S03E30 - Matt Huber & Kohei Saito on Growth, Progress and Left Imaginaries

Jan 19, 2025

Matt Huber, Professor für Geographie an der Syracuse University und Autor von "Climate Change as Class War", sowie Kohei Saito, Professor an der Universität Tokio und Verfasser von "Marx in the Anthropocene", diskutieren wegweisende Konzepte. Sie beleuchten Degrowth-Kommunismus und die Grenzen traditionellen Wachstums. Dabei fordern sie eine soziale Mobilisierung zur Bekämpfung des Klimawandels und hinterfragen kapitalistische Strukturen. Die Bedeutung einer starken Arbeiterbewegung für ökologischen und sozialen Fortschritt wird ebenfalls hervorgehoben.

Ask episode

Chapters

Books

Transcript

Episode notes

Intro

00:00 • 2min

Degrowth-Kommunismus und Marx' Wurzeln

02:17 • 8min

Wachstum neu denken

10:46 • 10min

Natürliche Grenzen und das Streben nach Gerechtigkeit

20:41 • 28min

Energie, Kapitalismus und soziale Emanzipation

49:10 • 29min

Historische Visionen und Kapitalismus

01:18:03 • 12min

Hoffnung durch eine starke Arbeiterbewegung

01:30:24 • 5min

Creative Construction

Democratic Planning in the 21st Century and Beyond

Jan Groß

Christoph Sorg

Marx and the Anthropocene

Kohei Saito

Climate Change as Class War

Building Socialism on a Warming Planet

Matt Huber

The Price is Wrong

Why Capitalism Won’t Save the Planet

Brett Christophers

Power Density

A Key to Understanding Energy Sources and Uses

Vaclav Smil

In this book, Vaclav Smil argues that power density is a key determinant of the nature and dynamics of energy systems. Power density—the rate of energy flux per unit of area—is an important but largely overlooked measure. Smil provides the first systematic, quantitative appraisal of power density, offering detailed reviews of the power densities of renewable energy flows, fossil fuels, thermal electricity generation, and all common energy uses. He shows that careful quantification, critical appraisals, and revealing comparisons of power densities make possible a deeper understanding of the ways we harness, convert, and use energies. Smil explains that modern civilization has evolved as a direct expression of the high power densities of fossil fuel extraction and argues that the move to new energy arrangements involving conversions of lower-density renewable energy sources will require a profound spatial restructuring of our energy system.

Enriching the Earth

Fritz Haber, Carl Bosch, and the Transformation of World Food Production

Vaclav Smil

In this book, Vaclav Smil discusses nitrogen's unique status in the biosphere, its role in crop production, and traditional means of supplying the nutrient. The core of the book is a detailed narrative of the discovery of ammonia synthesis by Fritz Haber—a discovery scientists had sought for over one hundred years—and its commercialization by Carl Bosch and the chemical company BASF. Smil examines the emergence of the large-scale nitrogen fertilizer industry, analyzes the extent of global dependence on the Haber-Bosch process, and discusses its biospheric consequences. The book also looks at the role of nitrogen in civilization and describes the lives of Fritz Haber and Carl Bosch after the discovery of ammonia synthesis.