"Re-enchanting humanity" is a book by social
ecologist Murray Bookchin. He criticizes deep ecology, sociobiology,
primitivism, postmodernism and other philosophies he regards as anti-humanist.
Personally, I agree with some of his criticisms, but find many others too simplistic. There are also a few rather quixotic passages, even a polemic against belief in angels. Bookchin's own alternative is a kind of neo-Hegelian, teleological evolutionism in which human beings are seen as natural, while at the same time being more advanced than animals or "first nature". This is the re-enchanting of humanity mentioned in the book's title (to some extent, the title parodizes those of New Age books). On the downside, the book often resembles a polemical Marxist tract at its worst. Bookchin was an ex-Communist, ex-Trotskyist and quite notorious for his hefty attacks on ideological opponents.
For a criticism of Bookchin, see "Beyond Bookchin" by David Watson, a primitivist with a keen eye to the contradictions in Bookchin's position, although Watson (perhaps) solved them all in the wrong direction!
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