The notion of economic growth as a regular, ongoing, self-sustained process no longer holds up to critical analysis. Even during what’s been called “The Glorious Thirty” – the years between the end of World War II and the 1974 oil crisis – growth occurred almost solely in industrialized countries and involved a minority of the world population; it was built on the senseless waste and pillaging of limited natural resources, access to cheap fossil fuels, dependency on killer technologies and the … [Read more...]
Life in a ‘degrowth’ economy, and why you might actually enjoy it
What does genuine economic progress look like? The orthodox answer is that a bigger economy is always better, but this idea is increasingly strained by the knowledge that, on a finite planet, the economy can’t grow for ever.But what is a steady-state economy? Why it is it desirable or necessary? And what would it be like to live in? The global predicament We used to live on a planet that was relatively empty of humans; today it is full to overflowing, with more people consuming more … [Read more...]
Trump Trauma
While we mourn the tragedy that fear, prejudice and ignorance “trumped” in the US Presidential election, now is the time to go deeper and broader with our work. There is a growing recognition that the scary situation we find ourselves in today has deep roots.To better understand what happened—and why—we need to broaden our horizons. If we zoom out a bit, it becomes clear that Trump is not an isolated phenomenon; the forces that elected him are largely borne of rising economic insecurity and … [Read more...]
The Sharing Economy: It Takes More Than A Smartphone
I ran into my friend Rick the other day in a small town near our homes in northern Vermont. He was just coming out of the bookstore, holding a pink plastic bag that, I would soon learn, contained a dozen eggs from his flock of free range hens. After a bit of small talk, Rick asked, “you don’t by any chance have a pair of jumper cables in your car?” I did. “Would you be willing to drive over to the post office and jump my pickup truck? I’ve been trying to park on hills until I can get a new … [Read more...]
Trump’s Populist Deceit
While misogyny, racism, and ethnic taunts were conspicuous signposts on Donald Trump’s path to the White House, much of that road was paved with “populist”, “anti-establishment” and “anti-globalization” rhetoric. Trump’s inaugural address featured numerous populist lines (e.g. “What truly matters is not which party controls our government, but whether our government is controlled by the people”), attacks on the status quo (“The establishment protected itself, not the citizens of our country”), … [Read more...]
Positive Thinking in a Dark Age
I recall a Buddhist parable involving a stick that appears from a distance to be a snake, causing fear to rise in the perceiver. As the perception shifts upon closer examination, the fear subsides and the relieved hiker continues down the path. Understanding and awareness have a lot to do with how we feel and how we act. As hosts to the dominant cultural mindset (our collective understanding of who we are in the universe), our minds play a critical part in both perpetuating our dominant way of … [Read more...]
Lean Logic: A Dictionary for the Future
What follows are some excerpts from the late David Fleming’s Lean Logic: A Dictionary for the Future and How to Survive It (Chelsea Green Publishing, 2016). The excerpts have been chosen by the book's editor, Shaun Chamberlin. Extensive references are given in the dictionary itself, but are omitted here. Localisation. Localisation stands, at best, at the limits of practical possibility, but it has the decisive argument in its favour that there will be no … [Read more...]
From Local Pants to Local Energy: The Case for Localizing Our Economies
(This article originally appeared on Truthout.org.)During a panel discussion this May on Community Choice Energy, a rapidly growing initiative in California and six other states that enables communities to seize control of local electricity services, I argued for the economic benefits of building out local, decentralized renewable energy assets such as rooftop and community solar arrays. I was followed by a panelist who chided my “misguided” belief in the virtue of locally-generated, clean … [Read more...]
How Globalization Divides Us: Perspectives on Brexit from a Dual Citizen
When I woke up on June 24th and checked the news, I cried. Along with millions of people around the world. I’m a diehard believer in independence, freedom, democracy, and strong local economies. For some, the Brexit result represented those things. If that had been the reality, I would’ve supported it too. But like every other choice offered in the global economy these days, Brexit was a false one. Getting out of Europe does nothing to address the real problems in UK society—or the world. We’re … [Read more...]
Why Global Capital Fears ‘Brexit’
A referendum in Britain will soon be held on the ‘Brexit’ question. While the leadership of the ‘Leave’ and ‘Remain’ camps portray their positions as fundamentally different, neither side is challenging the stranglehold of corporations that run the global economy. Their econometric, growth-based arguments focus primarily on which alternative will enable Britain to cut a better deal within a corporate-controlled global market. If we are to have any hope of avoiding further climate chaos, fear, … [Read more...]