Western Liberal Societies

Examining the evolution of the human-nature relationship is crucial for understanding where contemporary anthropocentrism comes from. The chapter aims to show that the general anthropocentric view of nature, on which modern Western liberal societies and legal systems are based, is centuries to millennia old. It thereby also seeks to demonstrate that the current unhealthy human-nature relationship is not without alternatives but stems from a particular culture that is subject to change. After briefly examining the human-nature relationship in classical antiquity, Christian theology and the Middle Ages, the chapter focuses on the past 500 years of social and political change in the liberal West. To this end, it analyzes the evolution of the human-nature relationship from the Scientific Revolution and liberalism via Romanticism, the Industrial Revolution, the Great Acceleration and the emergence of global environmentalism until today.