Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
The truth is that democracy, in its authentic direct form, has nothing to do with capitalism and is in fact at odds with it. James Madison, one of US’s Founding Fathers, seems to have been aware of this when saying that democracies have ever been found incompatible with personal security or the rights of property.
This is what I call the Death Economy, that defines success as the maximization of short-term profits for corporations and short-term accumulation of material things for individuals, regardless of the environmental and social costs.
Can this crisis provide a window of opportunity to re-organize and shift power to build radical democratic systems that genuinely care for the environment and our collective well-being?
As Giorgos Kallis has put it, “capitalism cannot survive under conditions of abundance”. MMT provides an opportunity for us to create a post-growth, post-capitalist economy.
Unless you read a book like The Case for Degrowth it is not obvious that some people are using the word to propose a radical policy package – qualitative, structural changes in ecological, social and economic relations as a necessary alternative to the economy growing quantitatively bigger.
Just as Indigenous wisdom is rooted in a myriad of complex and reciprocal interactions with the community, the land and water, the animals and plants, localizing makes visible the threads of interdependence that hold the living world together.
Universal Basic Income (UBI) – a policy that would provide a regular, cash income to every citizen without means test or work requirement – is surprisingly inexpensive.
Property law as it is today systemically privileges the individual versus the collective, self-serving control over relationships, and exchange value over intrinsic or use value.
Research & Degrowth should shift trajectories, dramatically, as soon as possible. In what direction? Political science research, and direct organizing.
Why?
We are running out of time.
It’s often been said that we’re living through an unprecedented moment. But in city centres, the coronavirus crisis has merely accelerated trends that have been unfolding for some time.
Doughnut Economics is rapidly moving from the fringe to the mainstream. Amsterdam in Holland was recently confirmed as the first ‘Doughnut City’, using the model to underpin its economic development strategy.
In other words, the inner lives of commoners, as commoners, have direct consequences for the external, material world. They are engaged in a symbiotic dance with living natural systems, a call-and-response conversation with the more-than-human plants and creatures of the forest.
