Political ecology is an interdisciplinary theoretical paradigm that emerged in the 1970s‒1980s, aiming to analyze power relations in environmental issues and uncover the underlying injustices and inequalities. This paper systematically elucidates the theoretical connotation of political ecology and constructs its theoretical profile through three dimensions: ideological origins, theoretical purports, and value orientation. The escalating environmental crisis has exposed the theoretical and practical limitations of traditional "human-excluded" ecology, giving rise to "human-included" or "political" ecology. The critiques of Malthusian population theory by Marx and Engels played a significant role in the formation of political ecology. Political ecology can also be regarded as an "expanded" ecology and a "specialized" political economy. Theoretically, political ecology focuses on power dynamics in environmental issues, employs cross-scale analytical methods, emphasizes practice-oriented case studies, and engages with discourse analysis or deconstruction of dominant narratives In terms of value orientation, political ecology fundamentally seeks to expose injustices and inequalities in environmental problems. From the perspective of its intellectual character, political ecology combines the deconstructive function of an "axe" with the constructive potential of a "seed", striving to advance fairness, justice, and sustainable development in environmental governance.

Political ecology emerged in the 1970s and has evolved in response to the intensifying global ecological crisis. Over the past five decades, it has become a vital theoretical framework and practical tool for understanding and addressing global environmental challenges. Unlike the more mainstream Anglophone tradition, German political ecology has developed along a distinct intellectual trajectory shaped by different theoretical traditions, social contexts, and modes of public engagement. These factors have led to unique methodological approaches, analytical perspectives, and research agendas. This paper reviews key literature in German-language political ecology, explores its distinctive contributions to the broader field of political ecology, and highlights existing limitations, aiming to offer new theoretical insights for future research.

Since its publication at the end of 1960s, Hardin's theory of "The Tragedy of the Commons" has solicited a lot of criticisms. Some scholars pinpoint that a lot of indigenous people hold their traditions and practices to respond to the overuse of natural resources. In recent years, discussion on the concept of "commoning" has emerged in political ecology, as scholars expand the meaning of "commoning" from a narrow framework of resource management to the broader issue of exploring an anti-capitalist space. As a word, "commoning" emphasizes the process of "value struggle", in which "common value" transcends commodity value. However, some western scholars lay hope on the community, a third way between state and market, as a site of "commoning", but pay little attention to state-led practices of "commoning". In Inner Mongolia, after the implementation of the "grassland and livestock double-contracted responsibility" policy, pastoralists had to endure the "the tragedy of the private" that featured the degradation of pastures and rise of production expenses. Now, several Gachas started to establish collective economy. This paper explores the two cases in which party branch took the lead to set up cooperatives in Xilingol League. Situated in a historical context of "collectivization-decollectivization-recollectivization", the two cases reveal how new collective economies expand ecological and social commons to help pastoralists achieve common prosperity. The "commoning" practices in China emphasize how government can play a key role leading to ecological "holistic productivity" and common economic prosperity, offering unique experience to the management of "commons" for the Global South.

Because of the cultural and political nature of contemporary human waste, Metabolic rifts in waste disposal become more delayed in time, more widespread in space, and less visible in process, more entropy, which produced many kinds of injustice and worsen the existing ecological crisis. Black Soldier Fly (Hermetia illucens L.) is a kind of insect that can process organic wastes such as food waste and livestock manure without secondary pollution, and produce high-quality organic fertilizers and animal protein which can improve soil quality and substitute imported resources. As a non-human agent, Black Soldier Fly plays an important role in organic waste treatment, entropy thrift and balance of nature maintenance, and also has high value in resource utilization of organic waste. The promotion of Black Soldier Fly biotechnology to treat organic waste can not only repair the injustice resulted from current waste disposal methods from the dimensions of time, space, ethnic group and species, and also repair multiple Metabolic rifts in knowledge and emotion. The (re) discovery of non-human ecological citizens such as Black Soldier Fly tells us that the nature has great power to repair itself, but it requires human scientific discovery, technological collaboration, and reorganizing of human lifestyle.