Capitalism Nature Socialism
Prospects for Kurdish Ecology Initiatives in Syria
and Turkey: Democratic Confederalism and Social Ecology
Stephen E. Hunt
To cite this article: Stephen E. Hunt (2017): Prospects for Kurdish Ecology Initiatives in Syria and Turkey: Democratic Confederalism and Social Ecology, Capitalism Nature Socialism, DOI:
10.1080/10455752.2017.1413120
To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/10455752.2017.1413120
Library Services, University of the West of England, Bristol, UK
ABSTRACT
This paper surveys the nascent experiments in political ecology underway in
predominantly Kurdish areas of south-eastern Turkey, known as Bakûr, and
Rojava (northern Syria). The Kurdish freedom movement is attempting to
consolidate a social revolution with ecology at its heart in a most
unpromising context, given its ongoing struggle against Islamic State and
regional embargoes. This greening of its ideology can be significantly
attributed to the influence of American social ecologist Murray Bookchin, an
inspiration for Kurdish attempts to implement democratic confederalism,
which comprises principles of direct democracy, gender equality and
ecological well-being in a needs-based economy. The Mesopotamian Ecology
Movement has emerged from activist campaigns opposing dam construction,
climate change and deforestation in the region, to inform ecology councils
tasked with formulating policies that reflect this philosophical paradigm shift.
The essay considers the prospects for the ecological initiatives in Turkish and
Syrian Kurdistan. It argues that, confronted by formidable challenges,
expansion of the democratic confederal model beyond the heartlands of
Bakûr and Rojava, and international solidarity, are preconditions for their
endurance.
ARTICLE HISTORY Received 31 March 2017; Accepted 3 October 2017
KEYWORDS Kurdistan; Rojava; environmental issues; social ecology; Murray Bookchin
The ecological struggle is the touchstone for the liberation of all humanity.
(MEM 2016a)
There are nascent but already extraordinary experiments in political
ecology underway in Kurdistan. Ecological well-being is one of the core principles
of democratic confederalism emerging in the predominantly Kurdish
areas of south-eastern Turkey, known by Kurds as Bakûr, and the autonomous
cantons of Rojava, in northern Syria. This bold expression of political
ecology can be attributed to a significant degree to the influence of American
social ecologist Murray Bookchin upon Abdullah Öcalan, the founder of the
© 2017 The Center for Political Ecology
CONTACT Stephen E. Hunt Stephen.Hunt@uwe.ac.uk
CAPITALISM NATURE SOCIALISM, 2017
https://doi.org/10.1080/10455752.2017.1413120
Downloaded by [77.177.105.74] at 13:03 18 December 2017
proscribed Kurdish Workers’ Party (PKK) and the Kurdish freedom movement.
There are several accounts of the transformation in the political orientation
and strategic approach of the Kurdish revolutionaries since Öcalan,
imprisoned by the Turkish state since 1999, and other PKK theoreticians
shifted away from nationalism and Marxist–Leninism, towards a fresh synthesis
of direct democracy, gender equality, ecological awareness and participatory
economics (Stanchev 2016; critically by Leezenberg 2016, 675–678).
The Revolution in Rojava and parallel attempts to implement progressive
change under emergency conditions in Bakûr have been a significant underreported
media story in recent years. Rojava consists of the predominantly
Kurdish but multi-ethnic cantons of Kobanî, Cizîrê and Afrîn. These are currently
estimated by Salih Muslim, Co-Chair of the dominant Democratic
Union Party (PYD), to have a combined population of “around three
million” people (via intermediary Sheila Mosley e-mail to author, 25 July
2017), allowing for fluctuations due to the ongoing conflict and mass
migration in the cantons. This autonomous area of Syria has been at the forefront
of the struggle against Islamic State (IS) and, since the withdrawal of
Bashar al-Assad’s forces in 2012, the site of one of the most extraordinary
social movements in modern times.
What follows, from a point of view of critical solidarity, aims to document
a little-known ecological dimension to a political development that has largely
been marginalised. While democratic confederalism is based on a threefold
aspiration for direct democracy, gender equality and ecological sustainability,
the latter has received the least critical attention to date. Despite being overlooked,
the Kurdish ecology initiatives are an important aspect of the ongoing
struggle for meaningful change, a testing ground for post-capitalist and ecologically
informed economics, and an underpinning for a political and cultural
alternative to statist and IS forces in the region and beyond. This bid
to reconfigure centralised power politics inevitably presents huge challenges.
Time will tell whether these challenges prove insurmountable or whether the
Kurdish freedom movement overcomes and endures in the face of overwhelming
external force and internal threats such as factionalism or authoritarianism,
along with co-optation within the capitalist system. I endorse,
nevertheless, Clark’s (2016, 109) tribute: “whatever its ultimate fate may
be,” the Rojava Revolution “already constitutes an enormous achievement.”
Engel-Di Mauro (2015, 1) feared that the Revolution, with its “unthinkable
political accomplishments” might already be extinguished before his commentary
on the situation was published in early 2015. In 2017 Rojava
endures, indeed with expanded territory, yet still the internal and geopolitical
threats against the Revolution appear overwhelming.
I will examine the Mesopotamian Ecology Movement (MEM), a coordinating
body which has developed from an environmental activist network that
dates back twenty years, into an organisation tasked with instigating
2 S. E. HUNT
Downloaded by [77.177.105.74] at 13:03 18 December 2017
ecology councils within the framework of democratic confederalism. In this
context, the MEM continues to conduct activist campaigns, while also
raising ecological awareness and seeking to formulate policies to implement
ecologically sensitive solutions in a solidarity economy. Their dominant concerns
include the construction of the Ilisu Dam and similar infrastructure, the
impact of the oil industry and persistent deforestation in the region. Ambitions
to reconstruct Kobanî along ecological lines in the aftermath of devastation
by IS are inspirational. In addition to such tangible examples of
ecological resilience, I note the philosophical aspects of concern for the
living world and non-human life forms in the context of revolution, war
and state repression.
I will assess Kurdish attempts to alter the prevailing political paradigm in
order to protect the natural environment and develop sustainable economies
in precarious circumstances. I argue that the ecological dimension is integral
to the intention of bringing about thoroughgoing social revolution, and that
the inclusion of environmental awareness within the programme of democratic
confederalism constitutes a remarkable endeavour to implement ecological
sustainability. A survey of practical outcomes must consider some of
the formidable challenges to the ecology initiatives. I conclude that both the
expansion of the democratic confederal model beyond Syrian and Turkish
Kurdistan, and large-scale and effective international solidarity, are essential
for the survival of this inspiring and audacious experiment in political
ecology.
This research is informed by first-hand communications with prominent
commentators on the Kurdish solidarity movement, Ercan Ayboğa, Janet
Biehl and Zaher Baher, as well as analysis based on extensive monitoring of
reports and commentary in English-language activist and academic sources
relating to recent ecological developments in Kurdistan.
Ecology and Democratic Confederalism
The opportunity for a dialogue between Murray Bookchin, the originating
theorist of social ecology, and Abdullah Öcalan, the imprisoned founder of
a formerly Marxist–Leninist national liberation party in Kurdistan, could
have made for a rich, mutually illuminating philosophical exchange. Such a
conversation, however, never happened. Bookchin’s biographer and
partner, Biehl (2015, 316–317), records a brief correspondence between
Öcalan’s intermediaries and Bookchin in 2004 (published in Ahmed 2015),
regretting that, near the end of the latter’s life; it was too late for direct dialogue.
Nevertheless, although there was no personal exchange between them
before Bookchin’s death, their minds apparently met in the realm of ideas.
Ecology is integral to the emerging idea of democratic confederalism.
Both Bookchin, in the 1940s, and Öcalan, in the 1990s, became disaffected
CAPITALISM NATURE SOCIALISM 3
Downloaded by [77.177.105.74] at 13:03 18 December 2017
with their respective Marxist–Leninist legacies. Both subsequently drew
upon thinking derived from their Marxist roots as a wellspring for fresh
syntheses of ideas. In two seminal texts, Toward an Ecological Society
(1980) and The Ecology of Freedom (1982), Bookchin emphasised the
importance of hierarchy as a more general form of domination predating
class as the origin of social injustice in human society, and bemoaned productivist
aspects of Marxism. Hierarchy was both a corollary of the human
domination of the natural environment and an ideological formation that
would need to be deconstructed if there was to be progress in establishing
a sustainable relationship with the rest of the living world. Bookchin proposed
that patriarchy and ecological destruction were aspects of the same
problem:
Even before man embarks on his conquest of man—of class by class— patriarchal
morality obliges him to affirm his conquest of woman. The subjugation of
her nature and its absorption into the nexus of patriarchal morality form the
archetypal act of domination that ultimately gives rise to man’s imagery of a
subjugated nature (1982, 121).
Öcalan’s close reading of Bookchin’s philosophy of social ecology was to
inspire the mutually reinforcing aspects of his emerging concept of democratic
confederalism: direct democracy, gender equality and ecology. Biehl
(2012) records that Öcalan particularly recommended to his followers The
Ecology of Freedom, a book since then read by several thousand activists
within the movement (Ayboğa in Skype interview with the author, 18
August 2017). Öcalan digested a wide range of other philosophical texts in
prison, while fellow Kurdish thinkers, still directly engaged in struggle,
made additional significant contributions to the future direction of their
cause. Nevertheless, Bookchin’s ideas were uniquely germane to the particular
character of the radical transformation and repositioning of the Kurdish
freedom movement as expressed in the “Declaration of Democratic Confederalism
in Kurdistan”:
The principle of democratic confederalism promotes an ecological model of
society.…It seeks the establishment of democracy in all spheres of life of
Kurdish society which is based on ecology and equality of the sexes and
struggles against all forms of reaction and backwardness. (Öcalan 2005)
Bookchin coined the term “libertarian municipalism,” which he expounded in
such works as From Urbanization to Cities (1995). Here, he analysed various
models of direct democracy which he adapted for the purposes of his own day.
Bookchin identified the face-to-face democratic assemblies that flourished in
classical Athens as a foundational model for an authentic participatory polis,
one that resurfaced most conspicuously at rare but scintillating historical
moments, for example, the Paris Commune of 1871, as well as in the early
stages of the Russian Revolution and the Spanish Revolution. He advocated
4 S. E. HUNT
Downloaded by [77.177.105.74] at 13:03 18 December 2017
direct democracy, with recallable delegates and built-in checks upon concentrations
of unaccountable power, as a means to realise an anti-hierarchical
politics ultimately able to negate the nation-state and potentially to establish
the kind of egalitarian human relations that, he hoped, could challenge structural
domination and oppression.
Bookchin saluted this radical tradition as the aspiration for a “Commune of
communes” (1995, 268). He also considered the term “Unity of diversity”
(1982, 5) to encapsulate the fundamental concept of the ecosystem, with
immediate implications for social ecology. Its application to the political
realm was to support dynamic pluralism, a desirable alternative respectful
of ethnic differences and promoting inclusion as an integral aspect of social
ecology. The Zapatistas took up the theme when they proclaimed “We
want a world in which there are many worlds,” as they practiced their own
form of direct democracy, setting up 32 “autonomous municipalities,” in
Chiapas, Mexico (Chiapaslink 2000, 9, 19). The English-language translation
of The Political Thought of Abdullah Öcalan also uses the term “unity in diversity”
(2017, 42) to describe the key governance objective of councils run on
principles of democratic confederalism. In Kurdistan an inclusive, federal
approach is not only ethically and theoretically sound but also constitutes a
pragmatic means to challenge the prevailing power politics of divide and
rule, transcending some of the sectarian hostilities evident in the Middle
East’s theatres of war.
The imprint of social ecology is evident, though less forcefully present than
in the 2005 “Declaration of Democratic Confederalism,” in the 2014 “Charter
of the Social Contract in Rojava.” There is a firm commitment to “ecological
balance,” pluralism and a multi-ethnic approach from the outset. Explicit
mention of “democratic confederalism,” however, is absent. The “Charter”
outlines a provisional mini-state, in part an expediency demanded by the
requirement to create a form of representation acceptable to international political
bodies and NGOs. Paradoxically, articles confirming the institution of
private property (Art. 41) sit alongside those designating natural resources
as public wealth and setting out commitments to democratic land management,
participatory economy, sustainability and environmental protection
(Art. 39, 40, 42 and 90). It remains to be seen whether the “Charter” constitutes
a version of conventional social democracy and a rapprochement with
capitalist society, or whether it is conceived as a structure for a transitionary
phase of dual power, with the energised popular assemblies retaining the
impetus to transform the conditions of daily life and promote ecological
well-being.
I shall now turn to the MEM, since its declarations express the most
direct exposition of social ecology within the framework of democratic
confederalism, as practiced by the ecological councils set up under its
auspices.
CAPITALISM NATURE SOCIALISM 5
Downloaded by [77.177.105.74] at 13:03 18 December 2017
The Mesopotamian Ecology Movement
The MEM’s origins lie in the impetus to complement direct campaigns
against environmental destruction with strategic bodies that would
promote policies within democratic confederalism for a more sustainable,
ecologically aware society. This represents an ambitious task for a
network with a lower level of participation than other initiatives of the
Kurdish freedom movement. In this regard, the MEM currently lacks the
capacity to act as effective check on the vast scale of environmental destruction
that is occurring throughout Kurdistan. Nevertheless, the emergence of
the MEM is an impressive and encouraging development, which has a vital
role to play in raising awareness of the struggle’s ecological dimension. If
the points in its declarations and policy documents are actualised and followed,
the MEM has the potential to significantly inform and improve sustainability
in the region.
The MEM has developed from a loose network of environmental activists
to a point where, in keeping with Bookchin’s model of participatory democracy,
its ecological bodies have become integrated into the broader structure of
popular assemblies. It first emerged from the Ecology Forum and the Mesopotamian
Social Forum, both held in Diyarbakir/Amed in 2011 (TATORT
Kurdistan 2013, 147). The MEM’s initial function was to coordinate singleissue
campaigns, for example against dam construction or fossil fuels, thus
enabling protesters to share ideas and network more effectively.
I interviewed founding and prominent MEM activist Ercan Ayboğa (18
August 2017) to assess the strength and structure of the MEM and the
ecology councils. Since early 2015 MEM delegates have been instrumental
in creating an impressive 12 ecological councils out of the 18 provinces
with predominantly Kurdish populations in Bakûr, participating in decisionmaking
and policy formulation. Council meetings, with male and female
co-chairs, are open assemblies at which all attendees have a single vote.
They are constituted to reflect the processes, gender-equal composition and
power structures of the wider project to implement democratic confederalism.
At their height in 2015, Ayboğa estimates that several hundred people were
involved in the MEM, that around 200 of them were participating in Amed
and that “400, maybe 500 were connected” to the ecology councils which
met at least every six months. Members of wider civil society, including the
women’s and youth movements, unions, municipalities, neighbourhood
councils and NGOs, would also participate in the ecology councils.
Ayboğa reports (Skype interview with the author, 18 August 2017) that the
MEM has achieved some significant positive outcomes. Opposition within the
municipalities, for example, thwarted an investment project deemed to threaten
the ancient Hevsel Gardens at Sur. The Gardens were subsequently designated
with UNESCO World Heritage status. The replacement of a potentially
6 S. E. HUNT
Downloaded by [77.177.105.74] at 13:03 18 December 2017
destructive proposal for development at Lake Wan/Van with a more ecologically
benign project represented a further notable success.
All major municipal projects must now undergo an ecological and social
impact assessment. Currently, there are also attempts to create additional
administrative bodies to promote ecological approaches at the district level.
MEM delegates participate in the ecology commissions, working parties
which produce policy documents focusing on issues such as agriculture,
eco-cities and the communal economy. The state of emergency has,
however, curtailed the ecology councils’ progress, especially since the
attempted coup in Turkey (July 2016). Many MEM members, particularly
those employed in education and the municipalities, have been fired, with
some key activists even imprisoned. Nevertheless, new projects have
emerged since 2016, including coordinated opposition to hydraulic fracturing
(“fracking”).
The MEM has made further progress through its integration into the overarching
structure of the Democratic Society Congress (DTK), the Kurdish
freedom movement’s main coordinating body (Ayboğa 2015). The MEM
also held its first major conference in Wan/Van in April 2016, with 170
Kurdish and international participants (“Final Declaration,” see 2016a). It
has, therefore, consolidated its role in promoting ecological ideas within the
wider project of advancing democratic confederalism in the region. No councils
dedicated exclusively to ecological matters have been established in Rojava
to date, although 2015 saw the foundation of the first Ecology Academy in
Cizîrê (Knapp, Flach, and Ayboĝa 2016, 220).
The MEM has adopted several strategies to promote its vision of social
ecology. It has cultivated links with the wider regional and international
environmental movement. Other groups, ranging from mainstream conservation
organisations such as Doĝa Derneĝi to radical groups like the Istanbulbased
Patika ecological collective (Corporate Watch 2015), have joined the
struggle to resist dam building and campaigned against environmental
destruction. The MEM also cooperates with ecology campaigners within the
borders of Iran and Iraq, including in areas controlled by the Kurdish
Regional Government in Northern Iraq (Ayboğa via Skype, 18 August
2017). With the development of structures for addressing ecological
matters, MEM activists endeavour to adjust from the mindset of social movements,
geared primarily towards protest campaigns, to that of participatory
ecology councils of a kind that have few precursors. To this end—to ensure
that the organisation does not consist of ecological activists talking to themselves—
it is envisaged that stronger links will be made with professional
engineers and architects to have their expertise inform decision-making processes
(TATORT Kurdistan 2013, 152). The MEM also recognises that, for
broader and longer-term progress to be achieved, it is essential that practical
and theoretical ecology be present in educational curricula so that ecological
CAPITALISM NATURE SOCIALISM 7
Downloaded by [77.177.105.74] at 13:03 18 December 2017
awareness and philosophy are integrated within Kurdistan’s schools and academies
of learning. In this respect, the schools set up by the MST (the Brazilian
landless workers’ movement), with their support for agroecology, have
been an inspiration (MEM 2016c). Above all, according to unnamed MEM
activists interviewed by TATORT Kurdistan (2013, 150) in Amed, the
MEM aims at “the transformation of people’s consciousness.”
The MEM’s shortcomings should be recognised. Ayboğa (2015), a prominent
spokesperson and critical advocate, is realistic about some of the difficulties
and dilemmas the movement faces. He acknowledges that the MEM has a
lower level of participation and representation than initiatives concerned with
women, youth and language. Furthermore, while integration into the DTK
represents a significant advance, ecological issues are infrequently discussed
at this level. In this context, there is a risk that the ecological agenda
remains a third priority within democratic confederalism, receiving less
emphasis than participatory democracy and gender equality, with progress
consequently deferred during the ongoing emergency situation. Additionally,
the ecological councils share logistical challenges common to other councils. If
the assemblies are held only in provincial centres, they may unintentionally
exclude participants living in outlying rural settlements. Above all, perhaps,
the task of more sufficiently theorising what might constitute an ecological
society in the specific context of Kurdistan is formidable. As Öcalan writes
in Democratic Nation:
I defined eco-industrial communities as communities in which the eco-industrial
society, the agricultural society of villages, and the industrial society of the
cities nurture each other and are strictly aligned with ecology. (2016, 64)
It is challenging for sympathetic municipal councils to translate this overarching
definition into the policies and practical measures required to create a solidarity
economy compatible with ecological well-being. In practice, Ayboğa
(2015) suggests, the HDP (People’s Democratic Party) have on occasion supported
the Turkish government’s “destructive-exploitative investment projects”
because they were “simply uncritically assuming that investments
would create jobs.” Consequently, it is seen as imperative that the ecological
councils formulate alternatives to the wage system and economic growth
based on increased resource consumption if they are to successfully transcend
such shortcomings.
Notwithstanding the foregoing concerns, the Kurdish freedom movement
has some advantages in its approach to ecological matters. Although awareness
of ecological campaigns may be low, this should be weighed against
the lived experience of rural Kurds in this predominantly agricultural
region. Despite Ba’athist policies of deliberate under-development and exploitation
of Kurdish areas through the gradual imposition of monocultural production
from the late 1960s and 1970s, some traditional animal husbandry
8 S. E. HUNT
Downloaded by [77.177.105.74] at 13:03 18 December 2017
and crop diversity in mountainous areas survived, while older workers retain
traditional horticultural knowledge (Zana 2017). Kurds have for the most part
lived low-impact lifestyles of necessity, with minimal consumer culture. In
recognising some of the environmental problems inherent in capitalist industrialism
at a relatively early stage, possibilities are opened for alternative
models of development as the movement experiments with a needs-based,
low-impact solidarity economy (TATORT Kurdistan 2013, 147–148).
The MEM Declaration of 2016, with its accompanying resolutions, sets
out a radical ecology agenda for the 21st century that reflects and
demands continuing resourcefulness and resilience. This agenda is asserted
in the face of extraordinary obstacles in the form of rapid industrialisation
and ongoing conflict. There is a sense of confidence, direction and purpose
in the proclamation that is often lacking in current American and western
European movements for political ecology, demoralised by elements of antienvironmental
backlash in “populist” ultraconservatism and divided by
statist/non-statist, radical/eco-pragmatist approaches. Part of the MEM’s
struggle will be to represent and articulate the ecological dimension so
that it is meaningful, comprehensible and achievable within Kurdistan.
Since there are no comparable historical or existing counterparts for the
kind of regional ecological councils recently created in the region, Ahmed
(2015) finds there is a lack of similar experience to draw upon. This exacerbates
the current difficulties. Finally, the state of emergency has impacted
on the prospects of ecology initiatives. Zaher Baher (e-mail to author, 18
January 2017) found that when he visited Bakûr in May 2015 “people
were seriously talking about ecology, especially in Wan and Jolamerg,”
and that Wan/Van would be a pilot for driving forward ecological structures
and policies. Unfortunately, he now reports that the resumption of
hostilities between the PKK and the Turkish state (in July 2015) means
that progress in furthering the ecological initiatives has since been
impeded. Ayboĝa (via Skype, 18 August 2017) corroborates this, reporting
that “now the organisational structure [of the ecology councils] is quite
weak” due to the intensified repression. Nevertheless, if the tenacious
MEM is successful in advancing its objectives, there will be wider implications,
beyond Kurdistan, for the international ecology movement.
Ecological Destruction and Resilience
Climate change, biodiversity loss and other forms of environmental degradation
are significant considerations throughout Kurdistan, impacting upon
the outlook for Rojava in particular. Factors such as water security, dependence
upon oil and uncertain agricultural production constitute major logistical
challenges to the prospects of the cantons and must be urgently
addressed if the alternative political experiment is to be viable.
CAPITALISM NATURE SOCIALISM 9
Downloaded by [77.177.105.74] at 13:03 18 December 2017
The most bitterly contested environmental controversy in Turkey’s
majority Kurdish areas is the colossal dam development scheme in Bakûr.
Major infrastructure projects, such as the high-profile Ilisu Dam, are not
only having a detrimental impact upon the natural environment, but are purposively
reconfiguring the homeland of local people. Consequently, large
hydroelectric schemes are embroiled in the conflicts concerning cultural identity
that have become an inextricable part of debates about energy and water
policy. Substantial loss of biodiversity has also been a consequence of this
activity. Rare and endangered species have suffered from ongoing habitat
destruction and disruption of ecosystems, due not only to the impact of
dam construction but to the accompanying infrastructure of roads, powerlines
and military installations (Şekercioğlu et al. 2011, 2758; Hommes,
Boelens, and Maat 2016, 15). Concerns that benefits from improved agricultural
irrigation within Turkey’s borders may be coming at the expense of
diminished water supplies downstream in Syria and Iraq are further exacerbating
wider riparian tensions.
Such schemes are also eroding the region’s archaeological heritage, including,
most notoriously, the ancient town of Hasankeyf, which is scheduled to
be submerged. Prominent among campaigns against the Ilisu Dam is the
Initiative to Keep Hasankeyf Alive. Renowned Hasankeyf is cherished for
its ancient cave houses and for having been settled for at least 12,000 years
(Yalcin and Tigrek 2016, 247). At the time of writing the town is threatened
with inundation to make way for the dam. Such deliberate destruction is a significant
loss since Hasankeyf constitutes a unique part of Kurdish, Arab and
Armenian, and indeed global cultural heritage.
Both sympathetic observers and more critical commentators believe water
security challenges threaten Rojava’s social and economic well-being (Balanche
2016; Knapp, Flach, and Ayboĝa 2016, 214–217). Knapp, Flach, and
Ayboĝa (2016, 216) identify several reasons why water is in short supply in
Rojava. For one, climate change is thought to have limited the amount of precipitation
in the region (see also Slow Food International 2016a). Over time,
aquifers are becoming depleted due to demand for domestic and agricultural
production. There are additional fears that contamination from inadequate
sewage and waste management threatens groundwater (Knapp, Flach, and
Ayboĝa 2016, 218). Turkish hydro-electric and irrigation projects affecting
the headwaters of the Euphrates and Tigris also determine the quantity and
quality of water supply in downstream areas, including in Rojava (Janet
Biehl in e-mail to author, 3 February 2017). Finally, the conflict has disrupted
water supplies, with damage to infrastructure a consequence, for example, of
battles between Kurdish militias and IS forces in war-torn Kobanî, and
Turkish security forces’ allegedly deliberate destruction of a water treatment
site in the predominately Kurdish border city of Nisêbîn/Nusaybin (Knapp,
Flach, and Ayboĝa 2016, 214).
10 S. E. HUNT
Downloaded by [77.177.105.74] at 13:03 18 December 2017
The complexities of fossil fuel usage also challenge Rojavans. Currently, the
cantons rely heavily upon poorly refined diesel for transport, electricity generation
and fighting IS. This, in turn, leads to a substantial problem of air pollution,
with further implications for public health and environmental damage.
Janet Biehl (e-mail to author, 3 February 2017) also observes that lack of
public transport causes increasing reliance upon private cars. In a war
economy, oil revenue is urgently needed. This presents several difficulties,
however. Rojava has plentiful supplies of crude oil within its boundaries,
centred in Cizîrê canton, but it has limited capacity to refine the commodity
(Lebsky 2017). Janet (2014) attributes the lack of refineries to Ba’ath Regime
policy, noting that the Rojavans have “improvised two new oil refineries.”
Embargoes are an obstacle to export and to realising full value for producers.
Leading political spokesperson for Cizîrê, Akram Hesso, also states that currently,
the policy of Rojava is to refuse to export oil until the revenue can be
democratically controlled by all of the Syrian people (cited in Lebsky 2017).
Even if substantial amounts were to be sold in future, this could potentially
undermine the cantons’ egalitarian foundations, while intensive exploitation
of oil would also conflict with commitments to ecological sustainability and
combatting climate change.
Oil production creates different but equally serious considerations in
several cities where it is the dominant industry in Bakûr. Interviewed by
TATORT Kurdistan (2013, 156–157), ecology activists claimed that
“Turkey is the state that, since the 1992 Rio Summit, has had the highest
increase in greenhouse gas emissions.” Kurdish populations believe that
they gain little benefit from the massive industrial production and consumption
that blights their environment. As interviewees from the Ecology Assembly
in Êlih/Batman (the regional centre for the oil industry) explain, the
refining process takes place in western Turkey, thus depriving their municipality
of substantial tax revenues (interviewed in Egret and Anderson 2016,
178). The Kurdish ecology movement has also extended its activity to campaigns
against fracking, which threatens to damage the land and atmosphere
further by initiating a new era of fossil-fuel extraction (Ayboğa 2015; interview
with activists from Êlih/Batman Ecology Assembly; Egret and Anderson
2016, 178).
There are longstanding allegations that the Turkish military deliberately
start forest fires as a strategy to eradicate what it regards as refuges for
PKK guerrilla forces. Members of the Cilo-Der Nature Association claim
that “forty percent of the forested lands in Şemzinan and Şirnex have been
denuded by arson” (TATORT Kurdistan 2013, 161). Consequently, in July
2016 the MEM (2016b) called for an international delegation to document
deforestation.
While the Kurdish ecological activists face daunting obstacles, populations
in the affected areas are resilient and there are many practical initiatives to
CAPITALISM NATURE SOCIALISM 11
Downloaded by [77.177.105.74] at 13:03 18 December 2017
bring about the ecological society they desire. The successful battle to liberate
Kobanî from IS has not merely motivated the returning population to start the
reconstruction process but also to symbolically reimagine the city as a citadel
of freedom, art and sustainability. The destruction of physical infrastructure
has opened a space to implement a uniquely progressive détournement of
the neoliberal notion of “shock doctrine” from the fallow ground of devastation.
Despite the residents’ fortitude, however, this appears a Sisyphean
task, since embargos prevent the import of even the most basic humanitarian
aid into Rojava (Anderson and Egret 2016). The liberated Kobanî, forged in
military struggle, now faces a mighty logistical battle. Nevertheless, the
Kurdish freedom movement aspires to build the city anew using environmentally
friendly methods, with Heval Dostar of the Kobanî Reconstruction Board
appealing for “architects that can help design the city to make it more ecological”
(Anderson and Egret 2016, par. 23). Again, according to Batman Ecology
Assembly delegates (interviewed in Egret and Anderson 2016, 178), the MEM
too is trying to support such aspirations to ensure that Kobanî is rebuilt in “an
ecological way,” prioritising an “ecological hospital” but also planning for
“ecological houses and power and water supplies.”
Across the border in Kurdish regions of Turkey, Rafael Taylor reports the
creation of several “peace villages,” including one in Wan/Van where an “‘ecological
women’s village’ is being built to shelter victims of domestic violence,
supplying itself ‘with all or almost all the necessary energy’” (Taylor 2014). In
2017, these are now being joined by “JINWAR,” the “village of free women” in
Cizîrê canton, Rojava. Such initiatives reflect an impassioned determination
to turn the aftermath of trauma and ruination to good account, venturing
to forge a new and positive cultural superstructure in the process of replacing
lost infrastructure.
The nature of the exercise of power and control in the reconstruction
process is a central consideration. Activists are wary of aid from Western governments
and corporations, since such support will inevitably be tied to
investment projects which will impose neoliberal forms of development.
The MEM seeks to harness “clean energy technology” to avoid negative
effects of industry on the ecosystem. They are insistent, however, that even
renewable energies such as wind and solar need to be controlled by the communities
they supply, not by corporations (TATORT Kurdistan 2013, 148–
149). This is in keeping with a call that Bookchin made as far back as 1965
for a distinctive “liberatory technology” facilitating profound social change.
Bookchin was building upon ideas put forward by Lewis Mumford in Technics
and Civilization (1934) and on the work of the radical German decentralist,
E.A. Gutkind, who coined the term “social ecology.” Bookchin’s ideal technology
would diminish the drudgery and toil of hard labour yet also reduce alienation
by making possible a more harmonious relationship with the natural
world. “Liberatory technology” would be human-scale and in control of the
12 S. E. HUNT
Downloaded by [77.177.105.74] at 13:03 18 December 2017
local communities it served while forging closer links between peoples because
it would “function as the sinews of confederation” (Bookchin 1974, 135).
Whatever forms the technology might take—Bookchin considered developments
in cybernetics and solar energy—democratic control and ecological
balance were key criteria to evaluate when considering whether a particular
technological development might be “liberatory”:
We would be free to ask how the machine, the factory and the mine could be
used to foster human solidarity and create a balanced relationship with nature
and a truly organic ecocommunity. (1974, 105–106)
There are several initiatives contributing towards food security in Rojava.
While Lebsky (2017) does not provide data to support his estimate that agriculture
accounts for 70 percent of Rojava’s economy, its food production
nonetheless is significant. The present situation challenging the cantons
bears comparison to the Cuban experience at the end of the Cold War,
when, during the early 1990s, imports from the Soviet Bloc ended while the
US economic blockade continued (prompting a community-gardening
response celebrated in Faith Morgan’s 2006 film The Power of Community).
It is in the area of agricultural policy in particular that aspirations for a solidarity
economy, integral to the political project of the MEM and wider
Kurdish freedom movement, are most evident. Under coordination by Movement
for a Democratic Society’s (TEV-DEM), there has been momentum to
secure the cooperative control of agricultural commons with democratic
economic planning and decision-making processes that demand a central
role for women. Collectivised “land and production units” (Stanchev 2016)
have already taken over much agricultural production, and a boom in community
gardening has been a necessary and heartening response to the lack
of chemical fertilisers. Agricultural cooperatives are expanding the production
of organic fertilisers, aiming to widen crop diversity and boost self-sufficiency.
To these ends the MEM’s unpublished document “Policies on Ecological
Economy”1 sets out principles that prioritise the needs of the community at
large above individual profit by establishing an economy that meets “basic
societal needs.” This is in keeping with the Rojavan “Charter” (2014) that
aims to meet “humanitarian needs and ensure a decent standard of living
for all citizens” (art. 42). The MEM’s “Policies” advocates the replacement
of private monopolies and encourages respect for the commons through community-
owned property and control of the means of production, supported
by an expansion of non-market modes of exchange such as gifting and
sharing (see also Öcalan 2017, 85). The MEM’s Agriculture Policy (2016c)
sets out a positive determination to embrace a vision that is avowedly “ecological,”
expressing a motivation to achieve a “dialectical connection” with
1Unpublished policy document shared with the author by Ercan Ayboĝa.
CAPITALISM NATURE SOCIALISM 13
Downloaded by [77.177.105.74] at 13:03 18 December 2017
the natural environment, beyond conventional anthropocentrism. It also
rejects the drive to impose genetically modified organisms as an attempt to
gain hegemonic control of the food-supply chain. Following their visit to
Rojava in 2014, Knapp, Flach, and Ayboĝa (2016, 217) suggest that the
water crisis could be ameliorated by growing crops that require less water
to flourish and raising awareness of water usage among the population as a
whole. A report about a project, supported by Slow Food, to involve local
schools in re-cultivating land around Kobanî, indicates that both strategies
are already being implemented, since low-irrigation crops are being grown
as a part of children’s ecological education (Slow Food International 2016b).
Rojava has also seen a widespread desire to create recreational and therapeutic
green spaces (Baher 2014, 12; Knapp, Flach, and Ayboĝa 2016, 213).
Freedom parks and memorial parks have started to spring up and flourish
as a response to the trauma of war. These are in keeping with the tradition
of those gardens planted as conscious sites of memory and liberation celebrated
in Kenneth Helphand’s Defiant Gardens (2006) and George McKay’s
Radical Gardening (2011). Parks and gardens are intended not only to
green the urban environment, produce food and instill agricultural skills in
children, but to have a significant cultural role as sites of remembrance and
resurgence. To make reclaimed terrain productive and colourful is both a
practical necessity and a powerful act of defiance against IS. The great symbolic,
aesthetic and physical value placed upon parks became clear in
Turkey in 2013, when a struggle to save Istanbul’s Gezi Park became the
site of the most prominent confrontation between Erdoğan’s government
and civil society. Environmentalists were first to confront Turkish state
forces during the protests when, Akça et al. reported (2014, 49–50), “activists
from the ecology and urban movements bravely stood in front of the bulldozers,
remaining in the park for days in spite of attacks and other harassment
by the police.”
The projects underway in Kurdistan, therefore, comprise the building
blocks and green shoots of a daring political experiment that, not content
with reconstruction, food security and conservation measures, seeks a new
paradigm in its social organisation and relationship with the living world.
As Federico Venturini (2015, [2]) observes, if a coherent and robust alternative
grounded in social ecology is to be achieved, Bookchin’s “reconstructive
vision” needs to be critically evaluated and expanded beyond its Eurocentric
roots, so that it can make a philosophical contribution in non-Western contexts.
There is also an immediate need for political and practical aid from sympathisers
beyond the region. Successful agroecology, for example, would
benefit from supplies of good quality seed and the development of seed
banks, requiring not only the provision of varieties able to propagate well
and produce good yields but also botanical expertise (Sabio 2015, 91; Slow
Food International 2016a). In the aftermath of the Hurricane Katrina disaster
14 S. E. HUNT
Downloaded by [77.177.105.74] at 13:03 18 December 2017
the grassroots organisation Common Ground Collective insisted that the
occasion demanded “Solidarity not Charity,” a principle of reciprocity that,
one would hope, would illuminate relations between Kurdistan and its international
sympathisers.
Conclusion
My hope is that the Kurdish people will one day be able to establish a free,
rational society that will allow their brilliance once again to flourish. (letter
from Bookchin, 9 May 2004; in Ahmed 2015)
While the ecological dimension of democratic confederalism has hitherto
received the least critical attention, it is inextricably connected to the accompanying
principles of direct democracy and gender equality. It is, as Zaher
Baher suggests, “the foundation for everything else” (e-mail to author, 29
January 2017). The positioning of ecology within the context of democratic
confederalism proposes an exceptional response to ecological challenges.
Also unparalleled is the extent to which Kurdish activists are striving to ecologise
the polis in the Middle East. If the ecology forums emerging in Kurdish
strongholds in Bakûr and Rojava endure, with their distinctive structure and
ethos, they have the potential to be significant exemplars for the region and
beyond. It is important to keep a watch on such practical expressions of the
social-ecological approach and to monitor their shifting prospects in light
of the immense challenges and setbacks that doubtless lie ahead.
The MEM seeks to address the insight from Bookchin that the destruction
of the natural environment is a consequence of deep-seated conflicts within
human relations. It understands that capitalism exacerbates this destruction
and that this is further intensified under neoliberalism, but it also holds
that the domination of the natural world indicates an even more profound
problem of social hierarchy. In keeping with the principles of social
ecology, the realisation of an ecological society would require a far-reaching
social revolution, transforming public and private power relations, as well
as the economy, to address human alienation from the greater living world.
From the perspective of social ecology, ecological well-being and sustainability
are fundamental markers of human progress, transcending narrow anthropocentric
approaches that regard the living world as a mere storehouse of commodities
to exploit for profit. In this way concepts of respect for plurality are
extended beyond the human realm with the understanding that humanity is
dependent on the multiplicity of living things embedded within ecosystems
and cannot flourish if these are damaged. The MEM views the provision
for primary need from a social-ecological perspective. To this end consumerism
is rejected and efforts are underway to create an ecologically informed
solidarity economy based on cooperatively run public enterprises and the
determination to establish a needs-based system providing an “irreducible
CAPITALISM NATURE SOCIALISM 15
Downloaded by [77.177.105.74] at 13:03 18 December 2017
minimum” (Biehl 2012)—an idea derived from cultural anthropologist Paul
Radin—for all citizens.
To be sure, these are ambitious hopes. Substantial environmental destruction
is already taking place throughout Kurdistan, including dam construction,
climate change, deforestation and the invasive extraction of oil and
minerals. The challenges of delivering an ecologically benign economy
while on a war footing, facing embargo and while many experts have fled
the region, appear overwhelming. Furthermore, the uneasy tactical collaboration
with the ideologically incompatible Trump administration may leave
an incompliant Rojava vulnerable to the USA’s longer-term, strategic interests
within NATO, following the territorial defeat of the common enemy, IS. Such
external threats, however, doubtless also have a role in forging internal cohesion.
In this regard, the cessation of hostilities or the removal of embargoes
would constitute a contrasting threat, as opportunities would emerge for
entrepreneurs to profit from environmentally destructive behaviours and to
engage in commerce that would enable them to gain control of the means
of production and exchange. Efforts to retain democratic control through
community ownership or measures such as the equitable allocation of essential
goods and services to achieve an “irreducible minimum,” would inevitably
incur retaliation from multinational corporations, bolstered by colossal state
power and keen to protect investments.
Within the tragic and tumultuous history of Kurdish struggle, the years
since the Revolution in Rojava have been marked by continuing and
intense upheaval. That said, the survival of the experiment in democratic confederalism
despite an existential and bloody conflict with IS, while also facing
military threats from Turkey (NATO’s second-largest army) and hostility
from the Ba’athist regime, has defied predictions. Since 2016 Syrian Democratic
Forces have achieved significant military victories over IS, leading to
the declaration of democratic confederalism in liberated areas such as
Manbij and Shengal.
The MEM considers its ecological objectives to be aspirations for the here
and now and integral to their revolutionary experiment. Referring to the
“Declaration of Democratic Confederalism in Kurdistan,” Knapp, Flach,
and Ayboĝa (2016, 211) point out that the “paradigm announced in 2005
emphasized ecology as much as democracy and gender equality.” This
demonstrates an understanding that ecology does not simply represent a
number of unrelated and peripheral problems that need to be addressed as
they arise, but is core to the philosophy underpinning democratic confederalism.
Yet concerns remain that, while there are impressive efforts to instill
principles of direct democracy and gender equality in the present, for compelling
pragmatic and logistical reasons the ecological revolution is deferred to
the future. The movement’s grassroots, furthermore, may be less aware of
ecology as a central principle and priority. There are forthright professions
16 S. E. HUNT
Downloaded by [77.177.105.74] at 13:03 18 December 2017
of political ecology in the MEM’s “Final Declaration” and “Principles and
Objectives,” issued in 2016, advocating “ecological struggle” to “communalize
our land, waters, and energy.” The “Charter of the Social Contract in Rojava”
states that “Wealth and natural resources are public wealth of the society and
its investment and management and treating conditions are regulated by a
law.” The difference in emphasis and tone here reflects the fact that the
former express the sentiments of a predominantly activist constituency,
whereas the latter is an official proclamation intended to communicate to
regional and world public opinion. While the policy may or may not indicate
something similar, the article in the latter document would not be out of place
in a conventional social democratic or liberal policy framework professing a
mixed economy of nationalisation and capitalist enterprise.
If the MEM is able to pursue its intentions further, and carry the overarching
DTK with it, there will indeed be a fascinating experiment in political
ecology to consider, learn from and hopefully to inspire change. This
should not be an isolated experiment, and cannot be if it is to prosper. To
endure, the democratic confederal model must expand beyond its present
heartlands in Kurdistan. The progress of Kurdish ecology initiatives is not
determined solely by the precarious political circumstances within Bakûr
and Rojava. The critical task of mobilising for awareness-raising and
mutual aid, of transform and redefining current prospects, awaits external
sympathisers, particularly the international Kurdish solidarity movement. If
a space to explore a post-capitalist, ecological imaginary endures with its territorial
base and provisional form of libertarian governance, there will be an
opportunity to follow a trajectory currently unavailable to the West’s left-wing
environmentalists and Greens. These are constrained within the context of
expansive capitalism (exacerbated by the Trump administration’s antienvironmental
policies), which Western environmentalists lack the capacity,
and, in some cases, the mindset to confront.
The Kurdish ecology initiatives in Bakûr and Rojava are a progressive
beacon offering an alternative way forward for political ecology. Attempts
to integrate ecologically informed structures and policies into the centre of
the Kurdish freedom movement’s political project in such circumstances
are therefore an unexpected achievement. It is well, therefore, to conclude
this survey of the prospects for the Kurdish ecology initiatives by observing
some positives. Zana (2017) notes that criticisms of the Revolution to the
effect that “the economy has made almost no progress in becoming more ecological
and sustainable,” mostly due to the ongoing dependence of the cantons
on industrial agriculture, are now being addressed by the creation of composting
plants for ecological fertiliser, signifying an important boost for self-sufficiency.
In addition to the MEM’s successful interventions against
environmentally destructive investment projects in Bakûr, Ayboğa reports
greater optimism about the character and future of Rojava, following his
CAPITALISM NATURE SOCIALISM 17
Downloaded by [77.177.105.74] at 13:03 18 December 2017
extended visit to the cantons in 2017. He finds that ecological discussions are
increasingly prevalent due to “theoretical developments” and, as a response to
the “increasing impact of neoliberalism in Bakûr,” have “brought the discussions
to a new point” (interview, 18 August 2017). At the time of writing the
greening of the Kurdish freedom movement, as improbable as it is profoundly
hopeful, deserves our notice and critical solidarity more than ever.
Disclosure Statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
ORCID
Stephen E. Hunt http://orcid.org/0000-0002-7291-1319
References
Ahmed, Akbar Shahid. 2015. “America’s Best Allies Against ISIS Are Inspired
byaBronx-born Libertarian Socialist.” Huffington Post, December 18. http://www.
huffingtonpost.com/entry/syrian-kurds-murray-bookchin_us_
5655e7e2e4b079b28189e3df.
Akça, İsmet, Ahmet Bekmen, and Bariş Alp Özden, eds. 2014. Turkey Reframed:
Constituting the Neoliberal Hegemony. London: Pluto Press.
Anderson, Tom, and Eliza Egret. 2016. “Rebuilding Kobanê.” Red Pepper, January 11.
http://www.redpepper.org.uk/rebuilding-kobane/.
Ayboğa, Ercan. 2015. “Restructuring Mesopotamia Ecology Movement:
Strengthening the Change in Ecological Awareness!”. Accessed 29 December
- https://www.academia.edu/18468207/Mesopotamian_Ecology_Movement.
Baher, Zaher. 2014. The Experiment of West Kurdistan: Feminism, Anti-sectarianism
and Collectivism in the Syrian Revolution. Huddersfield: Reargard Action.
Balanche, Fabrice. 2016. “Rojava’s Sustainability and the PKK’s Regional Strategy.”
August 24. http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/view/rojavassustainability-
and-the-pkks-regional-strategy.
Biehl, Janet. 2012. “Bookchin, Öcalan, and the Dialectics of Democracy.” February 16.
http://new-compass.net/articles/bookchin-%C3%B6calan-and-dialecticsdemocracy.
Biehl, Janet. 2015. Ecology or Catastrophe: The Life of Murray Bookchin. Oxford:
Oxford University Press.
Bookchin, Murray. (19741965). “Towards a Liberatory Technology.” In Post-Scarcity
Anarchism, 83–139. London: Wildwood House.
Bookchin, Murray. 1982. The Ecology of Freedom: The Emergence and Dissolution of
Hierarchy. Palo Alto, CA: Cheshire Books.
Bookchin, Murray. 1995. From Urbanization to Cities: Toward a New Politics of
Citizenship. London: Cassell.
“Charter of the Social Contract in Rojava (Syria). 2014. Kurdish Institute of Brussels.
February 7. http://www.kurdishinstitute.be/charter-of-the-social-contract/.
Chiapaslink. 2000. The Zapatistas: A Rough Guide. Bristol: Chiapaslink.
18 S. E. HUNT
Downloaded by [77.177.105.74] at 13:03 18 December 2017
Clark, John. 2016. “Imaginaire Aude! Lessons of the Rojava Revolution.” Capitalism
Nature Socialism 27 (3): 103–110. doi:10.1080/10455752.2016.1210367.
Corporate Watch. 2015. “Building Autonomy in Turkey and Kurdistan: An Interview
with Revolutionary Anarchist Action.” Corporate Watch. August 27. https://
corporatewatch.org/building-autonomy-in-turkey-and-kurdistan-an-interviewwith-
revolutionary-anarchist-action/.
Egret, Eliza, and Tom Anderson. 2016. Struggles for Autonomy in Kurdistan &
Corporate Complicity in the Repression of Social Movements in Rojava and
Bakur. London: Corporate Watch.
Engel-Di Mauro, Salvatore. 2015. “Rojava.” Capitalism Nature Socialism 26 (1): 1–15.
doi:10.1080/10455752.2015.1006948.
Helphand, Kenneth. 2006. Defiant Gardens: Making Gardens in Wartime. San
Antonio, TX: Trinity University Press.
Hommes, Lena, Rutgerd Boelens, and Harro Maat. 2016. “Contested Hydrosocial
Territories and Disputed Water Governance: Struggles and Competing Claims
over the Ilisu Dam Development in Southeastern Turkey.” Geoforum; Journal of
Physical, Human, and Regional Geosciences 71: 9–20. doi:10.1016/j.geoforum.
2016.02.015.
Janet, Biehl. 2014. “My Impressions of Rojava.” December 15. http://kurdishquestion.
com/article/3088-my-impressions-of-rojava.
Knapp, Michael, Anja Flach, and Ercan Ayboĝa. 2016. Revolution in Rojava:
Democratic Autonomy and Women’s Liberation in Syrian Kurdistan. Translated
by Janet Biehl. London: Pluto.
Lebsky, Maksim. 2017. “The Economy of Rojava.” Co-operative Economy. March 14.
https://cooperativeeconomy.info/the-economy-of-rojava/.
Leezenberg, Michiel. 2016. “The Ambiguities of Democratic Autonomy: The Kurdish
Movement in Turkey and Rojava.” Southeast European and Black Sea Studies 16
(4): 671–690. doi:10.1080/14683857.2016.1246529.
McKay, George. 2011. Radical Gardening: Politics, Idealism and Rebellion in the
Garden. London: Frances Lincoln.
MEM (Mesopotamian Ecology Movement). 2016a. “Final Declaration of the First
Conference of the Mesopotamian Ecology Movement.” Wan (Van), North
Kurdistan, April 23–24. http://www.biehlonbookchin.com/mesop-ecology-mvmt/.
MEM (Mesopotamian Ecology Movement). 2016b. Call for an International
Delegation on Forest Fires.” MEM. July 4. http://www.mezopotamyaekolojihareketi.
org/index/icerik/call-for-an-international-delegation-on-forest-fires/.
MEM website. 2016c. “Agricultural policy of the Mesopotamian Ecology Movement.”
Accessed 18 October 2016. http://www.mezopotamyaekolojihareketi.org/index/
icerik/agriculture-policy-of-the-mesopotamian-ecology-movement/.
Öcalan, Abdullah. 2005. “The Declaration of Democratic Confederalism.” Translated
by KNK. London. Accessed 28 December 2016. http://www.kurdmedia.com/
article.aspx?id=10174 [using archive.org/web].
Öcalan, Abdullah. 2016. Democratic Nation. Cologne: International Initiative/Neuss.
Öcalan, Abdullah. 2017. The Political Thought of Abdullah Öcalan: Kurdistan,
Woman’s Revolution and Democratic Confederalism. Translated by Havin
Guneser. London: Pluto.
Sabio, Oso. 2015. Rojava: An Alternative to Imperialism, Nationalism and Islamism in
the Middle East (An Introduction). Lulu.com.
Şekercioğlu, Çağan H., Sean Anderson, Erol Akçay, Raşit Bilgin, OÅNzgün Emre Can,
Gürkan Semiz, Çağatay Tavşanoğlu, et al. 2011. “Turkey’s Globally Important
CAPITALISM NATURE SOCIALISM 19
Downloaded by [77.177.105.74] at 13:03 18 December 2017
Biodiversity in Crisis.” Biological Conservation 144: 2752–2769. doi:10.1016/j.
biocon.2011.06.025.
Slow Food International. 2016a. “An Interview with Ercan Ayboga of the
Mesopotamian Ecology Movement at “Soup for Syria,” Part of Terra Madre
Salone del Gusto 2016” Video clip. Accessed 1 November 2017. https://www.
youtube.com/watch?v=wFqzIWyVLnM.
Slow Food International. 2016b. “Kobane: An Eco-challenge for Humanity.”
December 8. https://kurdishsolidaritynetwork.wordpress.com/2016/12/08/kobanean-
eco-challenge-for-humanity/.
Stanchev, Peter. 2016. “The Kurds, Bookchin and the Need to Reinvent Revolution.”
New Politics 15 (4): 77–82. http://newpol.org/content/kurds-bookchin-and-%E2%
80%A8need-reinvent-revolution.
TATORT Kurdistan. 2013. Democratic Autonomy in North Kurdistan: The Council
Movement, Gender Liberation, and Ecology—In Practice: A Reconnaissance into
Southeastern Turkey. Translated by Janet Biehl. Porsgrunn: New Compass Press.
Taylor, Rafael. 2014. “The New PKK: Unleashing a Social Revolution in Kurdistan.”
ROAR Magazine, August 17. https://roarmag.org/essays/pkk-kurdish-struggleautonomy/.
Venturini, Federico. 2015. “Social Ecology and the Non-Western World.” Speech
delivered at the conference “Challenging Capitalist Modernity II: Dissecting
Capitalist Modernity–Building Democratic Confederalism.” 5 April, Hamburg.
http://networkaq.net/2015/2015/speeches/pdf/2.5%20ENGLISH%20-%20Federico
%20Venturini%20-%20Social%20Ecology%20Non-Western%20World.pdf.
Yalcin, Emrah, and Sahnaz Tigrek. 2016. “Hydropower Production Without
Sacrificing Environment: A Case Study of Ilisu Dam and Hasankeyf.”
International Journal of Water Resources Development 32 (2): 247–266. doi:10.
1080/07900627.2015.1031210.
Zana, Salvadore. 2017. “Rojava’s Economics and the Future of the Revolution.” Eye Art
Collective, July 1. http://www.eyeartcollective.com/the-future-of-the-revolution/.
20 S. E. HUNT
Downloaded by [77.177.105.74] at 13:03 18 December 2017