The Politics of Actually The Politics of Actually Existing Unsustainability: Existing Unsustainability:

The Cancer Stage of The Cancer Stage of Carbon-Fuelled Consumer Carbon-Fuelled Consumer

CapitalismCapitalism

Dr. John BarrySchool of Politics, International Studies and PhilosophyQueens University Belfastj.barry@qub.ac.uk

Background

Context

Setting out: Actually Setting out: Actually Existing Unsustainability Existing Unsustainability

Just as it is injustice not justice that characterises the modern world, likewise it is unsustainability not sustainability that we find

Yet, vast majority of thinking scholarship and sometimes activism is around 'sustainability', 'sustainable development'

Sustainability beckons to the future, while unsustainability focuses on the present

Of course the two are or can be related but key issue is that one does not have to have a fully developed theory of justice/sustainability to condemn, recognise and struggle to eradicate injustice and unsustainability

The 'perfect' should not become the enemy of the 'good'

Injustice and Injustice and UnsustainabilityUnsustainability

The fight against injustices is not necessarily the same as a struggle for some positive conception of justice.

‘injustice has a different phenomenology from justice.

Understanding injustice constitutes a separate theoretical

enterprise from constructing a theory of justice...injustice

takes priority over justice’ (Simon, 1995: xvii).

Green political theory/economy should be a politics of actually existing unsustainability rather than a politics for (future) sustainability.

The analysis of actually existing unsustainability should take priority over the analysis of sustainability.

The Critique of The Critique of UnsustainabilityUnsustainability

The critique of the current unsustainable economic system does not and should not depend for its validity on the specification of some positive sustainable alternative.

While from a political/strategic point of view of persuading people of one’s position, one might wish to develop a worked-out alternative, this should not be a requirement for the critique to be politically considered and taken seriously in public policy debate.

‘the negative recommendation stands on its own, without the inclusion of a positive alternative . . . Requiring that negative recommendations depend upon positive alternatives has the effect of undermining the negative recommendations. We need to listen to the negative recommendations, irrespective of whether the negative criticisms also contain positive proposals’ (Simon, 1995: 14).

Turn the tables/precautionary principle– disprove unsustainability, as opposed to green objectors having to prove unsustainability (usually based on some notion of sustainability).

The cancer stage of The cancer stage of capitalism - unsustainable capitalism - unsustainable and uneconomic growth and uneconomic growth

Cancer - healthy cells that grow beyond a threshold to become unhealthy

Orthodox economic growth - undifferentiated GDP growth as a permanent feature of the economy -as 'cancerous' (John McMurtry) 'uneconomic growth' (Herman Daly)

Central importance of thresholds

Orthodox, undifferentiated Orthodox, undifferentiated economic growth - GDPeconomic growth - GDP

Orthodox GDP/GNP measurementsNeed to differentiate– some growth is, ceteris paribus,

positive , contributes to meeting human needs and enhances quality of life and human flourishing

‘Defensive consumption’/production – hiring security guards because of declines in social trust, increase in crime; buying water/air filters due to environmental pollution; purchasing children's’ toys/home entertainment due to parents having no time (work pressure) or there being no appropriate/local open spaces/parks; bottled water due to poor quality of tap water.

Because what ‘gets measured gets done’ we need better measurements than GDP (even most neoclassical economists accept this)

Why the capitalist economy is Why the capitalist economy is ‘‘locked intolocked into’’ economic growth economic growth

State’s plan their expenditure assuming that the economy will keep growing. If it then didn’t, there would be shortfalls in government income with repercussions for public expenditure and investment.

Companies are legally obliged to maximise returns to shareholders, and investors generally take their money wherever the highest rates of return and growth are found. ‘Fudiciary duty’ of corporate officers – logic of profit and accumulation.

Almost all money is lent into existence bearing interest. For every dollar lent, more must be repaid, demanding growth.

Capitalist economy has two modes – go and grow (3% p.a. minimum) or collapse (recession/depression)

Like a bicycle

Question: what would an economic system look liked designed by a scientist not an economist?

Why be critical of Why be critical of growth? growth?

1. Sustainability reasons – climate change, energy, resources and pollution;

2. Equality reasons – capitalist economic growth manages and reproduces inequality it does not eradicate it;

3. Human flourishing reasons – beyond a threshold, economic growth does not add to and can reduce human flourishing.

Developed more in tomorrow's lecture

Growth isn’t Working “Between 1990 and 2001, for every $100 worth of growth in the world’s

income per person, just $0.60 found its target and contributed to reducing poverty below the $1-a-day line. To achieve every single $1 of poverty reduction therefore requires $166 of additional global production and consumption, with all its associated environmental impacts.”

new economics foundation (2006), Growth Isn’t Working

Highly improbable to reconcile the objectives of poverty reduction and environmental sustainability if global growth remains the principal economic strategy. The scale of growth this model demands would generate unsupportable environmental costs; and the costs would fall disproportionately, and counter-productively, on the poorest – the very people the growth is meant to benefit.

Need to de-link poverty reduction from orthodox economic growth and focus on increasing the share of income that goes to those in poverty i.e. redistribution (which decreases inequalities) and economic security, not economic growth (which reproduces inequalities).

We need to talk about We need to talk about carbon…carbon…

It’s nonrenewable and the main cause of global climate change (carbon dioxide)

Modern industrial civilisation under capitalism and its development model /orthodox economic growth, is utterly dependent upon it

Name one thing in this room not made or transported without the use of oil or gas?

Also cause (potential or actual) of geopolitical instability – resource wars

And creation of local ‘sacrifice zones’

Carbon lock in to unsustainable development trajectory

Cubic Mile of Oil/YearCubic Mile of Oil/Year

Oil addiction....Oil addiction....

Political Implications: the downsides Political Implications: the downsides of oil addiction - resource warsof oil addiction - resource wars

Frying the planet....

Local Pipeline struggles

Energy and economic Energy and economic growthgrowth

“[Economic] growth does not drive increased exergy / useful work consumption, rather output growth is ‘driven’ by increased availability of energy and increased delivery of useful work to the economy.”(Ayres and Warr, 2009: 1692 emphasis added).

Thus declining energy inputs (either due to declining supply or rising prices) will have a significant impact on orthodox economic growth.

“The data show that recessions occur when petroleum expenditures as a percent of GDP climb above a threshold of roughly 5.5%” (Murphy and Hall, 2011: 70)

Energy as literally the driving fuel of the capitalist economy

"We need to leave oil...before oil "We need to leave oil...before oil leaves us", leaves us",

Fatih Biriol, Chief Economist, Fatih Biriol, Chief Economist, International Energy Agency International Energy Agency

However... if we look at the capitalization in the energy sector, we find that investors are betting on our continuing carbon lock in, continuing our carbon addiction and frying the planet through runaway climate change.

Oil and gas and renewable energy Oil and gas and renewable energy capitalisation (DiMuzio, 2012), the capitalisation (DiMuzio, 2012), the political economy of political economy of ‘‘Carbon lock inCarbon lock in’’

Political economy of carbon lock Political economy of carbon lock inin

“despite concerns over global warming and peak oil and questions about the overall sustainability of our current civilization order, investors continue to see a future shaped by the owners and directors of hydrocarbon energy” (DiMuzio, 2012: 379)

Fossil fuel corporations have 5 times more oil and coal and gas in known reserves than climate scientists think is safe to burn.

We have to keep 80% of their fossil fuels underground to avoid a 2% increase in global temperature and runaway climate change.

See IPCC September 2013 Fifth Assessment Report

Capitalism and Capitalism and ConsumerismConsumerismConsumerism - threshold beyond which the consumption,

accumulation of material goods and services undermines sustainability, human flourishing or increases socio-economic inequality

Consumerism - buying stuff you don't need to impress people you don't care about?

Psychologically infantilising and depoliticising consequences - passivity of the consumer (individualism) versus activism of the citizen

Consumerism – a WMD – weapon of mass distraction

And..least we forget ...its debt-based consumerism we are talking about

Causes of consumerismCauses of consumerismMarketing, advertising, normalisation of private

accumulation of goods and services;

Economic insecurity;

Socio-economic inequality (Wilkinson and Pickett, 2008);

Status competition - self-esteem (buying second hand goods means you're a 'second rate' member of society);

And…its enjoyable, socially acceptable/required and addictive....

Debt-based consumerism as the great engine of modern economic growth under neoliberal capitalism

Wilkinson and Pickett (2008)Socio-economic inequality as

driver of consumerism via status competition;

Psychological and political economic significance of shame and status;

Because inequality increases status competition, it also increases consumerism. People in more unequal societies work longer hours because money seems even more important.

More

inequality

• More superiority and inferiority• More status competition and consumerism

• More status insecurity

• More worry about how we are seen and judged

• More “social evaluation anxiety”(threats to self-esteem & social

status, fear of negative judgements

Inequality, status competition and consumerism

The necessity of scarcity and insecurity under neoliberal capitalism

The mythic or cultural-psychological The mythic or cultural-psychological ‘‘factfact’’ of scarcity, and of scarcity, and associated notions of insecurity (job, body image, status) and associated notions of insecurity (job, body image, status) and ‘‘status anxietystatus anxiety’’ (amongst others), are necessary features for the (amongst others), are necessary features for the modern growth economy.modern growth economy.

There is never There is never ‘‘enoughenough’’, only constant gratification without satiation , only constant gratification without satiation ‘‘Perpetual scarcityPerpetual scarcity’’ in the midst of affluence and plenty in the midst of affluence and plenty Scarcity as a master concept for neo-liberal capitalism– how to Scarcity as a master concept for neo-liberal capitalism– how to

organise human life between infinite wants and scarce means.organise human life between infinite wants and scarce means.Rather than democratically/politically regulating/limiting (some) Rather than democratically/politically regulating/limiting (some)

wants below a threshold in the interests of other wants and wants below a threshold in the interests of other wants and needsneeds

Economic growth as our modern myth to live by and through which Economic growth as our modern myth to live by and through which social order is sustainedsocial order is sustained

Not so much as 'let them eat cake' but the promise of cake in the Not so much as 'let them eat cake' but the promise of cake in the future future

Challenge to the left, Challenge to the left, trades unionstrades unions

Which should have political priority - increasing wages or increasing worker control ?

Of course both....but which is more strategically as well as normatively important?

Challenging consumerism and orthodox economic growth (=employment) - major paradigm shift for trades unions

Repoliticisation of the labour movement - putting demands for why democracy should end at the factor gate or office door, or classroom door back at the centre of the political agenda

Also (tomorrow's lecture), the social and ecological case for collective consumption as well as democratised production

Yet….Popular Support for Yet….Popular Support for Capitalist Economic GrowthCapitalist Economic Growth“under capitalism workers don’t have job security like tenured

professors. This fact may partially explain why it is that, despite all the anti-growth books published since the 1970s, there is no public support out there for a capitalist steady-state economy. …Poll after poll shows that ordinary citizens want to see the environment cleaned up, want to see a stop to the pillage of the planet, the threat of destruction of their children’s future. But as workers in a capitalist economy, “no growth” just means no jobs.” (Smith, 2010: 35; emphasis added).

Hence its entirely rational (within capitalism) to support economic growth – even though it causes ecological destruction, increases inequalities, erodes security and locks in a carbon-based energy system

Part of the issue here (tomorrow’s lecture) is to shift focus from formally paid ‘employment’ to ‘work’ and a much larger conception of the economy and economics beyond the public and private sectors

Conclusions: Actually existing Conclusions: Actually existing Unsustainability Unsustainability

Capitalist economic growth has locked us into a carbon based energy economy that is socially, economically and ecologically irrational, unsustainable and ecocidal;

Economic growth has passed the threshold beyond which it adds to human flourishing / development

Has locked us into debt-based consumerism;

Economic growth as permanent feature of the economy that serves the interests of a minority not the majority;

Its cooking the planet, creating geopolitical instability, increasing inequality and undermining human flourishing now and for future generations

We need system change not climate change.... tomorrow's lecture

Choices ahead....discussion Choices ahead....discussion tomorrow tomorrow

What is to be done?What is to be done?…..