TY - GEN A1 - Jing, Junxue T1 - A Study on the Psychoanalytic Criticism of the Current Ecological Crisis – Based on the Perspective of Marx’s Historical Materialism, Doctoral dissertation, Environment Science and Resources Utilization; Marxist Philosophy, Southeast University, Nanjing, Jiangsu, China 2021. N2 - Striking a balance between ecological protection and social development is not only intrinsic for humans to attain sustainable development but also a vital principle for China to boost modernization. In contemporary society, >ecology< has been inextricably linked with our production, lives and survival. On the one hand, people cannot live without the air and water provided by nature, and our society cannot produce anything or make progress without exploiting and utilizing sources from nature. On the other hand, nature demonstrates dissatisfaction to humans in various forms such as abnormal weather, resource shortage, reduction of biodiversity, and frequent disasters, as well as confrontation and rejection of human behaviors. Mankind not only bears the environmental pressure imposed by nature on our daily lives but also suffers from psychological depression and mental anxiety since whether we can survive sustainably is unknown, not to mention the continuous wars and conflicts due to competition for resources, which directly threaten human lives. The ecological environment, for us, becomes an increasingly serious crisis that poses a grim challenge to our survival. What lies in the core is that our survival is facing a crisis. Confronted with such a crisis, we need to reflect on how the relationship between man and nature evolves and how to deal with it, and to conduct a critical study on the roots and current situation of the current ecological crisis. This would help us to correctly understand and deal with the relationship between man and nature, probe into the origins of people’s psychology and living style when the ecological crisis erupts, and resolve people’s anxiety and worries about the crisis. After sorting out how humans’ cognition of nature evolves, the paper unfolds mainly from four aspects. First, based on the psychodynamic analysis of Marx’s historical materialism, the paper plunges into the characteristics of the current ecological crisis, such as its globality and complexity, spontaneity and sociality, hazard and severity; in which it analyzed that the current ecological crisis has both natural roots due to natural changes and social roots due to changes in production, life and survival methods brought about by humans’ industrialization; both humans’ cognitive limitations and the drawbacks of human rationality evolving into instrumental rationality. The crisis is also caused by the value pursuit of the capital’s nature, namely, profit-seeking. Second, the paper conducts a psychoanalytic criticism on the current ecological crisis, aiming at illustrating the necessity of introducing psychoanalysis into ecological crisis to solve the conflict between unlimited desire and limited resources, and to meet the realistic requirements of choosing >possession<, >aesthetic<, >fear< as a survival way while realizing human liberation. The psychoanalytic criticism of the ecological crisis sets the relationship between man and nature on the three levels of humans’ desire and drives: instinctual impulses, social unconsciousness, and ideal situation, through which the complexity of ecological crisis is related to the three levels of character tension of human desire, that is, the internal tension among individual character, market character and social character. In this way, the analysis of ecological crisis has added the critical dimension of the theory of human nature. Whether it is Heidegger, who emphasizes the existential concealment of human nature by objects, or Marcuse, who reveals the entanglement and confrontation between desire and civilization, we can infer that human existence is not only a process of continuously satisfying desires and creating new desires, but also a shift from the satisfaction of things and spirit to the pursuit of a higher state of consciousness, meanwhile rising to the control of desire and repeated anxiety of satisfaction. The complexity lying in the choice of survival mode reflects the >flow< of desire and the breakthrough of unconsciousness to consciousness. Third, it puts the ecological crisis and survival crisis under the comparative perspective of Fromm and Zizek's psychoanalysis. It shows that the current ecological crisis is not only an issue concerning the natural environment but also the direct result of human labor alienation, human alienation and even the alienation of modern capitalist society, which even causes the psychological alienation of modern people. Fromm proposed that we should transform the mode of survival from >possession< to >existence<, using the modest way out of constructing a sound society made of a new generation of humans, whereas Zizek claimed that humans should get rid of the setting of >original nature<, >humans are the wound of nature<, >crisis has already occurred<, mankind is in a state of >survival in fear<, that we must confront the ecological crisis pessimistically, finally realize the ideological suture of the >fracture< between man and nature, and we can take radical >social surplus< revolution if necessary. Although the two methods are different, they both reflect the concern about the actual living conditions of human beings and the concern for sustainable survival in the future, as well as the imminent pressure of the current ecological crisis on how to transfer our survival mode. Fourth, to deal with the current ecological crisis, it uses psychoanalytic methods to critically examine Marx’s historical materialism, summarize its advantages and disadvantages, and then propose a symbiotic construction option for China’s ecological civilization. The use of psychoanalytic methods to criticize the current ecological crisis correct people’s misunderstandings of industrial civilization, readdress the root cause of the industrial society’s exacerbation of ecological crises, examine people’s attitudes and consequences towards nature. Such methods also establish a mentality of treating nature equally and avoid the binary opposition between >anthropocentrism< and >eco-centrism<, and rectify the alienation of the relationship between man and nature and the psychological alienation of people caused by over-exploitation of nature. They lead us to correctly cope with the spiritual depression brought about by the ecological crisis and provide possible choices for ecological civilization to surpass industrial civilization. The shortcomings of this analysis method are apparent. It examines nature with a morbid vision by resorting to the mere improvement of individual characters while abandoned the function of man’s practical action in nature. In what depicts in the method, men wander in the >a mille plateau of desire< and the >the desert of the real<, sliding into the tragic dilemma of passive response or direct fear. We should realize that the current ecological crisis is no longer just a natural environmental issue, but a life-and-death issue of human survival. The ecological crisis will not only deteriorate living conditions and navigate mankind to a path of perdition, but also result in mental illness as people are in a long-term crisis state. Mankind should realize the unity of ecological revolution and social revolution in the coexistence of man and nature, so as to realize the unity of natural liberation and human liberation; and resolve the ecological crisis in the community of life coexisting between material, life and mind, thus meeting the real needs and promoting the spiritual realm simultaneously; in the creative ethical practice of man and nature, human’s possession is essentially achieved, so that humans are part of nature and return to nature. In short, only by unifying the love of human beings and the environment around them, getting rid of the binary opposition between >anthropocentrism< and >eco-centrism<, recognizing that man and nature should have a harmonious and symbiotic relationship, and constructing the community of life of humans and nature, using industrial ecologicalization and ecological industrialization to transform the production mode, can we shift from the survival mode of >possessing< materials to the symbiosis type. We shall apply ecological concepts, ecological values, and ecological culture into our production and lives, and truly embodies the modern meaning of >nature is man’s inorganic body< put forward by Marx. Only by replacing industrial civilization with the concept of ecological civilization can mankind turn crises into opportunities, fulfil the liberation of nature and men, and solve the dilemma of ecological crisis, survival crisis, and spiritual anxiety. That’s how we can realize the sustainable development of mankind. [Translation: www.cnki.net, 11/2022] Y1 - 2021 ER -