The long republican tradition is characterized by a conception of freedom as non‐domination, which offers an alternative, both to the negative view of freedom as non‐interference and to the positive view of freedom as self‐mastery. The first part of the book traces the rise and decline of the conception, displays its many attractions and makes a case for why it should still be regarded as a central political ideal. The second part of the book looks at the sorts of political (...) and civil institutions that would be required in a society in which freedom as non‐domination is systematically fostered. It outlines the causes and policies, the constitutional and democratic forms, and the regulatory controls that a republican state ought to endorse. And it argues for a vision of the state's relation to civil society in which there is no pretence of doing without widespread civility and trust; the argument is that the state ought, at once, to foster and build on such extra‐political foundations. (shrink)

In the past, it was possible to approach transhumanism as primarily involving philosophical discussion and technological speculation. While transhumanist goals such as radical life extension, uploading, and cognitive, sensory, and physical enhancement were speculative they were also considered scientifically feasible, even if the technologies to achieve those goals appeared remote.

The idea that there might be “limits to growth” is a key and contested feature of environmental politics. This chapter outlines the limits to growth thesis, describes and assesses critical reactions to it, and comments upon its relevance today. It argues that, after an initial highpoint in the early 1970s, the thesis declined in importance during the 1980s and 1990s under criticism from “ecological modernizers” and from environmental justice advocates in the global South who saw it as way of diverting (...) blame for ecological problems from the rich and powerful to the poor and dispossessed. “Peak oil” and climate change have, though, given renewed impetus to the idea, and this has given rise to new discourses and practices around “sustainable prosperity” and “degrowth.”. (shrink)

Henry David Thoreau, though often characterised as individualist or apolitical, is in fact an important link between Jeffersonian agrarian republicanism and environmentalism. Like the Jeffersonians, Thoreau espouses a political economy of citizenship, criticises modern capitalism, and celebrates simplicity and personal independence. However, Thoreau rejects the Jeffersonians' focus on conquest of the wilderness and economic industriousness, both of which were meant to promote virtue. Thoreau advocates preservation of wild nature as essential for cultivating virtue and regards nature as a community deserving (...) respect and protection. He criticises an emphasis on economic industriousness as promoting overwork, environmental destruction and greed. Thoreau emerges as a complex figure whose legacy points in two contrasting directions: toward a more ecologically responsible or sustainable republicanism embracing preservation of a spectrum of landscapes from wilderness to agrarian, and also toward a problematic, depoliticising separation between human beings and nature. (shrink)