues and a
vote for Green parties is wide everywhere in Europe鈥�. In the US, however,
where party politics has an entirely different flavour, no green party of any
significance exists at all, and it is with the American analysis that
Bramwell鈥檚 arguments become a little hazy.
More than a tenth of The Fading of the Greens is devoted to a detailed
examination of just three books published between 1970 and 1972: Ivan Illich鈥檚
Deschooling Society, Charles Reich鈥檚 The Greening of America and Ernest
Callenbach鈥檚 fantasy novel, Ectopia. Three texts from twenty years ago, taken
virtually in isolation, are used to make the argument that American political
ecology in a future party manifestation is likely to move towards the radical
utopian left. Bramwell pays far too little attention to true gurus of American
environmentalism, such as John Muir, Aldo Leopold and Henry Thoreau. And in
contrast to the California students of the 1960s, today鈥檚 green activists are
more likely to draw inspiration from the poetry of W S. Merwin, John McPhee鈥檚
chronicles of humans against nature, or the writing of Peter Matheiessen.
Also pretty marginal in real life, but integral to the Bramwell
interpretation of American environmentalism is the concept of deep ecology
which was first espoused by the Norwegian philosopher Arne Naess. In
Bramwell鈥檚 view, 鈥淭he metaphors of earth mother and father rapist that
permeate deep ecologist literature are Oedipal; they show the urge to kill the
father and marry the mother.鈥� It must be this imagery, and her obvious dislike
of the activist group Earth First!, that lead her to state 鈥淭he country where
ecological activism is most violent is America 鈥︹�� She offers no evidence for
this proposition, and a few sentences later asks rhetorically 鈥淲hy should eco-
terrorism have got off the ground in the US, and not in European countries?鈥�
In fact, eco-terrorism never has got off the ground in the US.
The worrying tendency towards inflammatory generalisation is apparent
throughout the book in other jibes and jabs, as, for instance, in the
overstated reference to a Greenpeace 鈥渨ho ram whalers鈥�. The book also makes
much of the 鈥渂ad science鈥� argument and upbraids greens for frequently
overhyping and misinterpreting science. This case is not improved by
Bramwell鈥檚 own lax interpretation of some scientific terms and arguments such
as referring to North American temperate rainforests as 鈥減rimordial鈥� or
claiming that the greenhouse effect 鈥渞emains in the realm of hypothesis鈥�.
These may seem like small quibbles, but they are typical of the irritations
that make this book hard to read with equanimity. The useful and thorough
examination of what makes green parties tick in Britain and Germany is let
down by a rather squint-eyed view of the American situation and a rather
transparent dislike of the emotional rather than pragmatic strands of today鈥檚
green movement.