In Climate Leviathan, Mann and Wainwright address the political implications of climate change by theorizing four possible planetary futures: Climate Leviathan as capitalist planetary sovereignty, Climate Mao as non-capitalist planetary sovereignty, Climate Behemoth as capitalist non-planetary sovereignty, and Climate X as non-capitalist non-planetary sovereignty. The authors of the present article agree that the depth and scale of destabilizations induced by climate change cannot be navigated justly from within the present social-political-economic system. We disagree, however, on which of the non-capitalist orientations is better suited for generating viable alternatives to the worst dystopian futures. The article thus stages a debate to elucidate the theoretical and political divergence between Climate X and Climate Mao (renamed Climate Jacobin).

This article addresses the place of situationist ideas in the current drive to make meaningful social and political change to avoid the catastrophic consequences of climate change. After a brief review of some key situationist concepts, the article shows how situationist thinkers post-1968 saw the prospect of environmental degradation as one of the key consequences of the social apathy induced by the spectacle and the grim prospects for the prevailing liberal assemblage of power to address the problem. The article concludes by briefly discussing the place of a situationist-inspired environmentalism in the larger debates about radical solutions to climate change.

What if we fail to mitigate and adapt to climate change, and so face its more severe impacts? I argue that asking this question reveals a new obligation of climate justice: contingency planning for severe climate change. Surprisingly, such plans are already being drafted. But the politics behind them is neoliberal and militarist. I identify the epistemology of futurity motivating contingency planning—possibilism—and argue that we can and should dissociate it from, and redeploy it against, neoliberal militarism.

How should we conceptualize direct action against climate change? Although direct action is an increasingly significant tactic by the global climate movement, we lack understanding how direct action contributes to the systemic change necessary for addressing the crisis. Drawing upon critical theories of climate change as a crisis in the social reproduction of the metabolic relations between humans and nature in capitalism, I conceptualize direct action as attempts to intervene directly in the organization of the social metabolism, towards reorganizing these relations in a more socially just and ecologically sustainable manner. My framework thus expands and clarifies the scope and potential of direct action as a means of confronting the capitalist climate crisis, as evidenced by Greta Thunberg’s school strike for climate.

I argue that environmental ignorance is a group-based form of substantive ignorance that is analogous to race-based ignorance, showing that they are structurally and functionally similar and sometimes overlap. While race theorists offer promising solutions toward eliminating race-based ignorance, I argue that something far more is needed in the environmental case. I turn to panpsychism as a possible solution. Though I conclude that it is too radical for most Americans to willingly embrace, I incorporate a notion of “encounter” to argue that an expanded conception of home helps with the conceptual overhaul needed to overcome environmental ignorance.

Many fear that climate change will lead to the collapse of civilization. I argue both that this is unlikely and that the fear is potentially harmful. Using examples from recent disasters I argue that climate change is more likely to intensify the existing social order—a truly terrifying prospect. The fear of civilizational collapse is part of the climate crisis; it makes us fear change and prevents us from imagining different social relations which is necessary if we are to survive the coming disasters and prevent further escalation. Using affect theory, I claim that our visions of the future affect our ability to act in the present. Rather than imagining a terrifying societal breakdown, we can look at how communities have survived recent disasters to get an image of what we need to expand upon to prepare for the future.

What forms of collective political action conceivably might offer the best prospects for radical, transformative change in the context of a planet currently in crisis, and characterized by intersecting struggles for environmental, economic, social, and racial justice? The concept of radical subjectivity that Herbert Marcuse developed throughout his life and work can provide social movement theorists, organizations and activists with valuable theoretical and practical resources to identify, encourage, and further develop new and emerging forms of political agency and activism, and thereby contribute to the mobilization of contemporary social movements seeking to address these crises and their underlying causes. This concept, when critically reevaluated and appropriated in light of more recent insights about the nature of subjectivity and political agency as well as in the context of these contemporary struggles, can assist in the development of a theory and practice that might be adequate to address the multiple global crises currently confronting humanity and other forms of life on Earth.

In his essay “Critique of Violence,” Walter Benjamin argued that only certain types of strikes can be considered revolutionary, while others—i.e., most bread and butter, or “political” strikes—tacitly rely on the violent logics of the state. This paper suggests, however, that by reading Benjamin against himself and applying his discussion of “pure means” to those “political” strikes, the extent to which even these basic collective actions represent effective “strategies of resistance” becomes evident. This framework requires an interdisciplinary approach to radical labor studies, combining political theory with history in order to identify and analyze past instances of joyful community-building during strikes. Relying also on a historical case study—the 1926 miners’ lockout in South Wales—and Benjamin’s own writings on the discipline of history, this paper contends that strikes, and the “alternative communities” they encourage workers and their families to build, present enormous revolutionary potential. When theory and history are studied together, and when we pay close attention to the actual tactics of solidarity that make up strike actions, this potential is uncovered.

The colonial process constituted a twofold catastrophe. On the one hand, the genocide and enslavement of racialized bodies, along with the large-scale destruction of their lands was a material, or physical, catastrophe. On the other hand, colonialism led to a reconfiguring of intersubjectivities which constituted a “metaphysical catastrophe” according Puerto Rican philosopher Nelson Maldonado-Torres. This metaphysical catastrophe relegates the racialized subject beneath the zones of being and non-being leading to dehumanization and permanent war. This text intends to illuminate ways in which analectical marronage, as an existential state of Being, resists this twofold catastrophe brought about by the imperial enterprise.

This essay examines the poem “Angelitos Negros” as a description of social inequity underlain by Latin-American histories of colonialism. Following Nancy Fraser, I analyze the poem as an illustration of the perils of embracing “identity politics” separated from redistributive claims. As Fraser notices, contemporary critique is often content elevating identity struggles to the foreground while simultaneously pushing wealth redistribution to the background. In this light, the paper concludes proposing the Zapatista revolution as an example of a movement whereby claims of identity and redistribution have been successfully combined to produce social change in a manner that responds to the issues that “Angelitos Negros” evinces.

A central challenge common to democratic processes is the inability of citizens to reach agreement on any given matter. Most frequently these disagreements are settled by vote, victory going to the majority. But majority rule is a fairly recent technique. Traditionally decisions were made by some form of non-opposition. This paper describes several versions of that decision-making technique and then shows how mediation methods, also known as “ADR” (Alternative Dispute Resolution), can replicate these traditional ways of overcoming disagreement. The paper argues that these techniques are frequently superior to electoral methods of reaching agreement.