Reconciling Modernity and Environmentalism: A Futile Yet Beautiful Effort

Abstract

The ultimate beauty in the contemporary pursuit of the ecological transition lies not within finding a harmonious balance between social, economic and environmental objectives, but within the collective self-reflection urged by this existential threat. This study, thus, wishes to contribute to the exploration of the relationship between humans and their surroundings by investigating whether modernity and environmentalism are compatible. As it is out of the scope of this paper to discuss all possible combinations of the two given the rich theoretical frameworks that have been established, this study limits itself to the following assumptions. First of all, modernity and environmentalism are only viewed at a collective level (group of people with the same political representative and subscribed to the same political ideology) to put it differently. Secondly, I consider environmentalism as a mode of living that can be continued forever given all other factors being constant. Lastly, this study attributes two different temporalities to the notion of modernity; retrospective and contemporary. With these assumptions in mind, I argue that modernity and environmentalism are not compatible in either of the cases.