Everyday Anarchism 163. Capitalism and Nature -- Alyssa Battistoni
Aug 20, 2025
Alyssa Battistoni, a political theorist and professor at Barnard College, dives into her book *Free Gifts: Capitalism and the Politics of Nature*. She critiques capitalism's portrayal of nature as a 'free gift' and questions why it needs to claim such value while ignoring ecological costs. The discussion tackles the tension between individual choices and systemic issues in environmental discourse, and emphasizes the absurdity of commodifying nature. Alyssa also explores the need for a more intrinsic understanding of nature and labor within a post-capitalist framework.
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Unpaid Work Links Households And Nature
- Alyssa Battistoni traced her book to parallels between unwaged reproductive labor and unpaid ecosystem work under capitalism.
- Both are essential for life yet remain economically unvalued, prompting the concept of nature as a “free gift.”
Free Gift Is A Market Paradox
- The phrase “free gift of nature” is paradoxical: nature provides without market exchange yet incurs real ecological and social costs.
- Capitalism treats these gratuitous contributions as peripheral because they lack monetary prices, hiding harms in biophysical terms.
Valuing Nature Often Produces Absurd Numbers
- Efforts to price nature (ecosystem services, natural capital) recur with enthusiasm but repeatedly produce absurd valuations.
- Those price-tag exercises reveal the mismatch between monetary accounting and the integral role ecosystems play.
