#1220 Alyssa Battistoni - Free Gifts: Capitalism and the Politics of Nature

Feb 26, 2026

Alyssa Battistoni, Assistant Professor of Political Science at Barnard and author of Free Gifts, explores how capitalism treats nature as a 'free gift' and why that matters. She traces the idea to classical political economy, links it to externalities and unpaid housework, and considers what changes if we stop assuming nature is free. Short, provocative takes on politics, labor, and the biosphere.

Ask episode

AI Snips

Chapters

Books

Transcript

Episode notes

INSIGHT

Wage Labor Creates Nature As Free Gift

Capitalism's wage-labor form makes human labor a commodity and, by contrast, turns nonhuman processes into wageless free gifts.
Because nonhuman entities can't sell 'labor power', their contributions remain unpriced or appear as property instead.

INSIGHT

Critique Focused On Capitalist Unfreedom

Battistoni reframes the ecological critique of capitalism as a critique of capitalist unfreedom: it's not just destruction but the inability to democratically choose how to transform nature.
She borrows 'freedom to' language: we lack responsible, collective choice under capitalist compulsions.

INSIGHT

Human Cooperation As A Captured Free Gift

Marx's idea of the free gift of human cooperation describes productivity gains from collective labor that capital captures.
The industrial factory is the apex where capital reorganizes work to extract this cooperative surplus.

Get the Snipd Podcast app to discover more snips from this episode

Get the app

******Support the channel******

Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/thedissenter

PayPal: paypal.me/thedissenter

PayPal Subscription 1 Dollar: https://tinyurl.com/yb3acuuy

PayPal Subscription 3 Dollars: https://tinyurl.com/ybn6bg9l

PayPal Subscription 5 Dollars: https://tinyurl.com/ycmr9gpz

PayPal Subscription 10 Dollars: https://tinyurl.com/y9r3fc9m

PayPal Subscription 20 Dollars: https://tinyurl.com/y95uvkao

******Follow me on******

Website: https://www.thedissenter.net/

The Dissenter Goodreads list: https://shorturl.at/7BMoB

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thedissenteryt/

Twitter: https://x.com/TheDissenterYT

This show is sponsored by Enlites, Learning & Development done differently. Check the website here: http://enlites.com/

Dr. Alyssa Battistoni is Assistant Professor of Political Science at Barnard College. She works and teaches on climate and environmental politics, capitalism, Marxism, feminism, and other topics in modern social and political theory. She is the author of Free Gifts: Capitalism and the Politics of Nature.

In this episode, we focus on Free Gifts. We talk about the relationship between nature and politics. We discuss the concept of “free gift” in classical economics. We talk about how capitalism devalues nature, a critique of capitalist unfreedom, the free gift of human cooperation, the effects of capitalism on nature as “externalities”, why housework is unpaid and unvalued under capitalism, and the biosphere. Finally, we discuss what would happen if we stopped treating nature as a free gift, and how we should engage with the nonhuman world differently.

A HUGE THANK YOU TO MY PATRONS/SUPPORTERS: PER HELGE LARSEN, BERNARDO SEIXAS, ADAM KESSEL, MATTHEW WHITINGBIRD, ARNAUD WOLFF, TIM HOLLOSY, HENRIK AHLENIUS, ROBERT WINDHAGER, RUI INACIO, ZOOP, MARCO NEVES, COLIN HOLBROOK, PHIL KAVANAGH, SAMUEL ANDREEFF, FRANCIS FORDE, TIAGO NUNES, FERGAL CUSSEN, HAL HERZOG, NUNO MACHADO, JONATHAN LEIBRANT, JOÃO LINHARES, STANTON T, SAMUEL CORREA, ERIK HAINES, MARK SMITH, JOÃO EIRA, TOM HUMMEL, SARDUS FRANCE, DAVID SLOAN WILSON, YACILA DEZA-ARAUJO, ROMAIN ROCH, YANICK PUNTER, CHARLOTTE BLEASE, NICOLE BARBARO, ADAM HUNT, PAWEL OSTASZEWSKI, NELLEKE BAK, GUY MADISON, GARY G HELLMANN, SAIMA AFZAL, ADRIAN JAEGGI, PAULO TOLENTINO, JOÃO BARBOSA, JULIAN PRICE, HEDIN BRØNNER, FRANCA BORTOLOTTI, GABRIEL PONS CORTÈS, URSULA LITZCKE, SCOTT, ZACHARY FISH, TIM DUFFY, SUNNY SMITH, JON WISMAN, WILLIAM BUCKNER, LUKE GLOWACKI, GEORGIOS THEOPHANOUS, CHRIS WILLIAMSON, PETER WOLOSZYN, DAVID WILLIAMS, DIOGO COSTA, ALEX CHAU, CORALIE CHEVALLIER, BANGALORE ATHEISTS, LARRY D. LEE JR., OLD HERRINGBONE, MICHAEL BAILEY, DAN SPERBER, ROBERT GRESSIS, JEFF MCMAHAN, JAKE ZUEHL, MARK CAMPBELL, TOMAS DAUBNER, LUKE NISSEN, KIMBERLY JOHNSON, JESSICA NOWICKI, LINDA BRANDIN, VALENTIN STEINMANN, ALEXANDER HUBBARD, BR, JONAS HERTNER, URSULA GOODENOUGH, DAVID PINSOF, SEAN NELSON, MIKE LAVIGNE, JOS KNECHT, LUCY, MANVIR SINGH, PETRA WEIMANN, CAROLA FEEST, MAURO JÚNIOR, TONY BARRETT, NIKOLAI VISHNEVSKY, STEVEN GANGESTAD, TED FARRIS, HUGO B., JORDAN MANSFIELD, CHARLOTTE ALLEN, PETER STOYKO, DAVID TONNER, LEE BECK, PATRICK DALTON-HOLMES, NICK KRASNEY, RACHEL ZAK, DENNIS XAVIER, CHINMAYA BHAT, RHYS, AND ALEX MACLEOD!

A SPECIAL THANKS TO MY PRODUCERS, YZAR WEHBE, JIM FRANK, ŁUKASZ STAFINIAK, TOM VANEGDOM, BERNARD HUGUENEY, CURTIS DIXON, BENEDIKT MUELLER, THOMAS TRUMBLE, KATHRINE AND PATRICK TOBIN, JONCARLO MONTENEGRO, NICK GOLDEN, CHRISTINE GLASS, IGOR NIKIFOROVSKI, AND PER KRAULIS!

AND TO MY EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS, MATTHEW LAVENDER,SERGIU CODREANU, AND GREGORY HASTINGS!