Kohei Saito has published another book to make a valid point: any economic system that does not overcome capitalism will fail to reconcile social provisioning with planetary boundaries. The question is how democratic we want this system to be. He advocates radically democratizing the economic system and avoiding any form of climate Maoism, or a state dictatorship to enforce how we transition from capitalism. Let's see why, who, and also some strategic gaps I identified while reading the book, which I recommend.
We need to reconcile socialism with ecology, and degrowth with socialism. Not all socialists agree or support degrowth or the notion of planetary boundaries, and definitely the mainstream left is rather green Keynesian, productivist, and mostly pro-growth. The author claims that due to the impossibility of sufficient decoupling and the need for capitalism to grow, only socialism and a break from capitalism can achieve a stable climate and public abundance.
Also, not all degrowthers or defenders of the steady-state economy are anti-capitalist or state that we should overcome it to achieve our social and ecological agenda. This is problematic analytically, as radical democratic systems are incompatible with capital-driven markets. Not only that, capital accumulation needs, by definition, growth, and this will not be possible in the long term, even if many other industries shrink to favor those that we want to increase as they are necessary. Note, for example, that even Erik Olin accepts an heterodox mix of provisioning systems that may include capital markets, but democratically channeled and socially limited.
I think there is commonly a confusion between capitalist enterprise and traditional markets. The former needs growth to function, the latter needs to ensure revenues are at least equal to costs in the long term. There are many cases where traditional markets, even when only post-growth businesses exist, are problematic (health, energy, education...); but I do think that markets have proven to provide affordable high-quality goods and services under the right conditions. In any case, I find it valid that socialism needs to confront capitalism more directly to be serious about ecology, while degrowth and ecological economists should be more explicit about the need to move from representative democracy directed by capital towards a social democracy directed by sufficiency, global justice within planetary boundaries. Let's explore how to implement degrowth socialism, or degrowth communism as explained by Saito.
The first reason is to break with the artificial scarcity generated by capitalism, that appropriates the commons to create commodities and makes them directly (via speculation) or indirectly (via climate change), more and more inaccessible or expensive. Degrowth communism can provide radical public abundance by focusing on universal social provisioning while reducing harmful and superfluous production.
Given the fact that the most likely path for climate stabilization is degrowth, this reduces the risk for those greatly exposed to the side effects of capitalism, due to its imposed scarcity and climate shocks that are making life in an increasing number of places impossible.
Revaluing and communalizing care, reducing the material pressures to work long hours for meaningless jobs provides a freedom that is not limited to those who hold privilege, but to everyone. It moves beyond the defensive freedom to consume and exploit oneself and others to one that evolves in truly connecting and respecting others.
The current economic system is deeply unfair; it exploits care providers, mainly female, farmers, and factory workers, so the capital owners take the biggest surplus value in justification for presumably affordable prices. The current economic system allows for private jets and hunger, plastic surgery and lack of essential vaccines, energy poverty and rockets. Degrowth socialism prioritizes access to essential services for all, revaluing and distributing better care and essential work, breaking with abusive trade and financial arrangements locally and globally.
Production is mainly driven by capital markets, where money is allocated to the most profitable activities; this is why, despite climate change risks, fossil fuel production and investment are at historic highs despite the clear mandate to phase them out. To change that, we need to reorient production collectively to prioritize essential basic goods and services (nutritious food, clean water, affordable housing, low emissions energy, care, education, and health...). There is a debate on the extent to which the State plays a role in certain provisioning sectors (most likely energy, housing, transport, and other capital-intensive sectors with economies of scale)
while in others, cooperatives with social goals will be dominant (for food, water management, education, and restoration of ecosystems...). While the book does not go deep into each sector, I think we should avoid the state-anarchist binary and see when top-down and bottom-up provisioning makes more sense, considering equality, efficiency, heterogeneity, information...
At the same time production focus changes, demand has to shrink, particularly on harmful and non-necessary products and services to live a good life. That means that ads, addictive technologies, SUVs, fast fashion, junk foods... providers need to change their focus and scale towards socially necessary activities. Advertising can focus on communicating the required social change and what is needed in a post-capitalist society and convince people to take an active role in a better future, technologies can focus on improving education, information gathering, data quality, transparency, health outcomes... Car manufacturers can refocus on hydrogen public transport and heavy transport necessary for agriculture without the need to rely on diesel; fast fashion can be transformed into clothing libraries and highly durable and functional clothing that looks great and can be maintained for years, giving more space for creativity and less space for a race to the bottom in prices and rush for sales; processed food industries will have to stop sodas, fatty snacks and non-nutritious foods with high footprints and provide low-footprint plant-based nutritious foods, that support and pay fair prices to farmers. This is not likely going to happen automatically, and that will require international coordination and the state, together with civil society and the workers affected, to make such a transition. If we provide a safe transition path to the workers, they are very likely to be onboarded, but note that very profitable companies like Nestle, if they continue to exist, will likely see their profits go down as well as their top salaries if they do transition to a truly socially desirable business. It is normally little explored, but I do see that those companies will need to have by law workers as part of the governance, to ensure that shareholders have a very limited role in the decision-making. During the book there is no mention of how to deal with debt and investment; note that reducing demand and aggregate production will make debt unpayable in a growth-based system, and also some responsible organizations will lack finance, as capitalists will refuse to invest in not-for-growth or profit businesses.
As part of the strategy to erode and dismantle capitalism; it is of particular importance that the top 10% income take out their money and engage in a voluntary simplicity life that creates sufficient cultural hegemony that private sobriety and public abundance are desirable and possible. Those privileged groups should go beyond individual optimization, engaging in a shift in cultural values and interests, using their privilege to confront the destructive imperial way of living; and engaging politically and through work into low-footprint high-wellbeing systems.
There are also groups like care workers, farmers, long-term unemployment, single parents, immigrants, and particular racial groups; who are suffering the oppression of capitalism with particular intensity. Those groups should be the starting point to find alliances and coordinate the disgust from the current system, that the extreme right is capitalizing; and bringing into a mass opposition to capitalism and support for degrowth socialism.
At the institutional level, the left is mostly lost, too much on the center and losing ground worldwide; this is a perfect time for the left to truly propose a radical plan that goes beyond reforms and deals with the root cause of the pluricrisis but being openly anti-capitalist, and willing to take over the commons and implement eco-socialism empowering citizens and communities like never before. Progressive parties' green Keynesianism is failing, and the time to explore radical ideas has come.
At a more local level, both civil society and political parties have to be part of the focus to affect systematically the rules of the economic system to erode capitalism and implement degrowth socialism
. In some cases, that will lead to a reduction of state role to ensure certain services in favor of communities and bottom-up orgs, but I foresee it to have a role as a guarantor for universal access, even if heterogeneous, and also coordinate in solidarity and not competition with other nations.
Media is currently a tool by the capital to install cultural hegemony to perpetuate capitalism and the unique viable system. The end of history, the fear of communism is installed in the minds by the experience of the non-democratic regimes and failures of state communism. There is also a regular threat on private property over tenants and business owners that vote the right out of fear from socialism, not of a genuine conviction that capitalism is the best system to go. Media is a place where debate and open criticism have to be ensured, and alternatives have to be exposed and sharpened while capitalism is challenged every day.
Culture and Arts are great platforms to open the imaginaries and the desires towards degrowth socialism. Artists and intellectuals are less tied to the ruling of productivism, and by nature, they should be a space for open expression and reorientation of the visions of what is possible, let's not underestimate that power.
Here is a list of proposed working groups:
- International institutions, finance, and global environmental justice
- Local institutions and media
- Universal, restorative social provisioning
- Eroding capitalism and reducing harmful production and consumption
- Alliance building, bottom-up organization towards decision-making
- Culture and artistic 'war' against capitalism, pluriversal expressions, and imaginaries
We need to reconcile socialism with ecology, and degrowth with socialism. Not all socialists agree or support degrowth or the notion of planetary boundaries, and definitely the mainstream left is rather green Keynesian, productivist, and mostly pro-growth. The author claims that due to the impossibility of sufficient decoupling and the need for capitalism to grow, only socialism and a break from capitalism can achieve a stable climate and public abundance.
Also, not all degrowthers or defenders of the steady-state economy are anti-capitalist or state that we should overcome it to achieve our social and ecological agenda. This is problematic analytically, as radical democratic systems are incompatible with capital-driven markets. Not only that, capital accumulation needs, by definition, growth, and this will not be possible in the long term, even if many other industries shrink to favor those that we want to increase as they are necessary. Note, for example, that even Erik Olin accepts an heterodox mix of provisioning systems that may include capital markets, but democratically channeled and socially limited.
I think there is commonly a confusion between capitalist enterprise and traditional markets. The former needs growth to function, the latter needs to ensure revenues are at least equal to costs in the long term. There are many cases where traditional markets, even when only post-growth businesses exist, are problematic (health, energy, education...); but I do think that markets have proven to provide affordable high-quality goods and services under the right conditions. In any case, I find it valid that socialism needs to confront capitalism more directly to be serious about ecology, while degrowth and ecological economists should be more explicit about the need to move from representative democracy directed by capital towards a social democracy directed by sufficiency, global justice within planetary boundaries. Let's explore how to implement degrowth socialism, or degrowth communism as explained by Saito.
Explain why we need degrowth communism
I explained previously that degrowth communism is the way to ensure economic stability is possible within planetary breakdown and the growth mandate. But there are other reasons why this will be superior and more desirable than capitalism or productivist socialism.The first reason is to break with the artificial scarcity generated by capitalism, that appropriates the commons to create commodities and makes them directly (via speculation) or indirectly (via climate change), more and more inaccessible or expensive. Degrowth communism can provide radical public abundance by focusing on universal social provisioning while reducing harmful and superfluous production.
Given the fact that the most likely path for climate stabilization is degrowth, this reduces the risk for those greatly exposed to the side effects of capitalism, due to its imposed scarcity and climate shocks that are making life in an increasing number of places impossible.
Revaluing and communalizing care, reducing the material pressures to work long hours for meaningless jobs provides a freedom that is not limited to those who hold privilege, but to everyone. It moves beyond the defensive freedom to consume and exploit oneself and others to one that evolves in truly connecting and respecting others.
The current economic system is deeply unfair; it exploits care providers, mainly female, farmers, and factory workers, so the capital owners take the biggest surplus value in justification for presumably affordable prices. The current economic system allows for private jets and hunger, plastic surgery and lack of essential vaccines, energy poverty and rockets. Degrowth socialism prioritizes access to essential services for all, revaluing and distributing better care and essential work, breaking with abusive trade and financial arrangements locally and globally.
To implement degrowth start with the commons; and take over production and demand
Public abundance requires that the commons: land, water, air, money... be returned to the control of the social and not decided upon individual preference. That may mean changing ownership or simply restricting what can be done so we ensure that we provide what is necessary while restoring the environment. That will lead to shaping production but also changing demand, particularly for the top 10% incomes.Production is mainly driven by capital markets, where money is allocated to the most profitable activities; this is why, despite climate change risks, fossil fuel production and investment are at historic highs despite the clear mandate to phase them out. To change that, we need to reorient production collectively to prioritize essential basic goods and services (nutritious food, clean water, affordable housing, low emissions energy, care, education, and health...). There is a debate on the extent to which the State plays a role in certain provisioning sectors (most likely energy, housing, transport, and other capital-intensive sectors with economies of scale)
while in others, cooperatives with social goals will be dominant (for food, water management, education, and restoration of ecosystems...). While the book does not go deep into each sector, I think we should avoid the state-anarchist binary and see when top-down and bottom-up provisioning makes more sense, considering equality, efficiency, heterogeneity, information...
At the same time production focus changes, demand has to shrink, particularly on harmful and non-necessary products and services to live a good life. That means that ads, addictive technologies, SUVs, fast fashion, junk foods... providers need to change their focus and scale towards socially necessary activities. Advertising can focus on communicating the required social change and what is needed in a post-capitalist society and convince people to take an active role in a better future, technologies can focus on improving education, information gathering, data quality, transparency, health outcomes... Car manufacturers can refocus on hydrogen public transport and heavy transport necessary for agriculture without the need to rely on diesel; fast fashion can be transformed into clothing libraries and highly durable and functional clothing that looks great and can be maintained for years, giving more space for creativity and less space for a race to the bottom in prices and rush for sales; processed food industries will have to stop sodas, fatty snacks and non-nutritious foods with high footprints and provide low-footprint plant-based nutritious foods, that support and pay fair prices to farmers. This is not likely going to happen automatically, and that will require international coordination and the state, together with civil society and the workers affected, to make such a transition. If we provide a safe transition path to the workers, they are very likely to be onboarded, but note that very profitable companies like Nestle, if they continue to exist, will likely see their profits go down as well as their top salaries if they do transition to a truly socially desirable business. It is normally little explored, but I do see that those companies will need to have by law workers as part of the governance, to ensure that shareholders have a very limited role in the decision-making. During the book there is no mention of how to deal with debt and investment; note that reducing demand and aggregate production will make debt unpayable in a growth-based system, and also some responsible organizations will lack finance, as capitalists will refuse to invest in not-for-growth or profit businesses.
As part of the strategy to erode and dismantle capitalism; it is of particular importance that the top 10% income take out their money and engage in a voluntary simplicity life that creates sufficient cultural hegemony that private sobriety and public abundance are desirable and possible. Those privileged groups should go beyond individual optimization, engaging in a shift in cultural values and interests, using their privilege to confront the destructive imperial way of living; and engaging politically and through work into low-footprint high-wellbeing systems.
Study who will support degrowth
Erik Olin in one of the chapters of this last book explains that alliances will require finding common spaces on interests, values, and visions; and each would not necessarily be in sync with the other. It is not in the interest, at least in the short term and with the current cultural values, for the top 10% to support degrowth; but many of these citizens share the values of justice, equality, and equity, and freedom. That means that when exposed to the facts that capitalism and the imperial mode of living break with all these values, they would support it even if it goes against their interests.There are also groups like care workers, farmers, long-term unemployment, single parents, immigrants, and particular racial groups; who are suffering the oppression of capitalism with particular intensity. Those groups should be the starting point to find alliances and coordinate the disgust from the current system, that the extreme right is capitalizing; and bringing into a mass opposition to capitalism and support for degrowth socialism.
At the institutional level, the left is mostly lost, too much on the center and losing ground worldwide; this is a perfect time for the left to truly propose a radical plan that goes beyond reforms and deals with the root cause of the pluricrisis but being openly anti-capitalist, and willing to take over the commons and implement eco-socialism empowering citizens and communities like never before. Progressive parties' green Keynesianism is failing, and the time to explore radical ideas has come.
Work and control vectors of power
There are institutions, particularly at the international level, that are strongly dominated by capital: WTO, UN, IMF, WB, and the like have to be reshaped and made democratic; current international arrangements have to be revisited and re-implemented on the principles of global justice and not power; which will have implications in economic sovereignty, debt repudiation and the flourishing of the pluriverse instead of the imposition of linear development.At a more local level, both civil society and political parties have to be part of the focus to affect systematically the rules of the economic system to erode capitalism and implement degrowth socialism
. In some cases, that will lead to a reduction of state role to ensure certain services in favor of communities and bottom-up orgs, but I foresee it to have a role as a guarantor for universal access, even if heterogeneous, and also coordinate in solidarity and not competition with other nations.
Media is currently a tool by the capital to install cultural hegemony to perpetuate capitalism and the unique viable system. The end of history, the fear of communism is installed in the minds by the experience of the non-democratic regimes and failures of state communism. There is also a regular threat on private property over tenants and business owners that vote the right out of fear from socialism, not of a genuine conviction that capitalism is the best system to go. Media is a place where debate and open criticism have to be ensured, and alternatives have to be exposed and sharpened while capitalism is challenged every day.
Culture and Arts are great platforms to open the imaginaries and the desires towards degrowth socialism. Artists and intellectuals are less tied to the ruling of productivism, and by nature, they should be a space for open expression and reorientation of the visions of what is possible, let's not underestimate that power.
Strategy requires working groups
We cannot do all if we expect each agent of change to be part of every pillar for a transition. I advocate here to generate working groups with different focuses, but strongly coordinated to achieve similar goals: ecological socialism, degrowth communism so the planetary pressures go down fast while more and more people have access to the basic services to flourish, unjust structures are changed or dismantled, reparations are in place and backed up by capital responsibility in damages, all with strong principles of radical democracy and solidarity between nations.Here is a list of proposed working groups:
- International institutions, finance, and global environmental justice
- Local institutions and media
- Universal, restorative social provisioning
- Eroding capitalism and reducing harmful production and consumption
- Alliance building, bottom-up organization towards decision-making
- Culture and artistic 'war' against capitalism, pluriversal expressions, and imaginaries
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