Résumé
This chapter argues that the arrival of the Anthropocene is most unlikely to facilitate the 'much-needed renewal' envisaged by those who are frustrated with the current mainstream of depoliticised sustainability policy, who are hoping for 'a massive escalation of truly disruptive action' that will 'change everything'. It distinguishes between eco-political approaches in the science- and technology-oriented mode of objectivation and eco-politics in the culture- and identity-oriented mode of subjectivation. The chapter reveals how, for the purpose of generating legitimacy and authority for their diagnoses and prescriptions, both of these approaches fundamentally rely on the nature/society dualism. The structural transformation of the capitalist growth economy and the consumer culture which the more radical currents of environmentalism, in particular, have always demanded, and which many climate scientists now regard as indispensable if large-scale catastrophe and social collapse are to be averted, is nowhere in sight.