Philippe Descola
Philippe Descola has renewed Claude Lévi-Strauss’s analyses of the relationship between humans and non-humans by drawing on the works of Bruno Latour on the politics of nature and Luc Boltanski on the justification of social conduct. He has relied on the reflection of Eduardo Viveiros de Castro to demonstrate that Amazonian ontologies radically overturn the principles of European ontologies. His fourfold division of ontologies—animism, totemism, analogism, and naturalism—provides a framework for understanding the conflicts and the alliances that arise from the global ecological crisis.
