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Capitalism and (De)Growth
What is capitalism?
A kind of state?
An institution?
Some values?
A power structure?
Ideology?
A Culture?
What governs capitalism?
Supply and demand
Invisible hand
Enclosure of land
The drive to expand
Market mechanism
Class schism
Racism
The moral virtue of productivism.
Innovation!
Invest!
Impress!
Progress!
Entrepreneurial quest for
Technological success in
Pursuit of profit.
Laissez faire!
Free market
Free trade
Free enterprise
Freedom to buy
Wage slavery
And debt.
Individual self-interest!
Ambition
Addiction
Friction
Cut throat competition
Eat or be eaten
Grow or die.
I think about capitalism as a moment. A blink in time. Organic life has thrived on earth for4 billion years. Modern humans have been walking around for some 200,000 years, looking a lot like you and me. That magical moment of capitalism dawned just 500 hundred years ago with European colonial expansion that enabled the rise of fossil-fueled industrial economies.
Vital to that rise are hierarchical systems of class, gender and race that interact with markets to engineer—and to justify—unequal exchange .Those who engage in markets from superior positions get more for their money. Ecological value flows toward them and wealth accumulates. Those who sell labor and other resources from inferior positions tend to get drained. Degraded. Deforested. Eroded. Impoverished. Exhausted.
Net cultural exchange has flowed in the other direction: capitalist practices, values and myths have been impelled far and wide, with scant return of other traditions. Cultural features of capitalism now seem so omnipresent that it is difficult to imagine and to forge alternatives. The most ingenious maneuver of modernity is to propagate the perception that this moment fills all horizons. As a result, political left and right, pro-growth and degrowth, slug it out in a confined capitalocentric arena.
The biggest challenge faced by degrowth is the shallow historical depth and narrow cultural scope that circumscribe contemporary debates. How to break out?
(1) Debunk myths that naturalize features of capitalism,
(2) learn from all kinds of socionatural worlds,
(3) forge systems driven by desires other than growth.
Degrowth is denounced as ecofascism: ideologically-driven imposition that would force unwilling victims to sacrifice their God-given freedoms and betray innate self-interests. Capitalism, in contrast, is perceived as apolitical and morally neutral; markets, in particular, appear as timeless mechanisms through which all humans freely organize livelihoods and establish value. Karl Polanyi (1944) showed they are anything but. The commodification of labor and nature, together with the colonization of human practice and worldview by market-relations and money-value, are historical exceptions brutally imposed in 18th and 19th century Britain in efforts to “mold human nature” for industrial growth. Moving to late 20th century, David Harvey (2007) and others have exposed the formidable political incursions enacted to force expansion of “free” market relations into the most isolated parts of the world and the most intimate realms of human intercourse.
Our stubborn blindness to these and other historical details is enabled by certain architectural features of Western language, science and philosophy, notably: hierarchical binaries. Binaries of white over non-white, man over woman, human over other nature are engraved in the world in ways that make it difficult to question unequal exchange and exploitation, even from the position of those most exploited. The nature-culture binary marks thinking humans as superior over instinct-driven beasts; it also cements as “natural instinct” (therefore unchangeable) those aspects of human life that should not be questioned.
Today, the conviction that human biology is responsible for the insatiable drive to increase production and consumption is fostered by powerful cultural and scientific narratives. Featured myths include Homo economicus, the innately rational agent who always maximizes utility for personal gain; Adam Smith’s “natural propensity” to truck and barter, and that selfish gene that makes each of us crave control over resources and strive to take more than our share, condemning to tragedy any attempts at commons management.
Even the Anthropocene is portrayed as a result of human evolution! Teleological narratives surrounding climate change are exemplified by Steffen, Crutzen and McNeill (2007, 614) who write: “the first use of fire by our bipedal ancestors, belonging to the genus Homo erectus, occurred a couple of million years ago.” And “The mastery of fire by our ancestors provided humankind with a powerful monopolistic tool unavailable to other species, that put us firmly on the long path towards the Anthropocene.” As Malm and Holmberg (2014, 65) point out, just as the power to shape planetary climate passes from nature into the realm of humans, it is re-naturalized as innate “human nature.”
Beware of cultural constructs that make the status quo appear natural
Antonio Gramsci (1971) taught us to beware the power of cultural constructs that make the status quo appear natural and inevitable. He also noted that historical crises can destabilize that power, opening transformative possibilities. Let’s seize this opportunity to shake up those myths.
Learning from all kinds of socionatural worlds expands our historical depth and cultural breadth. Archeological and ethnographic studies demonstrate that diverse hunter-gatherer-fisher cultures with extremely low societal metabolism and little or no market activity have thrived throughout human history and still today. Certainly they’ve impacted and co-constructed ecosystems in many ways– but there’s no sign of them changing the course of earth systems.
Evidence points to gradual expansion in per capita societal metabolism in some populations, starting around 10,000 years ago with the dawn of agriculture and urbanism, followed by much steeper increases just a few hundred years ago with the moment of capitalism, then a miraculous erection of supercharged growth in the late twentieth century, accompanied by skyrocketing atmospheric concentration of CO2.
Putting that latter moment in deeper historical and broader cultural context reveals the absurdity of claims that the ability to make fire (evolved two million years ago) inexorably led to human destruction of earth systems in the mid 20th century, when Geologists mark the beginning of the Anthropocene. It also challenges the common message that this new era was provoked by humanity as a whole (rather than a minority group or social system).
Cross cultural awareness can help us answer questions like: “How can humanity progress without capitalist motivation?” And, “How can non-expanding economies even sustain human society?” I’ve been learning with a network of scholar-activists working in 15 countries with communities trying to thrive equitably with low or decreasing societal metabolism. Some of the countries boast booming economic and material growth, others face postgrowth, or having missed out on growth altogether. Whereas many participants in this conference promote degrowth as a purposeful project, we also pay attention to degrowth as an unintended consequence, not necessarily welcomed, and not always recognized as a consequence of growth elsewhere. We find promising practices and meanings in long-sustained arrangements, among forced adaptations, and amid innovations toward new visions. You can learn about these diverse cultural paths in a forthcoming issue of the Journal of Political Ecology on Degrowth, Culture and Power.
The purpose of these studies is not to promote a return to primitive life or third world conditions. On the contrary, awareness of many possible modes of human existence widens horizons for building unprecedented futures. We turn now to the furnace where those futures are forged. We’ve made clear that behaviors and values that drive capitalist growth are not natural; they are artifacts of recent systems of culture and power. But there is something about human biology that is relevant here. Creatures interacting in the earth’s ecosystems display amazing characteristics evolved to meet their needs and to assure their descendants’ survival. Spotted salamanders use solar power, Atlantic wolf fish manufactures antifreeze, and African dung beetles navigate with the Milky Way. Cacti grow spines to defend their juicy stems against succulent-eaters, and nettles puncture predators (and passers-by), injecting poison into their wounds. Relative to those of other creatures, human bodies do not shine as particularly strong, quick or tough.
What does stand out is a biophysical capacity for symbolic thought and communication that enables usto collaboratively develop cultural systems that survive the individual organism and, in turn, shape the production of new generations of Homo sapiens, their habits, and their habitats.These uniquely human systems take the form of languages, religions, and sciences; production, kinship and gender systems. They are our most fundamental commons. That is where the growth imperative came from, and that is what we are already changing to support equitable and pleasurable degrowth.
This presentation was part of the plenary session “Capitalism and Degrowth“. Watch this conference session on our YouTube Channel
27 Comments on "Capitalism and (De)Growth"
onlooker on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 2:36 pm
“Debunk myths that naturalize features of capitalism,
forge systems driven by desires other than growth.”
Here is where I find is so revealing. Capitalism is unfortunately highlighting a main feature of our human nature. Pleasure, urges and prime emotions are satiated by Capitalism and they are instinctual thus we were always on track to act and behave this way without a strong self discipline to steer ourselves in other directions.
Dredd on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 2:52 pm
Current capitalism (the political concept) is a shape-shifter described by the words of propagandists like Bernays (The Ways of Bernays).
The economic concept (an illusion) is nothing more than feudalism in modern clothing (American Feudalism).
Apneaman on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 3:15 pm
Capitalism is just the humans expressing the Maximum Power Principle to the best of their abilities. I guess one could say war degrades energy even faster than capitalism, but war, is not really a system and does not provide enough dopamine hits for the humans to sustain it.
Apneaman on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 3:34 pm
onlooker, discipline or impulse control is, like many traits, inherent. You can have a highly disciplined society, but it would need to be martial. The Spartans were very disciplined, but it don’t sound like much fun and was a byproduct of their environment and the circumstances of their time.
This experiment, which has been repeated many times, is telling as to who might be disciplined into adulthood. One of many experiments dispelling the myth of free will and personal discipline. Sure you can tweak it a bit and some tiny few end up turning their lives around, but that takes all their energies and time. Most will stagger through life stuck with what they have. The exceptions are the ones Oprah and the rest of the hopium industrial complex uses to sell their snake oil.
Stanford marshmallow experiment
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_marshmallow_experiment
Plantagenet on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 4:07 pm
We can’t even get the world to reduce CO2 production. How do you expect to get “degrowth” of the entire global economy?
Sissyfuss on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 4:21 pm
“The studies do not promote a primitive lifestyle or third world conditions.”
Okay, then cancer on everybody!
onlooker on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 4:55 pm
“Okay, then cancer on everybody!”
quote of the day
makati1 on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 4:56 pm
I am beginning to hate the faux word: “degrowth”. Call it what it is: Contraction/Shrinking. The world economy as a whole is shrinking/contracting faster every day. It is just not politically correct to admit it. At least not in polite capitalist company. But the signs are becoming blatantly obvious. The dream of the above author is never going to happen. The capitalist system is not transitioning. It is dying.
Capitalism is nothing more than another method of wealth transfer. It moves resources and wealth from the serfs to the lords. The 3rd world to the 1st. The workers to the leeches. That has been the rule since the first farmer had to pay tithes to some shaman who realized he could get wealth by preying on the fears of the weak.
But we can see the end of capitalism in sight. If there is nothing to transfer, the leech dies (or is killed). The end of the Age of Petroleum is killing the wealth stream and probably humanity. As I see it, we are in uncharted territory and it is not rainbows and unicorns but monsters and death in this new world. Nothing can stop our stampede to the extinction cliff. Nothing.
Boat on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 4:56 pm
Wind is responsible for de-growth. The new turbines deliver 20x energy and up over 20 year. Less pollution equals smaller health care costs. That equals smaller GDP. Efficiency is responsible for de-growth. De-growth goes hand in hand with tech. Live it, embrace it. My efficient heat pump has cheap AC bills. In Texas you need AC. Less GDP, sure, less pollution, sure. Texas coal use drops while wind energy grows. It’s a win win. Bring on de-growth.
penury on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 5:06 pm
BOAT; i AM SORRY BUT YOU LOST ME AT “WIND IS RESPONSIBLE FOR DEGROWTH”, AND AGAIN AT “DEGROWTH GOES HAND IN HAND WITH TECH,” Sorry all caps, stuck key. My memory is probably faulty but has tech not been around since the invention of the wheel? Clarity improves both the writer and the reader.
makati1 on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 5:11 pm
Penury, Boat is apparently off his meds again. Ignore him. I do.
penury on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 5:15 pm
Boat just to continue my diatribe a little, if you are talking about electrical tech as the only real tech, I think that was started by a geek named Edison. Communications could start with A.Bell. I could go on but I already bored myself.
HARM on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 5:48 pm
Mak hit the nail on the head re: the true definition of capitalism. However, I am nowhere near as certain as he is that its end is anywhere in sight, nor that the end of the Age of Petroleum will kill it. Capitalism’s immediate precursor, mercantilism/colonialism, did not require fossil fuels to extract wealth from colonized subjects, nor did the 1,000+ years of feudalism before that.
If and when de-growth actually arrives (possibly not in my lifetime), we may see a return to those older, even more brutal and nakedly oppressive political arrangements. Opium Wars, anyone? How about Hopium Wars?
makati1 on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 6:07 pm
HARM, but today’s total system depends on the total system working totally. That is NOT comparable with the past. The strands are cracking and a few have already broken. There will be no “reset” unless it is tribalism for the few who survive.
I think you are in for a shock if you believe nothing will happen in YOUR life time. Maybe you are over 90?
Cloggie on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 6:07 pm
“Capitalism’s immediate precursor, mercantilism/colonialism, did not require fossil fuels to extract wealth from colonized subjects”
Bingo, capitalism began in Holland in the seventeenth century with the first central bank in Amsterdam, the first multinational corporation VOC. Nowhere was there any link to fossil fuel:
Vlissingen (Flushing) 1669: capitalism in action: sails, wind mills and a bit of peat to stay warm. No application of coal, gas or oil in sight.
The announced death of capitalism is exaggerated. Capitalism is NOT in the least tied to fossil fuel.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_capitalism
Cloggie on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 6:08 pm
Link to Flushing:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/56/Vlissingen_in_vogelvlucht,_1669.jpg
shortonoil on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 6:36 pm
“The world economy as a whole is shrinking/contracting faster every day.”
By our calculations that is presently occurring as a result of petroleum depletion at the rate of $504 billion per year. Of course, other factors may be affecting it. Like the depletion of every thing else – from water, iron ore, to sodium chloride.
http://www.thehillsgroup.org/
shortonoil on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 6:45 pm
If you want to talk about dollars, please specif pre-QE dollars, or post. They aren’t the same thing by some $20 trillion dollars, or 27% of annual world GDP.
Apneaman on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 6:54 pm
Ponzi World (Over 3 Billion NOT Served)
The globalized economy is a colossal Ponzi Scheme in which the vast majority survive on the bread crumbs falling off the table. The possibility of 7 billion people achieving a consumption-oriented lifestyle is zero, so the World Bank conveniently set the poverty line at $1.25/day to legalize global slavery. As long as someone else’s children are doing the suffering, it’s “all good”. Post-2008, this illusion was extended merely by plundering all future generations.
Globalization Is Going Bankrupt
“Free Trade is predicated upon the specious theory of Comparative Advantage: The economic fantasy that two countries will gain from open trade even when one country is far more cost competitive in all aspects. Several decades later and several thousand factories obliterated and now China is the factory to the world while we specialize in Cappuccino production subsidized with total debt at 350% of GDP. So much for textbook theories and the dunces who believe them…”
https://ponziworld.blogspot.ca/2016/09/globalization-is-going-bankrupt.html
Go Speed Racer on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 7:42 pm
Why only boring articles on Peak Oil nowadays?
We need some articles about oil wells running dry, and
slobs in monster trucks fist-fighting each other for
gasoline at the service station.
jef on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 8:33 pm
Capitalism is purely a financial construct designed for usury.
Without usury there is no emphasis on growth. It may or may not occur but is not necessary.
All money is loaned into existence and therefore we MUST have growth in order to pay the interest. No growth it all ends.
We can’t even imagine what the world would be like today if we didn’t accept the concept of our global monetary system such as it is.
Truth Has A Liberal Bias on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 8:45 pm
Every time I hear someone say ‘degrowth’ I want to punch them in the cock. When the famine hits it won’t seem so warm and fucking fuzzy. I can’t wait for the famine. Too many fucking retards.
Truth Has A Liberal Bias on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 8:52 pm
Oh and everybody blames capitalism. Well I don’t remember communism being much better. Plenty of rivers and ecosystems where destroyed by Marxists. It’s industrial civilization that is the problem, not the fucking political/economic system that determines how the profits are distributed. Plenty of rivers ran fluorescent red and green with pollution in former USSR countries. sure, capitalism is the current dominant paradigm so it’s an easy target but it’s incorrect. We could all go commie tomorrow and it wouldn’t change a fucking thing. Industrial human civilization is destroying the planet not economic models. Idiots.
Truth Has A Liberal Bias on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 8:54 pm
“Why only boring articles on Peak Oil nowadays?”
Because whoever runs this pathetic website is a fucking retard.
Truth Has A Liberal Bias on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 8:59 pm
Short says “If you want to talk about dollars, please specif pre-QE dollars, or post. They aren’t the same thing by some $20 trillion dollars, or 27% of annual world GDP.”
Hey retard, post your fucking Etp bullshit model for peer review, post your equations, references and bibliography for you supposed ‘thermodynamic model of the global economy’ or shut the fuck up. Retard. Your worse than Tom Whipple and his fusion bullshit promoting the Ecat scam.
makati1 on Fri, 23rd Sep 2016 10:07 pm
For the “Number One” flag wavers:
“It’s Official: America Is Not The Greatest Country On Earth… It’s 28th!”
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-09-23/its-official-america-not-greatest-country-earth-its-28th
And that is being generous!
Baptised on Sat, 24th Sep 2016 2:41 pm
I like what Harm said at 5:48. I believe as 1st world countries fall apart they will become 3rd world with rulers that are even more crueler and deceitful.