Reflections on Modernization Based on Marx’s Terminological Revolution of “Metabolism”

Historically, over the past two hundred years and more, modernization “driven by industrialization” has developed rapidly amid the global expansion of capital. This world-historically significant “global process of large-scale transformation from traditional agricultural society to modern industrial society” has triggered comprehensive and profound social and historical changes. (See Luo Rongqu, p. 17) Yet amid the surging tide of world modernization, a global ecological crisis has emerged, with the antagonistic opposition between humans and nature as its core manifestation. “Chinese-path modernization is modernization in which humans and nature coexist harmoniously,” and “promoting harmonious coexistence between humans and nature” is one of the essential requirements of Chinese-path modernization. (See Xi Jinping, 2022a, pp. 23–24) This has laid the ecological foundation for the path of Chinese-path modernization and highlighted Chinese characteristics in the wave of world modernization. In fact, as early as the initial period of capitalist industrialization and early modernization, Marx, grounded in historical materialism, critically transformed the concept of “metabolism,” which originally belonged to physiology and chemistry. Engels later called this a “terminological revolution”: “Every new insight that a science achieves constitutes a terminological revolution within that science.” (Marx/Engels Collected Works, Vol. 5, p. 32) It was precisely on the basis of this terminological revolution concerning “metabolism” that Marx demonstrated the inevitable emergence of an irreparable “metabolic rift” between humans and nature under the capitalist mode of production, and prophetically foretold the global ecological and environmental crisis that human society would inevitably face. This article proceeds from the concept of “metabolism” after Marx’s terminological revolution, examines the modernization process over the past two hundred years and more, analyzes the “metabolic rift” between humans and nature in the modernization process dominated by capital and its ecological consequences, elucidates Chinese-path modernization characterized by “harmonious coexistence between humans and nature” and its world picture of reshaping the historical form of “metabolism,” and highlights the worldview and methodological significance of “lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets” as the core concept of ecological civilization construction.

历史地看，两百余年来“以工业化为推动力”的现代化在资本的全球扩张中迅猛发展。这一具有世界历史意义的“传统的农业社会向现代工业社会的全球性的大转变过程”,引发了全面而深刻的社会历史变迁。(参见罗荣渠，第17页)但在波澜壮阔的世界现代化大潮中，出现了以人与自然关系对立冲突为核心表征的全球性生态危机。“中国式现代化是人与自然和谐共生的现代化”,“促进人与自然和谐共生”是中国式现代化的本质要求之一，(参见习近平，2022年a, 第23-24页)为中国式现代化道路奠定了生态底色，在世界现代化浪潮中亮明了中国特色。其实早在资本主义工业化初期暨现代化早期，马克思就立足历史唯物主义对原本生理学和化学意义上的“物质变换”概念进行了批判性改造。恩格斯后来称之为“术语的革命”:“一门科学提出的每一种新见解都包含这门科学的术语的革命。”(《马克思恩格斯文集》第5卷，第32页)正是在对“物质变换”进行术语革命的基础上，马克思论证了资本主义生产方式下人与自然之间必然会产生一个无法弥补的“物质变换裂隙”,并谶语式预言了人类社会必将面临的全球性生态环境危机。本文从经过马克思术语革命的“物质变换”概念出发，透视两百余年来的现代化进程，分析资本主导下现代化过程中人与自然之间产生的“物质变换裂隙”及其生态后果，阐释“人与自然和谐共生”的中国式现代化及其重塑“物质变换”历史形态的世界图景，彰显“绿水青山就是金山银山”作为生态文明建设核心理念的世界观方法论意义。

I. Marx’s Historical-Materialist Transformation of the Concept of “Metabolism”

一、马克思对“物质变换”概念的历史唯物主义改造

In Marx’s theoretical texts from different periods, the concept of “metabolism” underwent a dual process of historical emergence and theoretical construction. In February 1851, Roland Daniels sent his manuscript *Microcosm: Outline of a Physiological Anthropology* to Marx for review, in which the concept of “metabolism” was raised in a physiological sense. Marx communicated with Daniels and Engels on several occasions regarding this manuscript. At that time, Marx had already gained a preliminary understanding and awareness of the distinctive concept of “metabolism” in this manuscript and had begun its preliminary historical-materialist transformation. In March 1851, in the “Reflections” section of the *London Notebooks*, Marx used this conceptual term for the first time, proposing “the social organization that carries out metabolism,” “each person can carry out any metabolism according to the amount of money into which his income is converted,” and “the metabolism of the individual depends on the specific division of labor to which the individual belongs.” (See *Complete Works of Marx and Engels*, Vol. 10, pp. 645–646) From the usage at that time, Marx had already applied the concept of “metabolism” to the field of social history, conducting a political-economic analysis from the three dimensions of production, consumption, and distribution. This was also the theoretical origin of one of the three main meanings of Marx’s later concept of “metabolism,” namely “social metabolism.”

在马克思不同时期的理论文本中，“物质变换”概念经历了一个历史生成与理论建构的双重进程。1851年2月，罗·丹尼尔斯将自己的手稿《小宇宙。生理人类学概论》寄给马克思审阅，手稿中提出了生理学意义上的“物质变换”概念。马克思就这部手稿与丹尼尔斯和恩格斯进行了多次沟通。此时，马克思对这部手稿中别具一格的“物质变换”概念已经有了初步了解和认识，并对其进行了历史唯物主义的初步改造。1851年3月，马克思在《伦敦笔记》的《反思》中，首次使用这一概念术语，提出了“进行物质变换的社会组织”,“每个人都能够按照他的收入转化成的货币的数量来进行任何的物质变换”,“个人的物质变换，取决于个人所从属的一定的分工”。(参见《马克思恩格斯全集》第10卷，第645-646页)从当时的使用情况看，马克思已经将“物质变换”概念应用于社会历史领域，从生产、消费和分配三大维度进行了政治经济学剖析。这也是其后马克思“物质变换”概念三层主要含义之一“社会的物质变换”的理论源头。

From then until the *Grundrisse (1857–1858 Manuscripts)*, over the course of several years, while reflecting on the issue of “metabolism,” Marx also drew on and criticized the concept of “natural metabolism” proposed by the Dutch physiological materialist Jacob Moleschott. In response to Moleschott’s view of natural metabolism based on the combination and decomposition of chemical elements, Marx refuted his neglect of the active practice of human labor as a subjective force, extending the purely chemical sense of natural metabolism to the fields of metabolism between humans and nature and social metabolism. Thereafter, Marx frequently used this concept in his political-economic research. In the *Grundrisse (1857–1858 Manuscripts)*, Marx extensively employed such terms as “universal social metabolism,” “real metabolism,” “mere natural metabolism,” “chemical metabolism,” “metabolism regulated by labor,” and “metabolism with nature” (See *Complete Works of Marx and Engels*, Vol. 30, pp. 107, 171, 229, 270, 329, 481), covering both natural and social senses of “metabolism.” This concept became an important tool for Marx to analyze the capitalist mode of production and thereby explore the historical process of human society.

从此直至《政治经济学批判(1857—1858年手稿)》的几年时间里，马克思在思考“物质变换”问题时，又借鉴和批判了荷兰生理学唯物主义者摩莱肖特的“自然界物质变换”概念。针对摩莱肖特提出的基于诸化学元素通过化合、分解等方式进行自然界物质变换的观点，马克思批驳了其忽视人类劳动主体能动性实践的错漏，将其纯粹化学意义上的自然界物质变换延伸至人与自然之间以及社会的物质变换领域。此后，马克思在政治经济学研究中频繁地使用这一概念。在《政治经济学批判(1857—1858年手稿)》中，马克思大量使用了诸如“普遍的社会物质变换”“实在的物质变换”“自然界的单纯物质变换”“化学的物质变换”“由劳动调节的物质变换”“与自然界进行物质变换”(参见《马克思恩格斯全集》第30卷，第107、171、229、270、329、481页)等自然、社会意义上的“物质变换”概念。这一概念成为马克思剖析资本主义生产方式进而探讨人类社会历史进程的重要工具。

In the critique of political economy, the agricultural chemist Justus von Liebig entered Marx’s theoretical field of vision at an opportune moment. In Marx’s view, although Liebig’s “historical overview of agricultural history is not without serious errors,” he “elucidated the negative aspects of modern agriculture from the standpoint of natural science,” which can be regarded as “one of Liebig’s immortal merits.” (See *Marx/Engels Collected Works*, Vol. 5, p. 580) This “immortal merit” specifically refers to the fact that crop growth extracts chemical elements from the soil in the form of nutrients, so artificial fertilization is needed to promptly compensate for the loss of soil nutrients, thereby maintaining the smooth progress of metabolism between humans and the land (nature). Under the capitalist mode of production, however, modern agriculture, following the iron law of capital accumulation, “artificially accelerates the depletion of nutrients in the soil” (*Selected Works of Liebig*, p. 51), disrupting the soil nutrient cycle of natural metabolism and the ecological balance between humans and the land (nature). During the writing of *Capital* and its associated manuscripts, Marx had already used the concept of “metabolism” extensively and frequently, with its connotation and extension encompassing three major levels: “social metabolism,” “natural metabolism,” and “metabolism between humans and nature.” He regarded “metabolism between humans and nature” as “the eternal natural necessity that makes human life possible” (*Marx/Engels Collected Works*, Vol. 5, p. 56).

在政治经济学批判中，农业化学家李比希适时进入了马克思的理论视野。在马克思看来，李比希对“农业史所作的历史的概述虽不免有严重错误”,但“从自然科学的观点出发阐明了现代农业的消极方面”,这堪称“李比希的不朽功绩之一”。(参见《马克思恩格斯文集》第5卷，第580页)这一“不朽功绩”具体是指，农作物生长会以养分的形式汲取土壤中的化学元素，所以需要以人工施肥的方式及时补偿土壤中养分的损耗，如此才能维持人与土地(自然)之间物质变换的顺畅进行。而在资本主义生产方式下，遵循资本增殖铁律的现代农业，却“人为地加速土壤中营养物质的贫瘠化”(《李比希文选》,第51页),破坏了自然界物质变换的土壤养分循环以及人与土地(自然)的生态平衡关系。在《资本论》及其手稿群的写作过程中，马克思已经大量且频繁使用“物质变换”概念，其内涵与外延包括“社会的物质变换”“自然的物质变换”“人和自然之间的物质变换”等三大层面，并将“人和自然之间的物质变换”视为“人类生活得以实现的永恒的自然必然性”(《马克思恩格斯文集》第5卷，第56页)。

It can be seen that, from the “Reflections” in the *London Notebooks* of 1851 to the publication of *Capital* more than a decade later, the concept of “material metabolism” in Marx underwent a process from borrowing to critique to reshaping. Initially inspired by Daniels, he applied the physiological concept of “material metabolism” to the political-economic analysis of capitalist society; then, through a historical-materialist critique of Moleschott’s purely chemical concept of “material metabolism,” he highlighted the active agency of human practice; finally, spurred by Liebig’s “immortal achievement,” Marx formed a historical-materialist concept of “material metabolism” at three levels: nature, society, and the relationship between humans and nature. On the biological level, Marx considered the natural “material metabolism” of the natural world on which humans depend for survival and the internal life processes within it. In Marx’s view, all things in nature, as “the inorganic body of man,” have their own laws. Water, soil, air, and trees each engage in energy exchange activities, forming an organic ecosystem. Humans arise and develop within this ecosystem. For “real individuals,” who constitute “the first premise of all human history” (see *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, Vol. 1, p. 519), they are first and foremost biological beings. Satisfying the needs of the physical organism (primary and basic needs) and the other needs arising from this constitutes the “material metabolism” process between humans and nature based on physiological needs. At the more complex level of social relations, “real individuals” are also the “sum of certain social relations”; thus, the “material metabolism” relationship between humans and nature always exists within a specific community. Individuals produce and engage in universal intercourse for the survival of the community. Among these, labor, as the mode of existence and form of life for “real individuals,” connects the physiological needs and social dimensions of “material metabolism”: “Labor, this life activity, this productive life itself, appears to man only as a means of satisfying a need, the need to maintain physical existence. And productive life is species-life” (*Marx and Engels Collected Works*, Vol. 1, p. 162). Thus, labor becomes the mediator of the “material metabolism” between humans and nature. In the *Economic Manuscripts of 1861–1863*, Marx held that “actual labor is the appropriation of natural factors to satisfy human needs, the activity that mediates the material metabolism between humans and nature” (*Marx and Engels Complete Works*, Vol. 32, p. 44). In *Capital*, this view is more specifically expressed as “Labor is first of all a process between man and nature, a process by which man, through his own activity, mediates, regulates, and controls the material metabolism between himself and nature” (*Marx and Engels Collected Works*, Vol. 5, pp. 207–208).

可见，自1851年《伦敦笔记》中的《反思》至《资本论》问世的十多年间，“物质变换”概念在马克思那里经历了一个从借鉴到批判再到重塑的过程。从最初受丹尼尔斯的启发，将生理学意义上的“物质变换”概念应用于资本主义社会的政治经济学分析；再经由对摩莱肖特纯粹化学意义上的“物质变换”概念的历史唯物主义批判，凸显人的主体能动性实践；最终，在李比希“不朽功绩”的激发促成下，马克思在自然、社会及人与自然之间三大层面形成了历史唯物主义的“物质变换”概念。在生物学意义上，马克思从自然的“物质变换”角度，考量了人类赖以生存的自然界及其内部生命运动过程。在马克思看来，“作为人的无机身体”的自然中的万物各有其规律。水、土、空气和树木各自进行着能量的交换活动，形成了有机的生态系统。人类在这一生态系统中产生、发展。对于作为“全部人类历史的第一个前提”的“现实的个人”而言，(参见《马克思恩格斯文集》第1卷，第519页)首先应当是生物学意义上的人。满足肉体组织的需要(首要而又基本的需要)以及由此产生的其他需要，构成了人与自然之间的以生理需要为基础的“物质变换”过程。在更为复杂的社会关系层面，“现实的个人”亦是一定“社会关系的总和”,因而人与自然的“物质变换”关系总是处在一定的共同体之中。个人为了共同体的存续需要进行生产和普遍交往。其中，劳动作为“现实的个人”的存在方式和生存样态，勾连了“物质变换”的生理需要和社会向度，“劳动这种生命活动、这种生产生活本身对人来说不过是满足一种需要即维持肉体生存需要的一种手段。而生产生活就是类生活”(《马克思恩格斯文集》第1卷，第162页)。由此，劳动成为人与自然“物质变换”的中介。在《政治经济学批判(1861—1863年手稿)》中，马克思认为“实际劳动就是为了满足人的需要而占有自然因素，是中介人和自然间的物质变换的活动”(《马克思恩格斯全集》第32卷，第44页)。在《资本论》中，这一观点更加具体地表述为“劳动首先是人和自然之间的过程，是人以自身的活动来中介、调整和控制人和自然之间的物质变换的过程”(《马克思恩格斯文集》第5卷，第207-208页)。

II. The Eco-Marxist Theoretical Elaboration of the Concept of “Material Metabolism”

二、“物质变换”概念的生态马克思主义理论阐发

After the critical transformation by historical materialism, the concept of “material metabolism” became an important category for Marx to analyze and describe modern agriculture, the capitalist mode of production, the process of human social modernization, and its laws. In Marx’s view, modern agriculture based on large-scale industry “disturbs the material metabolism between man and the land,” “destroys the eternal natural conditions for the lasting fertility of the soil,” and “destroys all sources of wealth—the land and the worker” (see ibid., pp. 579–580). A huge “rift” thus appears in the material metabolism between humans and nature. It was precisely in his analysis of Western modernization, i.e., the capitalist mode of production, that Marx arrived at the theory of “metabolic rift,” i.e., “material metabolism rift” (Metabolic Rift). In the subsequent lineage of eco-Marxist theory, the “material metabolism rift” has been regarded by scholars such as Foster, Burkett, and Saitō Kōhei as a core concept and key node of Marx’s ecological thought.

经过历史唯物主义的批判性改造后，“物质变换”概念成为马克思分析和描述现代农业、资本主义生产方式、人类社会现代化进程及其规律的重要范畴。在马克思看来，以大工业为基础的现代农业，“破坏着人和土地之间的物质变换”,“破坏土地持久肥力的永恒的自然条件”,“破坏了一切财富的源泉——土地和工人”。(参见同上，第579-580页)人与自然之间的物质变换，就此出现了一个巨大的“裂隙”。也正是在对西方现代化暨资本主义生产方式的剖析中，马克思得出了“新陈代谢断裂”即“物质变换裂隙”(Metabolic Rift)理论。在其后的生态马克思主义理论谱系中，“物质变换裂隙”被福斯特、伯克特、斋藤幸平等学者视作马克思生态思想的核心概念和关键节点。

In Foster’s view, Marx recognized that modern or industrialized agriculture under capitalist conditions could not truly and rationally apply the agricultural science and technology that had emerged to maintain soil fertility and thus sustain the normal material metabolism between humans and nature. Overcoming the metabolic rift or material metabolism rift under capitalist conditions fundamentally requires a transformation of social relations (see Foster, 2006a, pp. 174, 188). Unlike Foster, who mainly elaborated Marx’s ecological thought in the history of ideas, Burkett’s primary focus was on the ecological thought within Marx’s critique of political economy. He found the key concept of “material metabolism rift” in this context and used it as a major terminological tool to analyze how capitalist production distorts the relationship between humans and nature on a global scale and undermines sustainable development. Building on the research of Foster and Burkett, Saitō Kōhei, through his study of newly published materials in the new *Marx and Engels Complete Works*—especially Marx’s extensive natural science notebooks from his later years—connected the history-of-ideas field and the critique-of-political-economy field of Marx’s ecological theory via the concept of “material metabolism.” He pointed out that “Marx’s ecology also systematically demonstrates its argument around this concept,” and thus there exists a “genealogy of material metabolism theory” (see Saitō Kōhei, pp. 8, 45). Saitō Kōhei further explicitly took the “material metabolism rift” theory as a key node of Marx’s systematic ecological thought, viewing the ecological crisis as an important manifestation of the contradictions of the capitalist mode of production. At a more macro level of social development, Saitō Kōhei argued that Marxism has ecological critical significance, and that Marx’s critique of capitalism and his aspiration for socialism are most conducive to contemporary society’s reflection on the global ecological crisis caused by capitalism (see Liu Rensheng, p. 172).

在福斯特看来，马克思已经认识到，资本主义生产条件下的现代化农业或工业化农业不可能真正有效和理性地运用已出现的农业科学和技术，以保持土壤肥力进而维持人与自然之间正常的物质变换。而克服资本主义生产条件下的新陈代谢断裂或物质变换断裂，根本在于社会关系的变革。(参见福斯特，2006年a, 第174、188页)与福斯特主要在思想史领域阐发马克思的生态思想不同，伯克特的主要关注点在于马克思政治经济学批判中的生态思想。他从中找到了“物质变换裂隙”这一关键性概念，且将其作为分析资本主义生产如何在全球范围内扭曲人与自然关系、破坏可持续发展的主要术语工具。在福斯特和伯克特的研究基础上，斋藤幸平通过对新版《马克思恩格斯全集》首次出版的新资料——特别是马克思晚年大量自然科学笔记等——的研究，以“物质变换”概念联通了马克思生态理论的思想史领域和政治经济学批判领域，指出“马克思的生态学也围绕此概念展开了系统性的论证”,因而存在一个“物质变换理论的谱系”。(参见斋藤幸平，第8页、45页)斋藤幸平进而明确将“物质变换裂隙”理论作为马克思系统性生态思想的关键节点，将生态危机看作资本主义生产方式矛盾的重要表现。在更为宏观的社会发展层面，斋藤幸平认为马克思主义具有生态批判意义，马克思对资本主义的批判和对社会主义的向往最有利于当今社会反思资本主义造成的全球性生态危机。(参见刘仁胜，第172页)

Upholding Marx’s thought on “material metabolism,” especially the “material metabolism” between humans and nature mediated by labor, eco-Marxists have given sufficient attention to Marx’s concept of “material metabolism” and the theory of “material metabolism rift.” Furthermore, eco-Marxism takes “material metabolism” as a “key” to explore the process of modernization and development in human society and to dispel the fog of ecological crisis within it. Foster, for instance, argued that, stemming from the analysis of the labor process and its mediating position, the ecological significance and contemporary value of Marx’s concept of “material metabolism” become evident. First, the concept of “material metabolism” “and the ideas of material exchange and regulatory activity it contains enabled Marx to express the relationship between humans and nature as encompassing both ‘natural conditions’ and the human capacities that affect this process” (Foster, 2006a, p. 176), thus presenting a clearer and more complete picture of the interaction among humans, nature, and labor. Second, the concept of “material metabolism” deepened and extended the early Marx’s concept of “alienation,” providing a concrete way to describe the interactive relationship between the alienation of nature and the alienation of labor, and also offering possibilities for exploring ways to eliminate alienation. Third, the concept of “material metabolism” connected three major aspects of his critique of capitalist economics—the exploitation of surplus product, capitalist ground rent theory, and Malthus’s population theory (see ibid., p. 158). The “material metabolism” link inherent in the labor process makes “ecology” an integral part of Marx’s concept of labor, endowing historical materialism, with labor and production as its core categories, with an ecological foundation, and also making it possible to analyze the relationship between specific forms of labor under different relations of production and nature and society.

秉承马克思“物质变换”思想，特别是以劳动为中介的人与自然之间的“物质变换”思想，生态马克思主义者们对马克思的“物质变换”概念与“物质变换裂隙”理论给予了足够的重视。进一步讲，生态马克思主义将“物质变换”作为一把“钥匙”,用以探讨人类社会的现代化发展转型过程并驱除其中生态危机的迷雾。福斯特就认为，源于对劳动过程及其中介地位的分析，马克思“物质变换”概念的生态意义和时代价值得以彰显。一是“物质变换”概念“以及它所包含的物质交换和调节活动的观念，使马克思能够把人和自然的关系表述为既包括‘自然条件’又包括影响这一过程的人类的能力”(福斯特，2006年a, 第176页),从而更加清晰完整地呈现人、自然、劳动之间的互动图景。二是“物质变换”概念深化和延展了早期马克思的“异化”概念，为描述自然异化同劳动异化的交互关系提供了具体方式，也为探索消除异化的途径提供了可能。三是“物质变换”概念将它对资本主义经济学批判的三大重要方面——剩余产品的剥削、资本主义地租理论和马尔萨斯的人口理论——连接在一起。(参见同上，第158页)劳动过程内含的“物质变换”环节，使“生态”成为马克思劳动概念的应有之义，既赋予了以劳动和生产为核心范畴的历史唯物主义以生态底色，也使分析不同生产关系下的具体劳动形式同自然和社会之间的关系成为可能。

In Schmidt’s view, Marx’s analysis of the dialectical relationship between metabolic interaction, labor, and relations of production reveals “the historical dialectic of the identity and non-identity of human beings’ own nature,” that is, the labor process in Marx’s writings is not transhistorical or timeless; changes in historical circumstances affect the character of each element of the labor process, and “all processing of nature is carried out ‘in a definite social form and through this social form’” (cf. Schmidt, p. 84). In other words, for Marx, the elements of the labor process are not only regarded as general conditions of all production but should also be grasped as situated within specific historical stages. Hence, from the perspective of ecological Marxism, the metabolic interaction between humans and nature mediated by labor, while constituting the general regularity of the development of human society, also takes on different modalities in its concrete forms of metabolic interaction as historical stages change. In the great global transformation from tradition to modernity, i.e., the process of modernization, the relatively direct and harmonious modality of “metabolic interaction” between humans and nature is broken, giving rise to an irreparable “metabolic rift,” which, accompanied by the global expansion of capital, has caused a worldwide ecological crisis. This is “not only because of the leap in productive forces, but more importantly because labor, as the medium of the metabolic interaction between humans and nature, has undergone a qualitative change” (Saito Kohei, p. 46).

在施密特看来，马克思关于物质变换、劳动和生产关系之间辩证关系的分析，揭示了“人自己的自然之同一性与非同一性的历史辩证法”,即马克思笔下的劳动过程并非是超历史、无时间的，历史状况的变迁影响着劳动过程的各要素的性质，“一切对自然的加工都是‘在一定社会形式中并借这种社会形式’来进行的”。(参见施密特，第84页)换言之，劳动过程的各要素在马克思那里，不仅被视作一切生产的一般条件，还应被放置于特定历史阶段之中加以把握。因而，在生态马克思主义看来，以劳动为中介的人与自然之间的物质变换，在构成人类社会发展一般规律性的同时，其具体的物质变换形式也随着不同历史阶段的改变而呈现出不同的样态。在从传统到现代的全球性大转变暨现代化进程中，人与自然之间相对直接与和谐的“物质变换”样态被打破，由此产生了一个无法弥补的“物质变换裂隙”,并伴随着资本的全球扩张造成了世界性生态危机。这“不只是因为生产力飞跃发展，更为重要的是因为以人与自然的物质变换为媒介的劳动发生了质的变化”(斋藤幸平，第46页)。

III. The “Metabolic Rift” in the Process of Western Modernization

三、西方现代化进程中的“物质变换裂隙”

The “metabolic interaction” of nature, society, and the relationship between humans and nature, along with its effectiveness and rationality, constitutes the material foundation for the sustainable development of human society. It should be said that among the three major levels of Marx’s concept of “metabolic interaction,” the metabolic interaction between humans and nature is more universal and fundamental. Of course, this does not mean that metabolic interactions within nature itself or within society are unimportant. In fact, the three levels of metabolic interaction mentioned above are interconnected and interwoven, and in the decisive sense of the mode of production, they have shaped the historical succession of forms of human civilization. Marx sometimes uses the concept of “social metabolism” to express the subtle and complex interactive process of “metabolic interaction” between humans and nature, and “each diachronic social mode of production gives rise to a specific modality of social metabolism” (Clark and Foster, p. 314). Therefore, the metabolic interaction between humans and nature is itself a dialectical “social-historical” process. In a general abstract sense, “metabolic interaction” mediated by labor runs through the entire development of human society; in terms of its concrete forms, “metabolic interaction” takes on different modalities in different spatiotemporal positions due to changes in the concrete forms of labor.

自然、社会、人与自然之间的“物质变换”及其有效性与合理性，是人类社会永续发展的物质基础。应该说，在马克思“物质变换”概念的三大层面中，人与自然之间的物质变换更为普遍和根本。当然，这并不是说自然界内部的和社会的物质变换就不重要。事实上，上述三大层面的物质变换是相互连续和交织在一起的，并在生产方式的决定性意义上形塑了人类文明形态的历史性更替。马克思有时会使用“社会新陈代谢”概念来表述人与自然之间微妙而复杂的“物质变换”互动过程，而“每一种历时性的社会生产方式下都会形成一种特定的社会物质代谢样态”(Clark and Foster, p.314)。因而，人与自然之间的物质变换本身也是一种辩证的“社会—历史”过程。在一般抽象意义上，以劳动为中介的“物质变换”贯穿人类社会发展始终；就其具体形式而言，“物质变换”在不同的时空定位中因劳动具体形式的改变而呈现出不同样态。

Western modernization, characterized by large-scale industrial production under the dominance of capital, as a specific model marking the transition of human society from tradition to modernity, can be regarded as a process of “metabolic interaction” at a certain social-historical stage. For thousands of years before the Industrial Revolution and the technological revolution—whether the gathering and hunting of prehistoric cultural periods or the cultivation of plants and domestication of animals in agricultural civilization—the metabolic interaction between humans and nature mediated by labor was, on the whole, gentle and restrained. But with the advent of the Industrial Revolution and the technological revolution over two hundred years ago, the historical process of human society entered a “general dynamic of abrupt transformation” (Luo Rongqu, p. 8), and the curtain of modernization was formally raised. Examined through the category of “metabolic interaction,” which has been critically transformed by historical materialism, modernization is also a process in which society shapes specific historical forms of “metabolic interaction.” While transforming the social mode of production, the Industrial Revolution also transformed people’s modes of labor. Correspondingly, changes in concrete forms of labor inevitably drive changes in the forms of “metabolic interaction” mediated by labor. Marx also frequently uses “metabolic interaction” to denote the labor process of commodity production and exchange in capitalist society, thereby situating the resolution of the historical task of reconciling humans and nature within the broader social-historical context of the modernization process. Under the domination of capital, “the view of nature formed under the rule of private property and money is a genuine contempt for and practical degradation of nature” (Marx and Engels Collected Works, Vol. 1, p. 52). The “metabolic rift” between humans and nature thus emerges.

资本主导下的以工业化大生产为表征的西方现代化，作为标识人类社会从传统向现代转型的特定模式，可被视为一定社会历史阶段下的“物质变换”过程。工业革命和科技革命之前的数千年间，无论是史前文化时期的采集和渔猎，还是农业文明时期对植物的培育和对动物的驯养，以劳动为中介的人与自然之间的物质变换整体上显得温和而有节制。但随着两百多年前工业革命和科技革命的到来，人类社会历史进程进入了一个“急剧转变的总的动态”(罗荣渠，第8页)过程，现代化大幕也正式开启。用经过历史唯物主义批判性改造的“物质变换”范畴来审视，现代化也是社会形塑“物质变换”特定历史形式的过程。工业革命在变革社会生产方式的同时也变革了人们的劳动方式。相应地，具体劳动形式的改变也必然推动劳动中介下的“物质变换”形式的改变。马克思也经常使用“物质变换”来表示资本主义社会商品生产和交换的劳动过程，从而将人与自然和解的历史任务的解决置于现代化进程的社会历史大背景中。在资本的支配下，“在私有财产和金钱的统治下形成的自然观，是对自然界的真正的蔑视和实际的贬低”(《马克思恩格斯文集》第1卷，第52页)。人与自然之间的“物质变换裂隙”就此产生。

At the starting point of the capitalist mode of production, “primitive accumulation plays approximately the same role in political economy as original sin does in theology” (Marx and Engels Collected Works, Vol. 5, p. 820). This primitive accumulation is also a process of the dissolution of the original form of metabolic interaction and the reshaping of a new one. Early modernizing countries, on the one hand, plundered vast wealth through commercial trade and colonial wars; on the other hand, through forms “of blood and fire” such as the enclosure movement and the Black slave trade, they drove large numbers of laborers away from the land on which they depended for survival. This not only accumulated a large labor force for large-scale industrial production but also led to the dissolution of “the relation in which the worker regards the land as the natural condition of production” and “the relation in which the worker is the owner of the instrument,” and even the dissolution of “the relation of the worker himself, of living labor capacity itself” (cf. Marx and Engels Collected Works, Vol. 8, pp. 149-150), causing the “metabolic interaction” between humans and nature to be unable to proceed directly through the laborers’ own labor. The form of metabolic interaction that had lasted for thousands of years was thus broken, and capital, like a “wedge,” inserted itself into the metabolic interaction between humans and nature, creating a huge, unbridgeable “rift.”

在资本主义生产方式的起点意义上，“原始积累在政治经济学中所起的作用，同原罪在神学中所起的作用几乎是一样的”(《马克思恩格斯文集》第5卷，第820页)。这种原始积累也是原有的物质变换形式解体和新的物质变换重塑的过程。早期现代化国家一方面通过商业贸易、殖民战争掠夺了大量财富；另一方面以圈地运动、黑奴贸易等为代表的“血与火”形式，驱使大量劳动者离开其赖以生存的土地，不仅为工业化大生产蓄积了大量的劳动力，还导致了“劳动者把土地当做生产的自然条件的那种关系”和“劳动者是工具所有者的那种关系”的解体，甚至是“劳动者本身、活的劳动能力本身”关系的解体，(参见《马克思恩格斯文集》第8卷，第149-150页)致使人与自然之间的“物质变换”无法直接通过劳动者自身的劳动而开展。数千年来的物质变换形式由此被打破，资本犹如“楔子”嵌入人与自然之间的物质变换，造成了一道巨大的无法消弭的“裂隙”。

When capital becomes the master of everything, all factors of production, including nature itself, become nourishment for the infinite valorization of capital, degraded into “useful things” that “serve human needs” (cf. Marx and Engels Complete Works, Vol. 30, p. 390). From then on, capital begins to ignore the prior value of nature, disregard the finitude of natural resources, and despise the objective laws of nature, thoroughly instrumentalizing and commodifying nature, recklessly exploiting, conquering, and even plundering nature, thereby expanding the global “metabolic rift” under the dominance of capital. Following the profit-driven nature and logic of valorization of capital, capital in the torrent of Western modernization breaks through all geographical and national restrictions, “bustles about the whole globe… making the production and consumption of all countries cosmopolitan” (Marx and Engels Collected Works, Vol. 2, p. 35), comprehensively reshaping the rules and order of the world economy, politics, culture, and society. In the sense of “metabolic interaction” between humans and nature, modernization under the dominance of capital reveals its historical paradox and irony: a kind of “reflexive modernization,” “the possibility of a creative (self-)destruction of an entire epoch—the epoch of industrial society. The ‘object’ of this creative destruction is not the revolution of Western modernization, nor the crisis of Western modernization, but the victorious achievements of Western modernization” (Beck, Giddens, and Lash, p. 5).

当资本成为一切的主宰时，包括自然本身在内的一切生产要素，都成为资本无限增殖的养料，被降格为“服从于人的需要”的“有用物”。(参见《马克思恩格斯全集》第30卷，第390页)资本从此开始忽视自然的先在价值，无视自然资源的有限性，蔑视自然界的客观规律，将自然彻底工具化和商品化，肆无忌惮地开发、征服甚至劫掠自然，造成了资本主导下全球“物质变换裂隙”的扩大。遵循资本逐利本性与增殖逻辑，西方现代化洪流中的资本突破了地域的、民族的种种限制，“奔走于全球各地……使一切国家的生产和消费都成为世界性的了”(《马克思恩格斯文集》第2卷，第35页),全方位改塑了世界经济、政治、文化、社会等规则和秩序。在人与自然之间的“物质变换”意义上，资本主导下的现代化展现出其历史的悖论与吊诡之处：一种“自反性现代化”(Reflexive Modernization),“创造性地(自我)毁灭整整一个时代——工业社会时代——的可能性。这种创造性毁灭的‘对象’不是西方现代化的革命，也不是西方现代化的危机，而是西方现代化的胜利成果”(贝克、吉登斯、拉什，第5页)。

This “reflexive modernization” driven by capital, while creating an unprecedented growth in productive forces, has also sown the seeds that destroy the fruits of modernization: ecological crisis. Early large-scale industrial production generated vast quantities of harmful smoke, to the point that textile industrial districts such as Manchester became the most severely polluted areas. Although the second agricultural revolution triggered by the Industrial Revolution greatly increased per-unit yields, the massive use of chemical fertilizers, while saving labor, destroyed the compensatory mechanism of soil fertility: “as more and more people left the farms, the break in the soil nutrient cycle became even more complete than in the nineteenth century” (Foster, 2006b, p. 158). The “metabolic rift” between humans and nature grew ever wider. At present, “the rapidly spiraling ecological and social crises and the irreversible destructive consequences they inflict on humans and the many other species that coexist with us” (ibid., p. 17). With the global expansion of capital and ecological colonization, this “metabolic rift” has also evolved into a global ecological crisis, leading to development difficulties in the Third World. Therefore, Marx’s theory of the “metabolic rift” provides us with an effective theoretical tool for analyzing how the mode of production dominated by capital destroys the relationship between humans and nature on a global scale, and it has exerted growing influence in fields such as climate change, fisheries, nitrogen fertilizers, ecofeminism, and the dairy industry. (See Saito Kohei, p. 6)

资本驱动的这种“自反性现代化”,在创造了史无前例的生产力增长的同时，也种下了毁灭现代化成果的种子：生态危机。早期工业化大生产产生了大量有害烟雾，以至曼彻斯特等纺织工业区成为污染最严重的区域。工业革命引发的第二次农业革命虽然大大提高了单位亩产，但化肥的大量使用在节省人力的同时，破坏了土地肥力的补偿机制，“随着越来越多的人口离开农场，土壤养分循环的断裂也比19世纪更加彻底”(福斯特，2006年b, 第158页)。人与自然之间的“物质变换裂隙”愈发宽广。当下，“迅速失控的生态与社会危机及其对人类和众多其他与我们共存物种所造成的无可挽回的毁灭性后果”(同上，第17页)。随着资本在世界范围内的扩张与生态殖民，这道“物质变换裂隙”也演变为全球性生态危机，导致了第三世界的发展困境。因而，马克思的“物质变换裂隙”理论为我们分析资本主导下的生产方式如何在全球范围内破坏人与自然之间的关系提供了有效理论工具，并在气候变化、渔业、氮素肥料、生态女权主义、乳畜业等领域中产生了越来越大的影响力。(参见斋藤幸平，第6页)

In a word, “taking capital as the center is the greatest defect of Western modernization.” (See *Study Outline for Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era*, p. 58) This means that as long as modernization still follows the principle of maximizing capital’s interests and unfolds according to the logic of capital, the “metabolic rift” formed in the process of modernization cannot be effectively repaired or bridged. Humanity needs a new path of modernization to cope with the increasingly severe global ecological and environmental problems.

一言蔽之，“以资本为中心”是“西方现代化的最大弊端”。(参见《习近平新时代中国特色社会主义思想学习纲要》,第58页)这意味着，只要现代化还遵循资本利益最大化的原则，还按照资本逻辑展开，现代化进程中所形成的“物质变换裂隙”就无法得到有效修补与弥合。人类需要一种新的现代化道路以应对日益严峻的全球性生态环境问题。

IV. Chinese-Path Modernization Promotes the Ecological Reshaping of “Metabolism”

四、中国式现代化推动“物质变换”生态重塑

In terms of the historical process of human society itself, the modernization transformation of specific countries and regions is influenced by complex factors such as their own historical inheritance and actual circumstances, internal conditions and external environment, and mode of production and living habits. It therefore manifests different paths of modernization, and thereby shapes and presents different socio-historical forms of “metabolism.” “There is no single modernization model that is set in stone, nor is there any one-size-fits-all standard for modernization.” (Xi Jinping, *The Governance of China*, Vol. 4, p. 123) Since the 18th National Congress of the CPC, the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core has “planned economic and social development from the height of harmonious coexistence between humans and nature” (Xi Jinping, *Selected Works on Ecological Civilization*, Vol. 1, p. 232), adhered to the value principle of “people-centeredness,” upheld the core concept that “lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets,” and, through orderly and smooth “metabolism” between humans and nature, built a Beautiful China and jointly pursued a path of global ecological civilization.

就人类社会历史进程本身而言，特定国家和地区的现代化转型过程受自身历史传承与现实境遇、内部条件与外部环境、生产方式与生活习惯等复杂因素影响，因而呈现出不同的现代化道路，并由此塑造和呈现出“物质变换”的不同社会历史形态。“世界上既不存在定于一尊的现代化模式，也不存在放之四海而皆准的现代化标准。”(《习近平谈治国理政》第4卷，第123页)党的十八大以来，以习近平同志为核心的党中央“站在人与自然和谐共生的高度来谋划经济社会发展”(《习近平生态文明文选》第1卷，第232页),坚持“以人民为中心”的价值原则，坚守“绿水青山就是金山银山”的核心理念，以人与自然之间有序顺畅的“物质变换”建设美丽中国、共谋全球生态文明之路。

Also as a process of “metabolism,” Chinese-path modernization, on the basis of an ecological reflection on the history of world modernization over more than two hundred years, has established the Chinese characteristic and ecological foundation of “harmonious coexistence between humans and nature.” Chinese-path modernization abandons the Western modernization path that “takes capital as the center,” adheres to the ecological value principle of “people-centeredness,” and effectively avoids the defect of exchanging the sacrifice of the ecological environment for the maximization of capital’s interests. General Secretary Xi Jinping points out, “The people are the deepest foundation and

同样作为一种“物质变换”过程，中国式现代化在对两百余年来世界现代化历史进行生态反思的基础上，确立了“人与自然和谐共生”的中国特色和生态底色。中国式现代化摒弃了“以资本为中心”的西方现代化道路，坚持“以人民为中心”的生态价值原则，有效避免了以牺牲生态环境为代价换取资本利益最大化的弊端。习近平总书记指出，“人民是我们党执政的最深厚基础和最大底气”,为人民谋幸福、为民族谋复兴是中国式现代化的出发点和落脚点，只有“坚持发展为了人民、发展依靠人民、发展成果由人民共享，才会有正确的发展观、现代化观”。(参见《习近平谈治国理政》第4卷，第171页)在“以人民为中心”的发展观指引下，“人与自然和谐共生”成为中国式现代化的本质要求之一，“我国现代化是人与自然和谐共生的现代化。我国现代化注重同步推进物质文明建设和生态文明建设，走生产发展、生活富裕、生态良好的文明发展道路”(《习近平生态文明文选》第1卷，第209页)。人与自然和谐共生的中国式现代化，塑造了以和谐共生为标志的人与自然之间的“物质变换”新形态。

The “metabolism” of Chinese-path modernization adheres to the dialectical unity of purposiveness and regularity. Purposiveness refers to the transcendence of the instrumental rationality of the “metabolism” of Western modernization. Chinese-path modernization upholds people-centered value rationality, taking the satisfaction of the people’s ecological needs and the protection of a beautiful ecological environment as its value-oriented goal. Since the New Era, the people’s need for a better life has completed a historic transformation from “seeking adequate food and clothing” to “longing for environmental protection,” and from “seeking survival” to “seeking ecology.” We have already built a moderately prosperous society in all respects, and “whether a moderately prosperous society is comprehensive in all respects hinges critically on the quality of the ecological environment” (Xi Jinping, 2022b, p. 62). Regularity means that the “metabolism” of Chinese-path modernization follows the inherent laws of natural development. General Secretary Xi Jinping has repeatedly quoted Engels’s classic statement in *Dialectics of Nature* about “nature’s revenge,” and has repeatedly stressed that “human development activities must respect nature, follow its laws, and protect it; otherwise, they will suffer nature’s revenge. No one can defy this law. Humans are born of nature, and the relationship between humans and nature is one of symbiosis; harm to nature will ultimately harm humanity itself. Only by respecting the laws of nature can we effectively avoid taking detours in the development and utilization of nature” (ibid., p. 167). Western modernization follows the law of capital accumulation, treating nature as a mere instrumental existence, and has taken detours in the development and utilization of nature: the “metabolic rift” between humans and nature has thus emerged and intensified. The “metabolism” of Chinese-path modernization both adheres to the people-centered purposiveness, regarding ecological and environmental protection as a major project for people’s wellbeing, “persisting in benefiting the people, serving the people’s interests, and acting for the people through ecological protection”; and respects the regularity of natural laws, “considering not only the needs of humanity and the present generation, but also the needs of nature and future generations, properly grasping the limits of the development and utilization of natural resources, and not exceeding the carrying capacity of natural resources” (ibid., p. 11), thereby controlling the “metabolism” between humans and nature within a range of appropriate tension between economic and social development and ecological and environmental protection.

中国式现代化的“物质变换”,坚持合目的性与合规律性的辩证统一。合目的性是指对西方现代化“物质变换”工具理性的超越，中国式现代化坚持以人民为中心的价值理性，把满足人民的生态需求与维护美好生态环境作为价值目标导向。新时代以来，人民群众对美好生活的需要已经完成了从“求温饱”到“盼环保”、从“求生存”到“求生态”的历史性转变，我们已经全面建成了小康社会，“小康全面不全面，生态环境质量很关键”(习近平，2022年b, 第62页)。合规律性是指中国式现代化的“物质变换”遵循自然界发展的内在规律。习近平总书记多次引用恩格斯在《自然辩证法》中关于“大自然的报复”的经典话语，反复强调“人类发展活动必须尊重自然、顺应自然、保护自然，否则就会遭到大自然的报复。这个规律谁也无法抗拒。人因自然而生，人与自然是一种共生关系，对自然的伤害最终会伤及人类自身。只有尊重自然规律，才能有效防止在开发利用自然上走弯路”(同上，第167页)。西方现代化遵循资本增殖规律，将自然看作工具性存在，在开发利用自然上走了弯路：人与自然之间的“物质变换裂隙”由此产生并愈演愈烈。中国式现代化的“物质变换”,既坚持以人民为中心的合目的性，将生态环境保护看作重大民生工程，“坚持生态惠民、生态利民、生态为民”;又尊重自然规律的合规律性，“不仅要考虑人类和当代的需要，也要考虑大自然和后人的需要，把握好自然资源开发利用的度，不要突破自然资源承载能力”(同上，第11页),从而将人与自然之间的“物质变换”控制在一个经济社会发展与生态环境保护的适度张力范围之内。

However, the coordinated advancement of economic and social development alongside ecological and environmental protection has always been a world-class challenge. Looking back at the world modernization process over the past two hundred years, periods of rapid economic growth have often been accompanied by severe environmental pollution, which has almost become an unavoidable fate in the development of human society. In this regard, the Club of Rome issued the prophecy of “the limits to growth,” while “Silent Spring” became the origin of the modern environmental protection movement. In the course of China’s modernization, it too once faced this world-class challenge. As socialism with Chinese characteristics entered the New Era, the way to resolve the dilemma of the “paradox” between economic and social development and ecological and environmental protection in the modernization process gradually emerged: “lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets.” Breaking free from entrenched thinking patterns and rigid economic and social development routines, “invaluable assets” and “lucid waters and lush mountains” are by no means an either-or, separate and opposing relationship, but rather a mutually reinforcing, dialectically unified one. The “Two Mountains Theory” has gradually become the core concept of ecological civilization construction, vividly depicting the picture of “metabolism” in Chinese-path modernization. On the one hand, sustainable and high-quality economic and social development must take the smooth and orderly metabolism between humans and nature as its prerequisite and foundation; on the other hand, “the success or failure of ecological and environmental protection ultimately depends on the economic structure and the mode of economic development” (Selected Works of Xi Jinping on Ecological Civilization, Vol. 1, p. 4). Ecological and environmental protection provides sustainable natural resources and an energy foundation for economic and social development, while economic and social development provides ample financial support and advanced technological guarantees for better protecting the ecological environment.

然而，经济社会发展与生态环境保护的同步协调推进，历来是一个世界级难题。纵观两百余年来的世界现代化进程，经济高速增长时期往往伴随着严重的环境污染，这几乎成为人类社会发展难以避免的宿命。对此，罗马俱乐部有着“增长的极限”预言，“寂静的春天”则成为现代环境保护运动的滥觞。中国现代化进程中，同样也曾经面临这一世界级难题。随着中国特色社会主义进入新时代，现代化进程中经济社会发展与生态环境保护两难“悖论”的破解之道逐步呈现：“绿水青山就是金山银山”。跳出固有的思维模式和固化的经济社会发展套路，金山银山和绿水青山决不是非此即彼、割裂对立的关系，而是相辅相成、辩证统一的关系。“两山论”逐步成为生态文明建设的核心理念，形象刻画了中国式现代化的“物质变换”图景。一方面，经济社会的可持续和高质量发展必须以人与自然之间顺畅有序的物质变换为前提和基础；另一方面，“生态环境保护的成败，归根结底取决于经济结构和经济发展方式”(《习近平生态文明文选》第1卷，第4页)。生态环境保护为经济社会发展提供了可持续的自然资源和能源基础，而经济社会发展则为更好地保护生态环境提供了雄厚的资金支持和先进的技术保障。

“In practice, the understanding of the relationship between lucid waters and lush mountains and invaluable assets has gone through three stages. The first stage was using lucid waters and lush mountains to exchange for invaluable assets, without considering or rarely considering the carrying capacity of the environment… The second stage was wanting both invaluable assets and to preserve lucid waters and lush mountains; at this time, the contradiction between economic development and resource scarcity and environmental degradation began to become prominent… The third stage was recognizing that lucid waters and lush mountains can continuously bring invaluable assets, that lucid waters and lush mountains themselves are invaluable assets… Ecological advantages become economic advantages” (Study Outline for Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, pp. 28-29). Historically, China’s modernization process and the reshaping of its “metabolism” pattern have also roughly gone through the above three stages.

“实践中对绿水青山和金山银山之间关系的认识经过了三个阶段。第一个阶段是用绿水青山去换金山银山，不考虑或者很少考虑环境的承载能力……第二个阶段是既要金山银山，但是也要保住绿水青山，这时候经济发展与资源匮乏、环境恶化之间的矛盾开始凸显出来……第三个阶段是认识到绿水青山可以源源不断地带来金山银山，绿水青山本身就是金山银山……生态优势变成经济优势”。(《习近平新时代中国特色社会主义思想学习纲要》,第28-29页)历史地看，中国的现代化进程及其“物质变换”样态的重塑，也大致经历了以上三个阶段。

During the period of socialist revolution and construction, the establishment of socialist public ownership laid the institutional foundation for rationally regulating metabolism. The Chinese Communists represented by Comrade Mao Zedong attached great importance to the natural conditions for socialist production and reproduction, such as “the air in the sky, the forests on the land, and the treasures underground” (Selected Works of Mao Zedong, Vol. 7, p. 34), advocating afforestation and actively building water conservancy projects. However, considering that the main task of the people nationwide during this period was to “concentrate efforts on developing the social productive forces” in order to “realize national industrialization” (see Resolution of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on the Major Achievements and Historical Experience of the Party over the Past Century, p. 11), there was a certain degree of overuse of natural resources such as land and forests. During the new period of reform and opening up and socialist modernization, with rapid economic growth, ecological and environmental problems gradually emerged. Environmental protection became a basic national policy of China, and the regulation and control of the “metabolism” between humans and nature began to be guaranteed by the rule of law. As reform and opening up deepened, the “metabolism” in the process of socialist modernization, accompanied by the rapid advancement of industrialization and urbanization, took on new patterns and characteristics, and ecological and environmental protection work became a clear shortcoming. Since the 18th National Congress of the CPC, the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core has attached unprecedented importance to and addressed ecological and environmental issues, creatively proposing and implementing the important thesis that “lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets.” The “Two Mountains Theory” has become an original viewpoint and iconic thesis of Xi Jinping Thought on Ecological Civilization. The natural ecosystem represented by “lucid waters and lush mountains” is a new development in adapting Marx’s concept of “humanized nature” to the Chinese context and the needs of the times, laying the natural material foundation for Chinese-path modernization; the dialectical unity between the socio-economic system represented by “invaluable assets” and “lucid waters and lush mountains” provides a new historical orientation and practical direction for adhering to the path of Chinese-path modernization characterized by harmony between humans and nature; the coordinated advancement between the “two mountains” injects a new value dimension into the sustainable development of human society, highlighting the “people-centered” value stance; the holistic systemic engineering thinking represented by “humans and nature are a community of life” and “integrated protection and systematic governance of mountains, waters, forests, farmlands, grasslands, and deserts” provides a methodological thinking for solving the world-class problem of the “dilemma” between economic and social development and ecological and environmental protection. Since the New Era, China has achieved a win-win situation of high-quality economic and social development and high-level ecological and environmental protection. The worldview and methodological significance of the “Two Mountains Theory” has gradually become evident. The overall condition of the ecological environment, represented by the three basic natural resources of air, water, and soil, has improved. China’s ecological and environmental protection work has undergone a fundamental transformation that is “historic, transformative, and comprehensive,” and “ecological civilization construction in the New Era has achieved remarkable and globally recognized great achievements” (Selected Works of Xi Jinping on Ecological Civilization, Vol. 1, p. 274), shaping a new pattern of Chinese-path modernization in the “metabolism” between humans and nature.

社会主义革命和建设时期，社会主义公有制的建立为合理地调节物质变换奠定了制度基础。以毛泽东同志为代表的中国共产党人高度重视“天上的空气，地上的森林，地下的宝藏”(《毛泽东文集》第7卷，第34页)等社会主义生产和再生产的自然条件，倡导植树造林，积极兴修水利。但考虑到这一时期全国人民的主要任务是“集中力量发展社会生产力”以“实现国家工业化”,(参见《中共中央关于党的百年奋斗重大成就和历史经验的决议》,第11页)对土地、森林等自然资源存在一定程度的过度使用现象。改革开放和社会主义现代化建设新时期，随着经济高速增长，生态环境问题逐步显现，环境保护成为我国的基本国策，并开始以法治为保障规制和调节人与自然之间的“物质变换”。随着改革开放向纵深发展，社会主义现代化进程中的“物质变换”伴随工业化、城镇化的高速推进而呈现出新的样态和特征，生态环境保护工作成为一个明显短板。党的十八大以来，以习近平同志为核心的党中央以前所未有的力度重视和解决生态环境问题，创造性提出并践行了“绿水青山就是金山银山”的重要论断，“两山论”成为习近平生态文明思想的原创性观点和标识性论断。以“绿水青山”为代表的自然生态系统，是马克思“人化自然”观的中国化时代化新发展，为中国式现代化奠定了自然物质基础；以“金山银山”为代表的社会经济系统与“绿水青山”之间的辩证统一，为坚持走人与自然和谐共生的中国式现代化道路提供了新的历史方位和现实方向；“两山”之间的协调推进，为人类社会可持续发展注入了新的价值维度，彰显了“以人民为中心”的价值立场；以“人与自然是生命共同体”“山水林田湖草沙一体化保护和系统治理”为代表的整体性系统工程思维，为破解经济社会发展与生态环境保护“两难”的世界性问题提供了思维方法论。新时代以来，中国实现了经济社会高质量发展与生态环境高水平保护的双赢，“两山论”的世界观方法论意义逐步彰显。以空气、水源、土壤等三大基础性自然资源为代表的生态环境总体状况得以好转，我国生态环境保护工作发生了“历史性、转折性、全局性”的根本转变，“新时代生态文明建设取得举世瞩目的巨大成就”(《习近平生态文明文选》第1卷，第274页),塑造了人与自然“物质变换”的中国式现代化新样态。

These three historical stages are not only a process of transformation and upgrading of the economic growth model, but also a process of continuous renewal and replacement of development concepts, and even more so a process in which the “metabolism” between humans and nature moves towards harmony and order. In particular, the “Two Mountains Theory,” as the core concept of ecological civilization construction, connects the natural ecosystem represented by “lucid waters and lush mountains” with the socio-economic system represented by “invaluable assets,” and through the systemic thinking of “humans and nature are a community of life,” provides a fundamental method for solving the world-class problem of the “dilemma” between economic and social development and ecological and environmental protection, embodying an innovation in worldview and methodology for handling the relationship between humans and nature.

这三个历史阶段，既是经济增长方式的转型升级过程，亦是发展观念不断更新换代的过程，更是人与自然之间“物质变换”趋向和谐有序的过程。特别是作为生态文明建设核心理念的“两山论”,联通了以“绿水青山”为代表的自然生态系统与以“金山银山”为代表的社会经济系统，并通过“人与自然是生命共同体”的系统论思维，为破解经济社会发展与生态环境保护“两难”的世界性问题提供了根本方法，体现了处理人与自然关系的世界观方法论创新。

V. Conclusion

五、结语

No matter how one understands the course of human social development, including modernization, one cannot avoid a fundamental and overarching issue: the relationship between humanity and nature. For the survival of the human species and the continuation of human civilization both require the exchange of matter and energy with nature—that is, the “metabolism” between humanity and nature. The concept of “metabolism,” after being transformed by Marx’s historical materialism, became the theoretical foundation of Marx’s ecological thought and the “weapon of critique” for examining the process of human social modernization. Based on Marx’s concept of “metabolism,” modernization can also be seen as a socio-historical process of reshaping the relationship between humanity and nature. In other words, no matter how one outlines the blueprint for modernization, or which path of modernization one chooses, the relationship between humanity and nature constitutes a fundamental dimension of modernization. The rational and orderly “metabolism” between the two lays the material foundation and historical premise for the process of modernization. Unlike the West, which spontaneously moved toward modernization through the Industrial Revolution and the scientific-technological revolution and created a “metabolic rift” between humanity and nature, Chinese-path modernization is in essence a socialist modernization. It adheres to the fundamental attributes of socialism, gradually reforms and integrates the economic, political, cultural, and social spheres, and moves toward the harmonious coexistence of humanity and nature in the overall transformation of society. The establishment of the socialist state system has laid the institutional foundation for Chinese-path modernization to surpass Western modernization in the sense of the ecological foundation on which human survival depends, because “the best green strategies are those designed to overthrow capitalism and build socialism/communism” (Pepper, p. 337). It should be noted that the “metabolism” in the process of Chinese-path modernization does not immediately become a “completed state” with the establishment of socialist relations of production; rather, it is an “ongoing process” based on the shaping of socialist relations of production. Marx once depicted the future vision of “metabolism” between humanity and nature: “The associated producers, rationally regulating their metabolism with nature, bringing it under their common control instead of being ruled by it as a blind power; accomplishing it with the least expenditure of energy and under conditions most worthy of and appropriate to their human nature” (Marx and Engels, Collected Works, Vol. 7, pp. 928-929). Chinese-path modernization is situated within this great historical process, providing Chinese wisdom and a Chinese approach for moving toward the ideal state of “metabolism” between humanity and nature that Marx described, and for achieving the harmonious coexistence of humanity and nature.

无论怎样理解包括现代化在内的人类社会发展历程，都离不开一个根本性和全局性的问题：人与自然的关系。因为人类自身的存续和人类文明的延续，都需要同自然之间进行物质和能量的交换即人与自然之间的“物质变换”。经过马克思历史唯物主义改造后的“物质变换”概念，成为马克思生态思想的理论基点和透视人类社会现代化进程的“批判的武器”。立足马克思“物质变换”概念，现代化亦可被视为人与自然关系的社会历史性重塑过程。换言之，无论如何勾勒现代化蓝图，无论选择走何种现代化道路，人与自然关系都构成了现代化的基本向度，二者之间合理而有序的“物质变换”,为现代化进程奠定了物质基础和历史前提。与西方依靠工业革命和科技革命自发走向现代化并造成了人与自然之间“物质变换裂隙”不同，中国式现代化在本质上是社会主义现代化，坚持社会主义根本属性，逐步改革和整合经济、政治、文化、社会等各层面，并在社会总体转型中迈向人与自然和谐共生。社会主义国家制度的确立，为中国式现代化在事关人类存续的生态基点意义上超越西方现代化奠定了制度基础，因为“最好的绿色战略是那些设计来推翻资本主义、建立社会主义/共产主义的战略”(佩珀，第337页)。需要说明的是，中国式现代化进程中的“物质变换”,并不会因社会主义生产关系的确立即刻成为“完成时”,而是以社会主义生产关系形塑为基点的“进行时”。马克思曾描绘了人与自然之间“物质变换”的未来图景：“社会化的人，联合起来的生产者，将合理地调节他们和自然之间的物质变换，把它置于他们的共同控制之下，而不让它作为一种盲目的力量来统治自己；靠消耗最小的力量，在最无愧于和最适合于他们的人类本性的条件下来进行这种物质变换。”(《马克思恩格斯文集》第7卷，第928-929页)中国式现代化正处于这一伟大历史进程之中，为通向马克思所描绘的人与自然之间“物质变换”的理想状态，实现人与自然和谐共生提供了中国智慧和中国方案。