Reflections on China's Socialist Ecological Civilization Construction: Perspectives of Social-Ecological Transformation

Abstract

The emphasis of Socialist Ecological Civilization in the 18th congress of CPC and the proposal of "Green Development" in the "Thirteen Five Year" Plan both indicate that Ecological Civilization Construction has been raised to an unprecedented height in China. Based on the theory of Social-Ecological Transformation, this article elaborates if or to what extent China’s Ecological Civilization Construction goes beyond the logic of capitalist imperative, if environmental benefits still succumbs to the current political and economic structures. It concludes that as the newest sustainable discourse, Ecological Civilization has great influence on the formation and enforcement of environmental policy in China. As a comprehensive and systematic experiment concerning the change of mode of living and production, divergent interpretations of Ecological Civilization Construction still exist among officials in multi-level governance, which leads to different preferences when implementing Ecological Civilization goals.The orientation of growth in multilevel governments should be weakened and pioneer of change with emancipatory horizon or ecological forms of production and living should be encouraged.