Geo-Social classes and planetary existentialism: an interview with Nikolaj Schultz

In recent years, the Danish sociologist Nikolaj Schultz has emerged as one of the most influential voices of his generation in social theory and ecological thought. In this interview, Schultz reflects on conceptual propositions and insights from his first two widely translated and highly influential books, discusses how they intersect and diverge, and considers how certain key questions within modern social theory need to be reposed in our new ecological era. In the first part of the interview, Schultz describes how the Anthropocene calls for a retheorized “geo-social class struggle”, and in the second part, he forwards the hypothesis that the existential conditions of humans have changed in the Anthropocene. The interview ends with Schultz describing his work as an investigation into the many divisions and cleavages – sociologically as well as existentially, collectively and individually – that marks our new ecological era.