The Three Ecologies - diagram of three ecologies

Felix Guattari is one of the most important writers over the last 40 years, he was a french activist, institutional physiotherapist, and founder of schizonanalysis and ecosophy (relevant to the three ecologies). He also collaborated with Gilles Deleuze with important texts such as A Thousand Plateaus and Anti-Oedipus

Guattari starts the three ecologies with a concise paragraph describing how the world is in a ecological crisis which could threaten life on the planet. This crisis is best described as the regression of human subjectivity, its cause being globalization and standardization or as Guattari describes “a period of intense techno - scientific transformations”. Human subjectivity is constantly being segregated from it external origins and reestablished in a simplified media controlled scope, devoid of any real feelings or meaning.

In equal measure the environment is also a part of this ecological crisis which is also put aside and handled with a one answer attitude. for these reasons political groups have failed and have supported capitalism over the people and the environment. As this is regular practice Guattari explains that current political groups are unable to understand the problem that faces them let alone tackle it appropriately. The type of political thinker that is required would be as Guattari describes a ethico-politician or which he calls “ecosophy”. The theory of ecosophy gives a understanding that there could be a strand of thought that is capable of considering in equal the three following ecological subjects:

1. The environment (as it is a given and humans rely on it for survival)
2. Social Relations
3. Human Subjectivity

These three subjects are the Guattari’s Three Ecologies. If globalization continues with its current pattern which involves the crushing of subjectivity and the standardization of society it is foreseeable that it will not succeed (what ever its goal maybe). Even if the current course of things did change, Guattari stresses that the two following factors must not prevail in social makeup:

1. Those of the imperium [Latin ; ‘authority’] of a global market that destroys specific value systems and puts on the same plane of equivalence: material assets, cultural assets, wildlife areas, etc.
2. Those that place all social and international relations under the control of police and military machines.

If neither of these is to prevail then it is clear to see that it is near impossible for one political party or hierarchy to understand and act accordingly to the solution, “Therefore this revolution must not be exclusively concerned with visible relations or force on a grand scale”.

This immediately then throws up the question of how can subjectivity be produced, and more importantly how can it come around with out contradicting itself and becoming standardized. Guattari explains that The super egos of the hard sciences have failed to recognize the creative power of subjectivity, “it is no surprise that the human and social sciences have condemned themselves to missing the intrinsically progressive and creative and auto-positioning dimensions of processes of subjectification”. Science is only good at answering certain questions and it is currently beyond human or machine capability to understand or predict the extents which subjectivity beholds.

If such a pan ecosophic society were to exist guattari explains that the power of subjectivity would be harnessed through re-creation, with the mentality of an artist, “Its ways of operating will be more like those of an artist, rather than of professional psychiatrists who are always haunted by an outmoded ideal of scientificity”. This then creates the idea of society having a ecosphic ethos in line with the three ecologies in order to sustain or stabilize mankind.

However is it not conceivable that naive human nature will always imitate or desire to recreate what ever the upper tiers of social hierarchy are experiencing and will the upper tiers not instinctively attempt to crystallize influences of the past. So if any part of a society were to thrive on subjective creative power then it would soon be repeated and thus contradict its self, even if the foundation set out not to. Architecture is a major contributor to this as forms of historical significance gain collective sentimentality and then get protected up held and repeated out of context, this may be something that architecture can never overcome. This cycle of creative subjectivity and false imitation can be explain in the following diagram:

As Subjective power can sometimes be volatile a entire society would soon lead to discourse or controlled, and then would no longer be a subjective society. This is really where the three ecologies come into play, the struggle of freedom and control set on the stage of the environment must be balanced in order to truly live and flourish on this planet. Although Globalization has devastated cultures and exploited the planets resources it has also revealed the emergence of international awareness and understanding, through this scope a global society is fast being born which may or may not lead to the unification of morals and ethics and then ultimately act as a platform for expressive freedom. This new epoch will grow and move away from repetition as it will become even more meaningless that it is now, in this process a new way of living may be formed with out environmental guilt and capital oppression. This will only prevail if the global community has the three ecologies as a locus of intention through out all levels of society.

All quotes taken from The Three Ecologies