Circulations and metabolisms: (Hybrid) Natures and (Cyborg) cities

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Notes 1 Although Schmidt (1971 Schmidt, A. 1971. The Concept of Nature in Marx, London: New Left Books. Google Scholar) and Fisher-Kowalski (1998 Fisher-Kowalski, M. 1998. Society's metabolism. The intellectual history of material flow analysis, Part I, 1860–1970. Journal of Industrial Ecology, 2(1): 61–78. Google Scholar) maintain that Moleschott (1857 Moleschott, J. 1857. Der Kreislauf des Lebens, Mainz: Von Zabern. Google Scholar) provided the influential insights, this is convincingly rebuked by Foster (2000 Foster, J. B. 2000. Marx's Ecology: Materialism and Nature, New York: Monthly Review Press. Google Scholar), who maintained that von Liebig and Mayer (1845 Mayer, J. R. 1845. Die Organische Bewegung in ihrem Zusammenhange mit dem Stoffwechsel, Heilbronn: C. Drechsler. Google Scholar) were of central importance. In any case, the use of 'metabolism' was widespread in the emerging social sciences at the time and both Marx and Engels were familiar with the then ongoing scientific debates in biology. 2 This has become engrained in social theory since its founding fathers Durkheim, Weber, and a 'socialized' Marx. 3 The first person apparently to suggest the circulation of blood in the arterial system was Ibn-al-Nnafiz (physician, born in Baghdad and died in Cairo in 1288) (Illich, 1986 Illich, I. 1986. H2O and the Waters of Forgetfulness, London: Marion Boyars. Google Scholar, p. 40). The idea of circulation remained alien to the imagination of sixteenth century Europeans. Two sixteenth century scientists suspected what Harvey would later discover: Servetus (a Spanish genius and heretic burnt by Calvin—he also edited Ptolemy's geography in Lyon—and student of Vesalius in Paris) and Realdus Colombus of Padua (also student of Vesalius). Harvey was a student of Vesalius in 1603. 4 Among those who address this issue are: Blowers (1993 Blowers, A. 1993. Planning for a Sustainable Environment, Edited by: Blowers, A. London: Earthscan. Google Scholar), Haughton and Hunter (1994 Haughton, G. and Hunter, C. 1994. Sustainable Cities, London: J. Kingsley. Google Scholar), or, for a more critical perspective, Burgess et al. (1997 Burgess, R., Carmona, M. and Kolstee, J. 1997. The Challenge of Sustainable Cities, Edited by: Burgess, R., Carmona, M. and Kolstee, J. London: Zed Books. Google Scholar), Baeten (2000 Baeten, G. 2000. Tragedy of the highway. Empowerment, disempowerment and the politics of sustainability discourses and practices. European Planning Studies, 8(2): 69–86. Taylor & Francis Online , Google Scholar), Davis (1998 Davis, M. 1998. Ecology of Fear: Los Angeles and the Imagination of Disaster, New York: Metropolitan Books. Google Scholar), Desfor and Keil (2004 Desfor, G. and Keil, R. 2004. Nature and the City—Making Environmental Policy in Toronto and Los Angeles, Tucson: The University of Arizona Press. Google Scholar), Gandy (2002 Gandy, M. 2002. Concrete and Clay—Reworking Nature in New York City, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Crossref , Google Scholar), Keil and Graham (1998 Keil, R. 1998. Los Angeles: Globalization, Urbanization, and Social Struggles (World Cities Series), New York: John Wiley & Son Ltd. Google Scholar) and Swyngedouw (1999 Swyngedouw, E. 1999. Modernity and hybridity: nature, regeneracionismo, and the production of the Spanish waterscape, 1890–1930. Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 89(3): 443–465. Taylor & Francis Online, Web of Science ® , Google Scholar, 2004 Swyngedouw, E. 2004. Social Power and the Urbanization of Water: Flows of Power, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Crossref , Google Scholar).