Human Detachment from the Land: Understanding the appropriation, expropriation and exploitation of land in the context of an extension of Marxian concepts of primitive accumulation and alienation from an animist/ecological perspective

In the encounter with ecological crisis, environmental degradation, and the rise of climate anxiety, the ongoing debate on naming the contemporary geological age either Anthropocene or Capitalocene must ultimately address the question of “what lies at the root of this ecocide?” It is undeniable that human beings are at the heart of environmental issues, and the anthropogenic factors intertwined with socioeconomic and political matters are indeed contributing to ecological injustice. Yet, it is of utmost importance to consider where these humans responsible for the ecocide are situated, in which the economic system dictates that they sustain their lives by exploiting every possible constituent of Earth. Karl Marx’s study on primitive accumulation—a historical stage that paved the way for the development of capitalism—encourages an investigation into the necessary conditions that enable power forces to inaugurate appropriation, expropriation, and exploitation. Regardless of whether we are living in the Anthropocene or Capitalocene, the current ecological crisis reflects the result of human exploitation of the Earth. Tracing the conditions that enabled the human exploitation of the Earth for economic means and the factors rooted in capitalism, Marx’s investigation into the development of capitalism is a useful resource to contemplate the origin of the problem.

The primary objective of this paper is to examine the Marxian concept of primitive accumulation through an animist perspective, which is suggested as an ecological lens, and to search for the critical condition of ecological relations between humans and nature that enabled primitive accumulation in the form of exploitation. By adopting an animist approach to ecological interpretation, this study seeks to explore the manner in which the exploitation of Earth was facilitated by the human-person detachment from the land-person as a pivotal condition of primitive accumulation. Given the overview of primitive accumulation from readings in Marx, I think with Silvia Federici’s reevaluation of Marx’s account of primitive accumulation from the feminist perspective in Caliban and the Witch: Women, The Body and Primitive Accumulation. John Bellamy Foster’s Marx’s Ecology: Materialism and Nature is where I examine Marx’s recognition of the human-nature relations, the operation of the alienation that stimulated the detachment, and the establishment of the capitalist mode of production in primitive accumulation alongside the critique of John Locke’s understanding of property rights in Two Treaties of Government. This analysis aims to address the alienation of nature and humanity as a cornerstone of capitalist appropriation, expropriation, and exploitation. From the common theme present in primitive accumulation—human attachment to the land—I engage with various anthropological and religious literature about animism. Specifically, I utilize the works of Eduardo Viveiros de Castro’s The Relative Native: Essays on Indigenous Conceptual Worlds, Philippe Descola’s Beyond Nature and Culture, Graham Harvey’s Animism: Respecting the Living World and Mari Joerstad’s The Hebrew Bible and Environmental Ethics: Humans, Nonhumans, and the Living Landscape in order to gain a comprehensive understanding of the human relations to the land prior to primitive accumulation, when humans lived in an animated world. Subsequently, I present this ecological standpoint as a means to argue that the human detachment from the land served as the foundational cause of primitive accumulation and offer a reflection about the narcissistic obsession with usefulness. In light of Robin Wall Kimmerer’s acknowledgment of the wisdom of Indigenous peoples in building a reciprocal relationship with the land, I criticize the narcissistic obsession with usefulness as a root of primitive accumulation that has caused the transformation of land into a commodity, which was once a gift. In the face of the current ecological crisis, this reflection calls for a revolutionary imagination for the world to rediscover the interconnection between body and land.