This chapter considers contemporary environmentalism through the lens of ecotopia, a modification of the utopian form that includes the ecological as a core consideration. The idea that the nonhuman world should have meaningful political status is a radical transformation of the usual terms of utopia, rendering certain utopian tropes (like the technology-fueled extinction of vermin or pests) impossible while activating other new possibilities both for the transformation of the social and for individual self-actualization. In particular, ecotopias are distinct from most utopias in their abiding suspicion of technology; in an era of escalating climate disaster, this suspicion of technology becomes increasingly urgent even as it becomes complicated by the perceived need for some miraculous techno-fix to ameliorate the worst impacts of climate change even in ecotopia. A short coda discusses real-world ecotopian projects, attempts to make such visions real as a model to others for what might yet be.

Examining Octavia E. Butler’s post-apocalyptic Parable series (Parable of the Sower and Parable of the Talents), this chapter argues that Butler uses an Afrofuturist aesthetic to create an imagined future that is not simply a description of American life, but a possible direction for rethinking who we are and how we live. It explores the prescient politics of Butler’s science fiction by showing how the political and economic systems in which the characters move both deeply impact how they live and are also strikingly absent. At its most basic political level, the Parable series offers a dystopian warning about possible futures and about the present. Responding to the neoliberal undermining of the values of public services under Reagan and beyond, the novels warn about both power-seekers filling political vacuums and our own willingness to ignore the consequences. The chapter ends with an examination of the benefits and drawbacks of Earthseed, the protagonist’s fictional religion, that prompts readers to reconsider the value of community itself, one dedicated to new ways of living that will challenge people to grow in new ways.