Environmental Ethics, 2015
The Alberta tar sands, and the proposed pipelines which would carry their bitumen to international markets, comprise one of the most visible environmental controversies of the early twenty-first century. Jacques Ellul's theory of technology presents ostensibly physical phenomena, such as the tar sands, as social phenomena wherein all values are subsumed under the efficient mastery of nature. The effect of technological rationality is totalizing because technical means establish themselves as the exclusive facts of the matter, which creates a socio-political environment wherein ethical engagement is precluded. Analyzing the tar sands controversy through Ellul's hermeneutic challenges environmental ethics to a more radical stance than the continuation of the technological worldview, and thus offers meaningful and hopeful alternatives to the status quo.
Publication Date: 2015
Publication Name: Environmental Ethics
Randolph Haluza-DeLay
Faculty Member, The King's University
Most of my research is now on environmental social movements. Current research foci are Environmental justice; Social movements and community organizations; Religion/Spirituality and the Environment; Anti-racism and Aboriginal relations. I was a wilderness guide and ski patroller for years. My background includes anti-racism and environmental education. I attend a Mennonite Church (my intro to sociological theory was through liberation theology)and am active in a number of community social justice organizations. I also do some contract research and consulting work with CSoP Research & Consulting.
Nathan Kowalsky
Faculty Member, University of Alberta
Nathan Kowalsky is Associate Professor of Philosophy at St. Joseph's College, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada. He also teaches philosophy courses for the University of Alberta's Department of Philosophy as an affiliated faculty member. Furthermore, he is Adjunct Professor of Religious Studies and, through a secondment agreement, Associate Professor of Science, Technology & Society, both through the Office of Interdisciplinary Studies, University of Alberta.
RELATED PAPERS
Alberta Internalizing Oil Sands Opposition-Alberta Internalizing Oil Sands Opposition: A Test of the Social Movement Society Thesis
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