Our economic system is built upon the idea of infinite consumption. The more we consume, the more profit is made. A business is defined as successful if its profit is growing, and, because it is the corporation’s responsibility to create profits for its shareholders, it is compelled to make decisions that encourage ever increasing consumption.
This can’t go on. Alex Steffen over at Worldchanging thinks that we need a 95% reduction in our impacts over the next two decades if we are to avoid catastrophe.
It is time to look at our economy differently. To remember what it is that we really value, and to realize that the purpose of our collective activity is not to mindlessly consume, as measured in GDP, but instead is to generate human wellbeing, while minimizing consumption.
It is a very different perspective, but not one without precedent, as Kristi van Riet detailed during an excellent talk she gave in Tokyo a few days ago:
So, before we start designing new services and systems from scratch, we need to ask first: has anyone addressed a similar question in the past? How might we learn from, adapt, and piggyback on their success? or failure, come to think of it.
Last week, for example, I received a new book by Azby Brown – Just Enough – which describes how Japanese society confronted multiple crises of energy, water, fuels, food, and population – 200 years ago.
Japanese society in the Edo period met these challenges because it was conservation-minded, waste-free, and valued wellbeing with the minimum of resource consumption.
We have created a system focused on the wrong measure of success: one that values the accumulation of money over human wellbeing.
Tim Jackson, writing in the Ecologist, sums up the needed shift most eloquently:
“Addressing the social logic of consumerism is … vital. This task is far from simple – mainly because of the way in which material goods are so deeply implicated in the fabric of our lives. But change is essential. And some mandate for that change already exists. A latent disaffection with consumerism and rising concern over the ‘social recession’ have prompted grassroots initiatives to seek out ‘alternative hedonisms’ – sources of identity, creativity and meaning that lie outside the realm of the market.
For at the end of the day, prosperity goes beyond material pleasures. It transcends material concerns. It resides in the health and happiness of our families. It is present in the strength of our relationships and our trust in the community. It is evidenced by our satisfaction at work and our sense of shared meaning and purpose. It hangs on our potential to participate fully in the life of society.
Prosperity consists in our ability to flourish as human beings – within the ecological limits of a finite planet. The challenge for our society is to create the conditions under which this is possible. It is the most urgent task of our times.”
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