20 Minutes with Joerg Rieger: Anthropocene Vs. Capitalocene

Blaming “humanity” for climate collapse feels intuitive, but it hides the real drivers. We sit down with Prof. Joerg Rieger to unpack why Anthropocene flattens responsibility and how Capitalocene offers a sharper, more useful map—one that follows power, money, and relationships across extraction, production, and belief. From oil fields to boardrooms to pews, we trace how decisions at the top cascade into carbon, culture, and daily life.

We start with the familiar story: humans shape the planet. Then we pull the thread—who, exactly, is shaping what? Joerg walks us through the links between petroleum, minerals, finance, and law, showing how extraction and exploitation move together. We interrogate terms like Eurocene and Petrocene, and explain why focusing on identities or single resources misses the system organizing them. Along the way, we tackle a live debate in geology about timescales, arguing that the rapid acceleration of capital-driven warming justifies a vocabulary that centers agency where it operates.

The conversation turns to theology and culture, where modern metaphors drift from kings to CEOs. If God begins to mirror a chief executive bound to shareholder value, what happens to care for the common good? Jorg offers a theologically grounded critique and points to alternative traditions—jubilee, stewardship, solidarity—that resist extractive defaults. We also explore AI’s near future: not a savior or a curse, but a force that will amplify whatever incentives it serves. Under current structures, it risks deepening inequality and environmental strain; under new governance and ownership, it can help build resilience.

By the end, we trade guilt for clarity. Instead of shaming consumers, we focus on production standards, energy systems, ownership, and policy that shift outcomes at scale. If you’re ready to move past vague blame toward concrete levers for change—across climate, economy, and faith—this conversation maps the terrain and points to the work ahead. Subscribe, share with a friend who loves big ideas, and leave a review with one system you think we should unpack next.

This episode of Religion and Justice was produced by Peterson Toscano Studios. Learn more about their other podcasts and projects. Visit petersontoscano.com.

About Religion and Justice
Religion and Justice is a podcast from the Wendland-Cook Program in Religion and Justice at Vanderbilt Divinity School. We explore the intersections of class, religion, labor, and ecology, uncovering how these forces shape the work of justice and solidarity. Each episode offers space for investigation, education, and organizing through conversations with scholars, organizers, and practitioners.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:02

So, when you talk about the Anthropocene, you're basically now blaming human beings in general. It basically assumes you know the solution is let's get rid of human beings and we're fine.

SPEAKER_01 0:16

Welcome everyone to a new series we have on some very complicated terms that we're gonna sort of unpack over the course of several uh episodes. And we have with us today the leading expert on a lot of these terms, Professor Jorg Rieger. So thank you for being with us.

Launching The “Scenes” Series

SPEAKER_02 0:34

Glad to be with you, George. Uh looking forward to this. Uh, they might be complicated terms, but this is also fun. Uh, this is the sort of stuff I think that will make some light bulbs go up.

SPEAKER_01 0:45

So the first term we're basically dealing with today is one that is very critical to your scholarship right now, which is the capitalocene. Could you first describe what we mean by these scenes? C-E-N-E? We're seeing them in various ways across different disciplines. The one that seems to be very prevalent right now is Anthropocene. So could you talk about these scenes and Anthropocene, and then maybe why the Capitalocene is different? Aaron Ross Powell Right.

Defining Geological Ages

From Anthropocentrism To Anthropocene

SPEAKER_02 1:14

So so this is really about geological ages. You know, people will have heard about the Pleistocene, the Holocene. Uh that's probably the most recent one, right? The Holocene, uh, that's the geological age since the last ice age, and this is sort of the emergence of human civilization in the last 10,000, 11,000 years. The one that everybody knows is Anthropocene, and I think this is what's in people's minds. Anthropocene means this is the part of the geological age that's determined by humanity. So humans now shape the planet, uh course shape themselves, but shape everything to such a degree that humans are now what changes the planets, and so those who like to think in geological ages say this is a new age, you know, it's no longer the end of the ice age or this age or that age that's determined geologically, but humans now have become a factor in determining uh geological history and reshape the world, basically. Those of us who talk about the Capitolocene, I I did not invent the term, it was uh Jason Moore picking up something that uh Andreas Malm had said. When we talk about the Capitolocene, uh it's actually meant as an alternative to talk about the Anthropocene.

SPEAKER_01 2:30

Yeah, Anthropocene is and uh and even the idea of the Anthropocene has its roots as it ties into the ecological crisis, going back to Lynn White's 1967 field-shaping essay, where he talked about the singular cause or problem in the ecological crisis is anthropocentrism. Could you talk about that for a second?

Why Capitalocene Changes The Question

SPEAKER_02 2:52

So if you haven't heard about Lynn White, right, this is what everybody talks about. Uh, this is a person, historian that wrote an article in 1967 that acquired fame. But the basic point of White was that uh, you know, anthropocentrism is the problem of the world. That is uh, you know, human beings putting themselves in the center. And the causes for that, uh, you know, the primary cause White says is Christianity. Christianity, White said, is the most anthropocentric religion the world has ever seen. It's all about humanity, nobody cares about anything else. And this, White says, has shaped the modern world. So the way we think as moderns, including, you know, modern science and so on, uh, is all anthropocentric. So it's all about the human being, nothing about anything else, the environment, ecology, animals, plants, and so on. That's of course, to some degree right if you look at sort of the majority opinion. There's a lot of anthropocentrism out there. I think uh that's where Lynn White got it. By the way, Lynn White is a man. Uh people think uh Lynn uh is a woman's name, but in this case it's actually a man's name. And what Lynn uh White was saying here uh to some degree makes sense. What he wasn't quite clear about is there have always been alternatives. I mean, even in Christianity, you know, you have the romantics in Europe, you know, you have the transcendentalists in the US. They were also uh nature-loving uh and not so anthropocentric. They challenge science, they challenge technology, all that stuff is out there also. But the basic assumption was, you know, because it's not all about the human being, this is where we are, and it's Christianity's and religions' fault. To some degree, there there's a kernel of truth, but it is missing something else, a bigger picture here.

SPEAKER_01 4:40

Yeah, and the anthro in anthropocentrism speaks to sort of the anthropos, humanity in general is really kind of the problem, also. So centering humanity in general kind of makes this all really unfolds the ecological crisis as we understand it today. But there's a bunch of alternatives that have come on the uh on the scene, not to do a pun here, but the Manocene, the Eurocene, the Cthulhu scene, the petrol scene, all of these, and Capital Oscene sort of joins all of those alternatives. Why, why do you go towards Capitalocene versus all these others that you find to be really important?

Beyond Identities To Power And Money

SPEAKER_02 5:16

So take this back to the Anthropocene, and of course, uh White was not talking about the Anthropocene, so there's a bit of a stretch from anthropocentrism to Anthropocene. But you know, there's some common DNA here. The problem is what gets overlooked. So when you talk about the Anthropocene, you're basically now blaming human beings in general. The solution is, well, let's forget about human beings, let's look at something else, right? That's a little simplistic because uh not only it blames all of human beings, it basically assumes, you know, the solution is let's get rid of human beings and we're fine. That doesn't quite work. The capitalocene here is a better term compared to the Anthropocene because it actually talks about flow of money and power. So now when we talk about human beings again, the question is which human beings are actually the ones who are calling the shots. Which humanity is the biggest problem? This not to let anybody off the hook, but is to say there's a difference between the billionaire and the person that's doing farming in Asia. Those things have to be kept in mind. If you look at Eurocene, you can say, well, the Europeans, of course, shape the globe. Well, that's true too, you know, uh part of my background is European, right? I'm from Germany. So there is a real problem with Europe shaping the world in its own image. But then again, blaming Europeans uh altogether doesn't really make a lot of sense either, if you don't look at which Europeans we're talking about. Who has the money? Who is actually in control, who has the power. And so uh talking about identities doesn't quite help as much, even though there's something to it, I wouldn't I wouldn't necessarily deny it. That's the truth with everything else, you know. You could of course say, you know, it's um the authoritarian scene or something like that, it's all authoritarians out there. But even that, you know, uh you couldn't really be an authoritarian ruler these days without having the money. So it comes back to the capitalist scene. And keep in mind this is not a moral argument, it's not so capital is bad and we should hate it. Uh it's at first just an analytical point to say what drives what? What's going on here? Of course, then the question is how do we engage in?

SPEAKER_01 7:32

So does capitalocene focus on a smaller group of the anthropos, or does it focus on a system beyond sort of humanity?

SPEAKER_02 7:42

That's a really good question. It focuses to some degree on some specific people, right? There is a small group of extremely wealthy people. When we look at Russia, we call them the oligarchs. Uh, that term isn't used in the US as much, but it's coming, right? People are not talking about American oligarchs too. Autocracy, the ruling, the rule of wealth or of the wealthy. All of that, I think, is part of it. But in the end, of course, uh keep in mind that when we talk about people, we're always talking about relationships. So so no wealthy people are wealthy just because they're wealthy. I was just reading a book uh titled All Riches Come from Injustice. This is a book uh about the church fathers. This is not somebody who woke up yesterday and said, Oh, all riches are in unjust. The church fathers said you can only be rich if you build your wealth, and your wealth uh is built on the back of other people. That's really interesting here too, Zozo. There's something about these relationships that uh then of course put certain people in certain positions. But I think what you're also asking for is that it's not about individuals, it's not about demonizing this or that wealthy person, it's not about blaming people who have more than others. It's looking at the structures, it's looking at the relationships, which are of course between people, but then these relationships are also between people and the environment. Uh, and that's what we're seeing. So those who would talk about the petro scene, for instance, realize that uh, you know, a lot of this power comes from exploiting, extracting petroleum, right? Uh oil, minerals, uh, all those kinds of things. That too is a relationship. But keep in mind, extraction and exploitation are always closely related. So the one who extracts the fuels uh and and the minerals and all of this is also the one who exploits. And so those two things have to be seen together, which is why I think the capitolocene is still the better term than the Petrocene, because then you think, oh, this is about minerals and oil. It's really about relationships.

SPEAKER_01 9:48

So a number I want to say within the last two or three years, the International Commission on Stratigraphy and the International Union of Geological Sciences both officially had submissions to their voting bodies that the Anthropocene be taken up as the current geological epoch. Ultimately, the Anthropocene was rejected for a number of reasons, but one of the main ones was that terms like the Holocene are sort of these massive long periods that you can almost identify in the geological record. But to say the Anthropocene is to sort of start looking at geological epochs in a very short, limited time where we don't have that retroactive glance back to be able to see 11,000 years, let's say, or even longer for some of the geological epochs. Does Capitalocene have the same issue that we might be looking at something, but we don't have that 11,000 yard stare to be able to really understand the issues and the systems that are fundamentally creating our world and our reality?

Acceleration, Carbon, And Capital

AI, Power, And Future Risks

SPEAKER_02 10:58

That is a problem, that uh we don't have these long-term uh perspectives here. But at the same time, uh it seems to me that things are speeding up under the capital scene. In the past there was global warming that was not caused by the flow of capital. That usually took a little longer, right? What we're seeing now, this capital cost global warming. Most of that is in the last 250 years. So that's not eleven thousand years, but it is significant and it has significant consequences for the planet. This is different than just saying we don't know enough about humans. Of course, uh there are things we're still learning, but the problem is we we actually see how capital has done a lot in a very short term. And I think this is again why it is more appropriate than Anthropocene. It can actually put this back to carbon emissions, which weren't just immediate because there's carbon, but because uh capital had an interest uh in doing this kind of thing. At the same time, you know, if you think about Capitolocene, Anthrocene, and so on, you now have to say what happens after humanity. I say this cautiously, but we're now seeing with the development of a an intelligence growing that already is surpassing human IQs. Some of the experts say uh in the next 20 years, 25 years perhaps, it will be a billion times smarter. So as AI now moves into some of the places that still need to be occupied, capitolocene also is a warning sign what that could do. In other words, AI itself might not be the problem, humanity itself might not be the problem, but how the relationships get played out, how money and power are distributed might actually be a problem even when humanity now is less in charge, when a lot of people have lost their job. This is happening now already. So in that sense, too, uh I think it is a term that is more future-proof, probably, than Anthropocene.

Theology Reframed By Capitalocene

SPEAKER_01 13:08

Future-proof, I like that. Your major book out right now is Theology and the Capitalocene, Ecology, Identity, Class, and Solidarity. And then you also have been influencing other religious studies scholars and theologians, so much so that a new book came out published with Dare, Facing Climate Collapse, Ecology, Theology, and Capitolo Scene, where you're in the epilogue. And there was a very tiny quote that I wanted to read that that leads into a question. You say the Capitolocene is, quote, foundational for the study of religion and theology. The Capitalocene is foundational for the study of religion and theology. And I'm just wondering why is Capitalocene so fundamental for understanding religion and theology?

God As CEO And Its Consequences

Moving From Blame To Structures

SPEAKER_02 14:00

Whoever has listened up to this point uh might wonder why the theologian is talking about all these things, right? It sounds like a lot of social criticism talking about the world and all of this. But my basic point here is that the capital scene here, uh, as it is reshaping the planet and reshaping humanity, human relationships, is also reshaping everything else. So it's reshaping politics. We see that right now. You know, if we don't see it now, we'll probably never find it. But it's also reshaping religion, it's also reshaping ideas, it's also reshaping traditions, and this is where I think some of the work really has to be done yet. Because people assume capitalism is something for politicians, uh economists, perhaps, theologians for us it's optional. But uh what I'm seeing, and and this this is uh what I'm talking about in the book, is that the capital scene is shaping religion so deeply and theology that it's basically taken over our basic terms. And maybe the best example here is images of God, where of course people have always looked up, right? Uh when they say God, they look for a higher power. This is what AA calls it. And so you always look higher than than you are. But what exactly is that higher power? There were images of kings and emperors and rulers and this and that and popes perhaps. But now it seems to me images of God resemble more and more the CEO. And what's the difference, right? Because well, king, CEO, they're all on top. But you know, in the old days a king actually would have had some responsibility for everybody, the common good. I'm not a monarchy, so I'm I'm not arguing for monarchy here, but somebody who is ruling from the top down like a king would have had the obligation to take care of the poor, would have had the obligation to take care of the environment, not to burn up the planet. Whereas the CEO, this is not me guessing here, this is what the law says. A CEO is responsible to the bottom line, in other words, the shareholders who are making the money off the company. Now, if this is God, you can see how our God image here becomes really problematic. God basically helps those who help themselves, right? God is the one who is with those at the top and everything else gets lost. So this is where one example of how I think the capital scene is a lot more influential in our theological thinking. I mean, we could talk about everything else, you know, sin, salvation, evil, Christ, and all that stuff is also shaped. And so for me then the question is if this is going on, how do we develop alternatives? When I talk about the capitalocene, this is the crucial point here. I'm never, you know, using that word in despair or you know, being so negative. I'm saying, well, if this is where we are, what now? So so it's really uh in search of solutions that I'm talking about this.

SPEAKER_01 17:02

Yeah, oftentimes you bring up problematic moralizing that takes place. I think whenever we we talk about something like the Anthropocene, there is a implicit moralization that's there. The humanity in general, right? So the human being at large, but then also the individual is really at fault here for the ecological crisis. And the capitalist scene disrupts that sort of moralizing. I'm wondering, could you talk about that in the next like minute and a half?

Closing Reflections And Next Steps

SPEAKER_02 17:32

Yeah, thanks for that. This is really good. So, what happens when you sort of blame individuals is you're forgetting about the bigger connections. Consumerism is a great example. When you blame consumerism and consumers for doing damage to the planet, what you're overlooking and in fact covering up perhaps some of that is done intentionally. When you blame consumerism and consumers for doing damage to the planet, you're covering up the fact of production. Who needs to keep producing? Who needs to keep enticing consumers? The reason why there is so much consumption is not just because people want to consume, but somebody needs to sell stuff. Somebody wants to sell stuff, keeps producing stuff. So it's those relationships that are usually overlooked. By looking at these broader relationships, the capitalist scene here is actually helping us to see not only what's wrong with consumerism, but how we could address it at the source rather than by blaming individuals. Now, somebody might say that's yet another moralism because now you're blaming companies and corporations, but not so much, you know, who is corporations, right? It's relationships, uh, it's something that has been built, something that is part of our current economic situation, and something that can be changed. And so it's not making anybody look bad, it's simply asking the question, what's good for us and how do we deal with that?

SPEAKER_01 19:05

Thank you so much, York. Thank you for being with us. The capital of scene. It's a lot to unpack there. Thanks. Welcome.

SPEAKER_02 19:13

Uh, and keep thinking about it theologically. I think this is where we can make a contribution. That's what we're trying to do at the Winland Cook program. What do we do when this is the problem.

SPEAKER_00 19:31

And you have to reach out to your friends who think they are making it good and get them to understand that they as well as you and I.