My goal in this article is to reconsider current ideas of globalisation, and of the relations between nature and society, by looking at two theoretical programmes of the past four decades. I start by reconsidering Ulrich Beck’s theory of risk society and highlight some of its core strengths and weaknesses. I then revisit more recent debates on the Anthropocene and unpack some key dimensions. There, I contend that arguments on the Anthropocene allow us to develop a more robust concept of globalisation than those currently available: an idea of globalisation that is the inescapable condition of what humans are as a species. Finally, I offer some preliminary reflections on the new stage of globalisation that seems to have started with the Covid-19 pandemic.