Mapping the Red-Green Future: A Theoretical Analysis of the Works of James O’Connor, Joel Kovel, and Salvatore Engel-Di Mauro

As the former Editors-in-Chief of Capitalism, Nature, Socialism (CNS), James O’Connor, Joel Kovel, and Salvatore Engel-Di Mauro advanced a series of major theoretical innovations by integrating concepts from socialist theory, radical political economy, and contemporary ecological science, thus imbuing ecological Marxism with a greater analytical capacity for explicating the environmental crisis of global capitalism. James O’Connor expanded the natural dimensions of historical materialism through the concept of the “conditions of production”, formulating a theory of the second contradiction of capitalism whereby capitalism has a tendency to destroy the social and ecological foundations of its own existence. On the other hand, Joel Kovel developed a revolutionary ecological socialist framework by combining the theory of intrinsic values with his political-economic critiques of capitalism. Finally, Salvatore Engel-Di Mauro has reinterpreted the relevance of dialectical materialism for understanding the interrelationship between society and the environment, proposing a research framework on “eco-social relations” that connects scientific analyses of biophysical processes with critiques of social contradictions. Although these various “theoretical reconstructions” of historical materialism are in need of further refinement, their collective impact is to provide a critically important foundation for advancing interdisciplinary research that integrates Marxism (red) and ecology (green).