Last March, Tim Jackson put forward the idea of prosperity without growth in a report published by the United Kingdom’s Sustainable Development Commission and followed up with a book of the same name released last November. The book is a best seller (ranked 1,729 on Amazon) and in it he argues convincingly that we can still prosper without adhering to the encoded mantra of expansion and growth that permeates modern market economies.
More recently, in January 2010, Andrew Simms and Victoria Johnson at the new economics foundation (nef) published a more emphatic message in their report entitled Growth isn’t possible. They argue that we should abandon the notion of growth altogether. The premise is that we need a new economic model “that allows the human population as a whole to thrive without having to rely on ultimately impossible endless increases in consumption”.
In influential forums — like the G8 or G20, for instance — while it is acceptable and even desirable to use the word ‘sustainability’ in communiqués, it is most certainly taboo to equate ‘no economic growth’ to a social good. However, such heresy nonetheless finds traction (if only in book sales), even when our world is suffering from the ills of economic recession.
When addressing our environmental ills, the closest we ever seem to get is ‘decoupling’. This idea has been around for decades and essentially suggests that we can break the links between economic growth and nasty side effects like pollution (e.g., carbon dioxide). Decoupling is done by producing things more efficiently — using less (and preferably renewable) energy, or using technology to capture the pollution. However, Jackson says that this relative decoupling is only possible to a certain level. He believes absolute decoupling is a myth — simply the acceptable face of sustainability that leaves our complex social and economic systems unchanged.
Stuff, Stuff, and More Stuff
Generally, we humans don’t really like complexity or understanding how things work too much. For many of us, it is a bit of a shock to be confronted by some of the realities. You can find a good illustration of this in The Story of Stuff, which does a nice (albeit heavily politicised) job of illustrating the linkages within the modern economy: from where we get our resources, to their production, consumption and disposal.
You either love or truly hate this story. Some of the more inquisitive may want to look more deeply into “stuff”, but I suspect many will convulsively reject it as heresy. After all, growth is good and without wealth there is no progress and what you don’t know, doesn’t hurt you.
At the same time, there are several important and accepted norms that dictate how the economy works and the role that consumption plays. For example, companies’ first obligations are to shareholders, governments plan their spending based on the assumption of growth, and investors expect interest on their monies lent. Our role as consumers is to fuel that growth (preferably borrowing money in the process).
It is therefore entirely understandable that governments, businesses and consumers have little choice but to be obedient followers of the Growth God: otherwise uncertainty would prevail, revenues would fall and social stability would be threatened.
At a personal level, all this talk of growth focuses on the consumer cycle. Most of us like new things and the feeling of satisfaction (sometimes fleeting) that these things provide. And a large part of our modern society is optimized to meet these consumption habits with ever more innovative products delivered with ever increasing efficiency, even to the point of not having to leave the comfort of your home.
Ironically, it is this increasing efficiency — coupled with advancing technology and connected trade systems — that often breaks the link between the consumer and the consequences of their manufactured goods and results in social vulnerability when growth slows. Individually, we are often unwittingly runners on this treadmill.
Fortunately, it is the buzz of this consumer exercise that helps us deal with the stress it creates. Governments are hopelessly addicted and try frantically to get us back on the treadmill like the overbearing trainer whose job is on the line if you don’t perform. Far from this latest financial and economic crisis being a time of reflection, the main priority is to get growing again.
Yet, as American author Edward Abbey once wrote, “growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell”. Reforming an economic system that mandates growth on a finite planet requires drastic changes in how we do business. Therefore, in order to avoid the pain of environmental chemotherapy, many are developing alternative therapies.
Better, Not Bigger
The notion that our progress (and happiness) equates to our consumption became very strongly embedded in economic policy not least because we can measure consumption, and although we know it’s imperfect at some level, it works. There is however, a whole array of proposals aimed at redressing this.
For example, the Redefining Progress approach is based on broadening our conception of affluence beyond Gross Domestic Product (GDP) to the Genuine Progress Indicator. The ‘capability approach’, articulated by India’s Nobel Prize winning economist Amartya Sen and others, has provided the basis for the Human Development Index and mainstream acceptance of wider measures of welfare.
Some are advocating economic changes that address the key problems affecting the world’s resources and climate systems. Jackson believes that, as many have long warned, we must recognise that exponential growth interacts with resources so that we may begin to adjust our economic activity in the face of scarcity and constraint. (This notion seems to be experiencing a revival, see our recent Survivalism back in vogue).
[quote quote=”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.” author=”Tim Jackson” ]
“Prosperity consists in our ability to flourish as human beings — within the ecological limits of a finite planet,” states Jackson in the report. “The challenge for our society is to create the conditions under which this is possible. It is the most urgent task of our times.”
So, beyond concepts of green growth or sustainable growth there is also that of ‘no growth’. The latter is distinguished by the fact that it does not equate ‘development’ with economic expansion. The so-called steady state economy would look very different than our current system. We may share jobs, which would mean less income but, if we must still believe that time is money, increasing our time capital would afford us the luxury of doing the things that money can’t, or would no longer be needed to, buy.
How does such a thing happen? Will everyone come on board? The reality is that changing any system is always hard because we are not rewarded for doing things differently or because we receive perverse incentives not to change (i.e., fossil fuels still heavily subsidized).
Some of the ideas laid out in the above-mentioned publications may initially sound awfully undesirable. But are they really? Or is it just because they don’t fit with how we currently define prosperity?
“As long as you are using that word ‘consumer’, you will be degrading the quality of the public discussion as we go into the very difficult future that we face.” — James Howard Kunstler
The tricky part is getting individuals to think about changing. The provocative author and new urbanist James Howard Kunstler puts it simply: people need to stop thinking of themselves as consumers. He argues that consumers do not have obligations, responsibilities or duties to their fellow human beings.
“As long as you are using that word ‘consumer’, you will be degrading the quality of the public discussion as we go into the very difficult future that we face.”
So while today we cannot deny that we are part of a mass consumer culture, it is a culture that to which we should begin waving goodbye. Perhaps luckily, mass consumerism is still a relatively new phenomenon; it is essentially a leftover of post-war excess productive capacity allied to ingenious marketing that plays a crucial role in stimulating various desires and dissatisfactions and keeps the consumer ball rolling. The culture-jamming magazine Adbusters considers advertising to be akin to intellectual pollution and aims to reform current perceptions of advertising in modern society, often using subversive counter advertisements.
Maybe what we really need is more space and time to reflect on these issues. Interestingly, Clay Shirky coined the term cognitive surplus to describe the little free time that our structured working lives allow. He explains how this time is currently filled largely by watching television (and shopping). Some of his figures are astounding: 200 billion hours of TV are watched in the US each year and 100 million hours/weekend are spent just watching adverts.
This vast cognigitve surplus could be better employed, he argues, by using our time creatively rather than consumptively. The creative awakening enabled by the internet is transforming some of us from consumers to producers and sharers of music, video, knowledge and so on.
昨年3月、イギリスの持続可能な発展委員会（Sustainable Development Commission）の報告書にティム・ジャクソン氏の「成長なき繁栄」というアイデアが発表された。同年11月には同名の著書も発行され、アマゾンで1,729番目にランクインするほどのベストセラーとなった。この著書の中でジャクソン氏が主張しているのは、現代の市場経済に浸透している成長と拡大というスローガンに頼らずとも繁栄は可能であるという考え方だ。
一般的に、人間は物事の複雑さや仕組みを理解するのがあまり好きではない。私たちの多くにとって、現実を突きつけられるのはちょっとした衝撃である。この事実については「The Story of Stuff」（モノの一生）を見るとわかりやすい。本作は（かなり政治色が強いものの）現代の経済における連鎖を理解しやすく説明しており、資源の入手に始まり、製品化、消費、廃棄に至るまでの過程を追うものである。
Our World without Economic Growth
by Christopher Doll
https://ourworld.unu.edu/en/the-end-of-the-growth
Last March, Tim Jackson put forward the idea of prosperity without growth in a report published by the United Kingdom’s Sustainable Development Commission and followed up with a book of the same name released last November. The book is a best seller (ranked 1,729 on Amazon) and in it he argues convincingly that we can still prosper without adhering to the encoded mantra of expansion and growth that permeates modern market economies.
More recently, in January 2010, Andrew Simms and Victoria Johnson at the new economics foundation (nef) published a more emphatic message in their report entitled Growth isn’t possible. They argue that we should abandon the notion of growth altogether. The premise is that we need a new economic model “that allows the human population as a whole to thrive without having to rely on ultimately impossible endless increases in consumption”.
In influential forums — like the G8 or G20, for instance — while it is acceptable and even desirable to use the word ‘sustainability’ in communiqués, it is most certainly taboo to equate ‘no economic growth’ to a social good. However, such heresy nonetheless finds traction (if only in book sales), even when our world is suffering from the ills of economic recession.
When addressing our environmental ills, the closest we ever seem to get is ‘decoupling’. This idea has been around for decades and essentially suggests that we can break the links between economic growth and nasty side effects like pollution (e.g., carbon dioxide). Decoupling is done by producing things more efficiently — using less (and preferably renewable) energy, or using technology to capture the pollution. However, Jackson says that this relative decoupling is only possible to a certain level. He believes absolute decoupling is a myth — simply the acceptable face of sustainability that leaves our complex social and economic systems unchanged.
Stuff, Stuff, and More Stuff
Generally, we humans don’t really like complexity or understanding how things work too much. For many of us, it is a bit of a shock to be confronted by some of the realities. You can find a good illustration of this in The Story of Stuff, which does a nice (albeit heavily politicised) job of illustrating the linkages within the modern economy: from where we get our resources, to their production, consumption and disposal.
You either love or truly hate this story. Some of the more inquisitive may want to look more deeply into “stuff”, but I suspect many will convulsively reject it as heresy. After all, growth is good and without wealth there is no progress and what you don’t know, doesn’t hurt you.
At the same time, there are several important and accepted norms that dictate how the economy works and the role that consumption plays. For example, companies’ first obligations are to shareholders, governments plan their spending based on the assumption of growth, and investors expect interest on their monies lent. Our role as consumers is to fuel that growth (preferably borrowing money in the process).
It is therefore entirely understandable that governments, businesses and consumers have little choice but to be obedient followers of the Growth God: otherwise uncertainty would prevail, revenues would fall and social stability would be threatened.
At a personal level, all this talk of growth focuses on the consumer cycle. Most of us like new things and the feeling of satisfaction (sometimes fleeting) that these things provide. And a large part of our modern society is optimized to meet these consumption habits with ever more innovative products delivered with ever increasing efficiency, even to the point of not having to leave the comfort of your home.
Ironically, it is this increasing efficiency — coupled with advancing technology and connected trade systems — that often breaks the link between the consumer and the consequences of their manufactured goods and results in social vulnerability when growth slows. Individually, we are often unwittingly runners on this treadmill.
Fortunately, it is the buzz of this consumer exercise that helps us deal with the stress it creates. Governments are hopelessly addicted and try frantically to get us back on the treadmill like the overbearing trainer whose job is on the line if you don’t perform. Far from this latest financial and economic crisis being a time of reflection, the main priority is to get growing again.
Yet, as American author Edward Abbey once wrote, “growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell”. Reforming an economic system that mandates growth on a finite planet requires drastic changes in how we do business. Therefore, in order to avoid the pain of environmental chemotherapy, many are developing alternative therapies.
Better, Not Bigger
The notion that our progress (and happiness) equates to our consumption became very strongly embedded in economic policy not least because we can measure consumption, and although we know it’s imperfect at some level, it works. There is however, a whole array of proposals aimed at redressing this.
For example, the Redefining Progress approach is based on broadening our conception of affluence beyond Gross Domestic Product (GDP) to the Genuine Progress Indicator. The ‘capability approach’, articulated by India’s Nobel Prize winning economist Amartya Sen and others, has provided the basis for the Human Development Index and mainstream acceptance of wider measures of welfare.
Some are advocating economic changes that address the key problems affecting the world’s resources and climate systems. Jackson believes that, as many have long warned, we must recognise that exponential growth interacts with resources so that we may begin to adjust our economic activity in the face of scarcity and constraint. (This notion seems to be experiencing a revival, see our recent Survivalism back in vogue).
[quote quote=”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.” author=”Tim Jackson” ]
“Prosperity consists in our ability to flourish as human beings — within the ecological limits of a finite planet,” states Jackson in the report. “The challenge for our society is to create the conditions under which this is possible. It is the most urgent task of our times.”
So, beyond concepts of green growth or sustainable growth there is also that of ‘no growth’. The latter is distinguished by the fact that it does not equate ‘development’ with economic expansion. The so-called steady state economy would look very different than our current system. We may share jobs, which would mean less income but, if we must still believe that time is money, increasing our time capital would afford us the luxury of doing the things that money can’t, or would no longer be needed to, buy.
The Center for the Advancement of the Steady State Economy has summarised a number of policies from leading thinkers in this area.
Changing Attitudes
How does such a thing happen? Will everyone come on board? The reality is that changing any system is always hard because we are not rewarded for doing things differently or because we receive perverse incentives not to change (i.e., fossil fuels still heavily subsidized).
Some of the ideas laid out in the above-mentioned publications may initially sound awfully undesirable. But are they really? Or is it just because they don’t fit with how we currently define prosperity?
The tricky part is getting individuals to think about changing. The provocative author and new urbanist James Howard Kunstler puts it simply: people need to stop thinking of themselves as consumers. He argues that consumers do not have obligations, responsibilities or duties to their fellow human beings.
“As long as you are using that word ‘consumer’, you will be degrading the quality of the public discussion as we go into the very difficult future that we face.”
So while today we cannot deny that we are part of a mass consumer culture, it is a culture that to which we should begin waving goodbye. Perhaps luckily, mass consumerism is still a relatively new phenomenon; it is essentially a leftover of post-war excess productive capacity allied to ingenious marketing that plays a crucial role in stimulating various desires and dissatisfactions and keeps the consumer ball rolling. The culture-jamming magazine Adbusters considers advertising to be akin to intellectual pollution and aims to reform current perceptions of advertising in modern society, often using subversive counter advertisements.
Maybe what we really need is more space and time to reflect on these issues. Interestingly, Clay Shirky coined the term cognitive surplus to describe the little free time that our structured working lives allow. He explains how this time is currently filled largely by watching television (and shopping). Some of his figures are astounding: 200 billion hours of TV are watched in the US each year and 100 million hours/weekend are spent just watching adverts.
This vast cognigitve surplus could be better employed, he argues, by using our time creatively rather than consumptively. The creative awakening enabled by the internet is transforming some of us from consumers to producers and sharers of music, video, knowledge and so on.
It is early days, and we still don’t fully comprehend the way the internet is altering our social and economic norms and it will certainly be employed on both sides of the consumption debate.
But, if we can change the way we use media, then why not also the way we consume material things?
経済成長のない世界
by クリストファー・ ドール
translated by 森泉綾美
昨年3月、イギリスの持続可能な発展委員会（Sustainable Development Commission）の報告書にティム・ジャクソン氏の「成長なき繁栄」というアイデアが発表された。同年11月には同名の著書も発行され、アマゾンで1,729番目にランクインするほどのベストセラーとなった。この著書の中でジャクソン氏が主張しているのは、現代の市場経済に浸透している成長と拡大というスローガンに頼らずとも繁栄は可能であるという考え方だ。
さらに最近では、2010年1月に新経済財団（NEF）のアンドリュー・シムズ氏とヴィクトリア・ジョンソン氏が「成長は不可能である」（Growth isn’t possible）という報告書においてより断固たる警告を発した。彼らは、私たちが成長という観念をすべて捨て去るべきだと主張している。私たちに必要なのは「人類全体が際限なく増加する消費に頼らずに繁栄できるような」新しい経済モデルだという。
例えばG8やG20のような影響力のあるフォーラムでは、「持続可能性」という単語を声明で用いることが受け入れられ、むしろ好ましいとさえされている。一方、「ゼロ経済成長」と社会の利益を同一視するのは紛れもなくタブーだ。しかし、このような異論は、世界が景気後退に苦しむ現在でさえ（書籍販売においてだけでも）けん引力を持つものである。
環境問題について考える時、私たちは「デカップリング」（経済成長と環境負荷の分離）という概念に行き当たるであろう。これは数十年前から存在する考え方であり、基本的には、経済成長とその劣悪な副作用である公害など（例：二酸化炭素）の繋がりを絶つことを提言している。デカップリングは、エネルギーの（できれば再生可能エネルギーの）消費量を減らし効率よく生産を行なうことで、または技術を駆使して公害を予防することで実現できる。しかしながら、ジャクソン氏はこの相対的デカップリングが有効なのはある一定のレベルまでだと指摘している。また、絶対的デカップリングはおとぎ話に過ぎず、単に私たちの複雑な社会・経済システムを現状にとどめる程度の持続可能性しかもたらさないと述べている。
モノ、モノ、モノ
一般的に、人間は物事の複雑さや仕組みを理解するのがあまり好きではない。私たちの多くにとって、現実を突きつけられるのはちょっとした衝撃である。この事実については「The Story of Stuff」（モノの一生）を見るとわかりやすい。本作は（かなり政治色が強いものの）現代の経済における連鎖を理解しやすく説明しており、資源の入手に始まり、製品化、消費、廃棄に至るまでの過程を追うものである。
あなたはこの物語を好きになるか、あるいは心底嫌いになるかのどちらかだろう。探究心の強い人であれば「モノ」についてより深く知りたくなるだろうが、多くの人はこのような異説を発作的に拒絶するだろう。結局のところ、成長は素晴らしく、富がなければ進歩もなく、知らなければあなたが傷つくこともないのだから。
同時に、いくつかの重要な通念は受け入れられ、経済の仕組みや消費の役割を決定付けている。例えば、企業が最優先しなければならないのは株主であり、政府は成長予測に基づいて支出を計画し、投資家たちは預けた資金の金利を期待する。そして、私たち消費者は（なるべくならお金を借りて）成長に勢いを与えるという役割を担っているのである。
このため、政府、企業そして消費者たちが成長という絶対的な存在に追従せざるを得ないのも十分に納得できる。そうしなければ、先行きへの不安は高まり、歳入は落ち込み、社会の安定は脅かされるだろう。
個人的なレベルになると、成長に関するこれらの話は消費サイクルを中心に行われる。私たちの多くは、新しい物やそれらが与えてくれる（時につかの間の）満足感が好きなのだ。そして、現代社会の大部分がこのような消費習慣に対応している。それを可能にしているのは、より革新的な商品やますます効率的になる配送手段であり、今や私たちは家でくつろいでいるだけで商品を入手することができる。
皮肉にも、私たち消費者と製品の関係性を破壊しているのはこの効率化であり、進化する技術や連携した貿易システムである。そして、成長が停滞すれば社会の脆弱化を引き起こすのだ。私たち個人は、無意識のうちにこの踏み車の上を走らされている。
幸運なことに、私たちは消費が引き起こすストレスを、このような消費者エクササイズによって解消している。政府は救いようがないほど消費に依存しており、私たちを踏み車の上に戻そうと必死だ。その姿はまるで、私たちが演技をしなければクビにされてしまう横暴な調教師のようである。昨今の金融経済危機の反省はおろか、またしても成長が最優先されているのだ。
しかし、アメリカ人作家エドワード・アビーがかつて記したように「成長のための成長はガン細胞の増殖と変らない」のである。限りある惑星に成長を要求する経済システムを改革するには、ビジネスのあり方を抜本的に変えていかなければならない。環境に化学療法の痛みを負わせることを避けるため、現在では多くの人々が代替となる治療法を推進している。
拡大を伴わない改善
経済政策には、私たちの進歩（そして幸せ）と消費を同一視する習慣が深く根付いている。消費は測ることができ、完璧ではないがそれなりに効果があるからだ。しかしながら、この習慣を是正する提案が数多くなされている。
例えば、リディファイニング・プログレス（進歩を再定義する）のアプローチは、私たちが持つ豊かさの観念を、国内総生産（GDP）から真の進歩指標にまで広げることを目指している。インドのノーベル賞受賞者である経済学者アマルティア・センらが提唱する「潜在能力アプローチ」は、人間開発指数（HDI）の基盤となり、より幅広い繁栄の尺度が主流派に受け入れられるきっかけとなった。
世界の資源や気候システムに影響を及ぼす主要な問題を解決するような経済改革を提唱する人々がいる。多くの人々が長年警告してきたように、ジャクソン氏もまた、私たちは急激な成長と資源との相関関係を認識し、予期される欠乏と制限に向かい合って経済活動を調整し始めるべきだと述べている。（この議論は再活発化してきた様子である。生存主義の再流行をご覧下さい）
「繁栄は、生態学的に制限のあるこの惑星において、私たちが人類としての繁栄を達成できるかどうかにかかっている」とジャクソン氏は報告書の中で述べている。「私たちの社会が抱える課題は、このような形での繁栄を可能にする条件を生み出すことだ。これは現代における最も緊急の課題である」
だからこそ、グリーン成長や持続可能な成長という概念を超えた「ゼロ成長」という考え方が存在するのだ。後者は「発展」と経済成長とを同一視しない点で区別されている。いわゆる定常型経済は、既存のシステムとは大きく違って見えるだろう。私たちは仕事をシェアすることになるので、収入も減ることになる。しかし、もし「時は金なり」という言葉がまだ意味を持つなら、時間という資本が増えることで、お金では買えない贅沢をする余裕が生まれる。
The Center for the Advancement of the Steady State Economy（定常型経済振興センター）ではこの分野における第一人者たちが提言する政策をとりまとめている。
態度を改める
どうしたらこのようなことができるのだろうか。人々は果たして参加するだろうか。現実には、何らかのシステムを変えることは常に困難を伴うものである。なぜなら、私たちは違う方法を試したからといって見返りが与えられるわけでもなく、むしろ何も変えないようにと歪んだ奨励金を受け取ったりするからだ。（たとえば、化石燃料にはいまだにかなりの助成金が給付されている）
前述の出版物に紹介されているアイデアは、最初のうちは魅力に乏しく映るかもしれない。でも本当にそうなのだろうか。むしろ、これらのアイデアが、ただ現在の繁栄の定義に沿っていないだけなのではないだろうか。
厄介なのは、個々人が変化に対して前向きになってもらうことだ。挑発的な作家でありニューアーバニズムの専門家でもあるジェームズ・ハワード・クンストラー氏は、シンプルな提案をしている。つまり、人々は自分たちを消費者であると考えるのをやめるべきだというのだ。同氏は、消費者は義務や責任、または義理を周りの人間に負っているわけではないと主張する。
「消費者という言葉を使い続けている限り、私たちを待ち受ける厳しい未来を検討する公の議論の質を引き下げてしまうだろう」
私たちが大量消費文化の一部であることは今日否定できないが、この文化に別れを告げるべき時が来たのだ。運がいいことに、おそらく大量消費主義はまだ比較的新しい現象である。大量消費主義とは、基本的に戦後の過剰な生産設備が残していったものであり、様々な欲望や不満を刺激し、消費者たちに消費させ続けるための巧妙なマーケティングと連動している。カルチャー雑誌アドバスターズは、広告を知性への公害と見なしており、しばしば破壊的な反撃広告によって現代社会における広告の観点を改革することを目標としている。
おそらく、私たちが本当に必要としているのはこれらの問題を反省するための場所と時間だ。クレイ・シャーキー氏が作り出した思考の余剰という言葉が興味深い。これは私たちの構造化された生活の中にあるほんの少しの自由時間を表す言葉だ。同氏は、この自由時間の大部分がいかにテレビを見ることに（そして買い物に）費やされているかを説明している。驚くべきことに、アメリカでは年間2,000億時間もテレビが放映されており、週末には1億時間がコマーシャルに使われている。
時間をただ消費するのではなく創造的に使うことで、この莫大な思考の余剰をより有効に使うことができる、と同氏は主張している。インターネットは私たちをよりクリエイティブにし、消費者を生産者へ、または音楽、動画、知識などを共有する仲間へと変えた。
インターネットは発明されてまだ間もない。このため、私たちにはインターネットがどのように私たちの社会と経済の基準を変えていくのかを完全に掌握することはできないが、消費を議論する上で必ず持ち上がるテーマであるには違いない。
しかし、もし私たちがメディアの利用方法を変えることができるなら、物質を消費する方法も変えられるのではないだろうか。