Ariel Salleh

Ariel Salleh is an Australian sociologist who writes on social ecology and ecofeminism. In contrast to idealist ecofeminisms coming from philosophy and cultural studies, Salleh's analysis is close to that of fellow sociologists Maria Mies in Germany and Mary Mellor in the United Kingdom. Reproductive labour and use value are central themes here. Her own "embodied materialism" addresses resistance to globalisation through the movement of movements, introducing the term "meta-industrial labour" to integrate indigenous, peasant, women's, and worker politics under the banner of ecology.

Her book Ecofeminism as Politics: nature, Marx and the postmodern outlines the scope of a materialist ecofeminism, proposing a transdisciplinary analysis of the embodied roots of capitalist patriarchal globalisation. Salleh traces the effects of what she sees as the "originary contradiction": economic resourcing of labour (women's bodies in the first instance) "as nature" and the eurocentric ideology of "humanity v nature" used to justify that systemic exploitation.

Salleh exemplifies the marxist argument that hands-on praxis is essential to grounded political theory. She was a convener of the Movement Against Uranium Mining in Sydney, 1976, and helped found The Greens in 1985. She worked on the 1992 Earth Summit with Women's Environment & Development Organization; on local catchment struggles in the mid 90s; and from 2001-04 acted as ecologist/critic on the Australian federal government's Gene Technology Ethics Committee.

As a co-editor of the international journal Capitalism Nature Socialism, Ariel Salleh works at en/gendering dialogue between advocates of ecofeminist and eco-socialist politics. Her writing has addressed this terrain since the early 1980s and she was an original signatory to the 2001 'Eco-socialist Manifesto'. Her critical studies of green thought, environmental ethics, and ecopolitics, run to some 100 articles and chapters. She lectures on ecofeminism internationally.

Selected works

 * (2006)' Edited Symposium: ‘Ecosocialist-Ecofeminist Dialogues’', Capitalism Nature Socialism, 17 (4): 32-124.
 * (2006) ‘We in the North are the Biggest Problem for the South: A Conversation with Hilkka Pietila’, Capitalism Nature Socialism, 17 (1): 44-61.
 * (2006) ‘Social Ecology and the Man Question’ in Piers Stephens, John Barry, and Andrew Dobson (eds.), Contemporary Environmental Politics. London: Routledge.
 * (2005) ‘Deeper than Deep Ecology’ in Baird Callicott and Clare Palmer (eds.), Environmental Philosophy, Vols. 1-5. London: Routledge.
 * (2005) 'Editorial: 'Towards an Embodied Materialism, Capitalism Nature Socialism'', 16 (2): 9-14.
 * (2005) ‘Class, Race, and Gender Discourse in the Ecofeminism/Deep Ecology Debate’ in Linda Kalof and Terre Satterfield (eds.), Environmental Values. London: Earthscan.
 * (2004) ‘Global Alternatives and the Meta-Industrial Class’ in Robert Albritton et al (eds.), New Socialisms: Futures Beyond Globalization. New York: Routledge.
 * (2001) ‘Ecofeminism’ in Victor Taylor and Charles Winquist (eds.), The Postmodern Encyclopaedia. London: Routledge.
 * (2001) 'Interview with Maria Mies: ‘Women, Nature, and the International Division of Labour’', in Veronika Bennoldt-Thomsen et al (eds.), There Is An Alternative. London: Zed Books.
 * (2001) ‘Sustaining Nature or Sustaining Marx? Reply to John Foster and Paul Burkett’, Organization & Environment, 1: 43-450.
 * (1999) 'Dialogue with Meira Hanson: ‘On Production and Reproduction, Identity and Non-identity’', Organization & Environment, 12: 207-218.
 * (1997) Ecofeminism as Politics: nature, Marx and the postmodern. London: Zed Books and New York: St Martins Press.
 * (1996) ‘Politics in/of the Wilderness’, Arena, 23: 26-30.
 * (1994) ‘Nature, Woman, Labor, Capital’ in Martin O'Connor (ed.), Is Capitalism Sustainable? New York: Guilford.
 * (1993) ‘Earth Summit: reflections on our political times’, Ecofeminist Newsletter, 4: 6-8.
 * (1991) ‘Eco-socialism/ecofeminism’, Capitalism Nature Socialism, 2: 129-134.
 * (1991) ‘Essentialism - and ecofeminism’, Arena, 94: 167-173.
 * (1990) ‘The Politics of Representation’, Arena, 91: 163-169.