Toward an age of low tech for a more resilient and sustainable society
I believe ‘high’ technology will not solve global problems and propose a different ‘low tech’ approach to building a more resilient, equitable and sustainable society.
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Reflecting on the emerging strategy debate in the degrowth movement
We believe the degrowth community should invest time and energy into the creation and legitimisation of a Degrowth International, to conduct these processes of collective deliberation.
Degrowth: A Response to Branko Milanovich
In sum, it is irrational to hope, against the evidence, that our existing economic system will deliver the development outcomes we want while at the same time reversing ecological breakdown. We need to be smarter than that.
Make life, not work: democratizing, decommodifying and remediating existence
Democratizing and decommodifying work, and remediating the environment are essential to sustain life on this planet. However, this cannot be done through limiting ourselves to well-worn social democratic thinking.
Pausing the game of growth
Here is a proposition: think of the economy as made of Lego. All rules to organise extraction, production, allocation, consumption, and disposal are social institutions. I
Degrowth resonates: a reflection on DegrowthFest 2020
Degrowth resonated with many people in our community. That is the remarkable result of DegrowthFest, for me. I am thrilled but not surprised that so many friends and neighbors were keen on this movement and idea that is so dear to me.
Debt, Land and Money, From Polanyi to the New Economic Archaeology
Behind today’s ‘free market’ advocacy is the power of financial wealth to appropriate the political, fiscal and central planning role that Polanyi, Marx and other socialists hoped to see expanded in the hands of democratic government.
Now Published: ‘The Great Awakening: New Modes of Life Amidst Capitalist Ruins’
I am happy to announce the publication of a new anthology that I co-edited with Professor Anna Grear, Professor of Law and Theory at Cardiff University in the UK. The book is entitled The Great Awakening: New Modes of Life Amidst Capitalist Ruins, released by punctum books last week.
A debt reckoning is unavoidable — will activists seize the moment?
These crises offer a vivid illustration of the cruel nature of elite rule and expose economic myths that have long convinced everyday people that their deprivation is inevitable. There is an opportunity here to open up space for a new society to emerge. Activists must seize it.
Caring and Thriving: The Social Security Engendered by Commoning
So there is a direct link between economic crises and the crisis of our social security system. This should scare us all. We know there will be another crisis.
Structural violence and the automobile
The car remains a weapon of choice against anti-racist protestors as the uprisings against systematic racism ignited by the police murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor stretch into their fourth month.
What COVID-19 suggests for the future of sharing cities
While the growing instability of our biosphere and global civilization are worrying to say the least, the prospect of a rise in city power is an exciting silver lining because it is in self-governing city-states that civilization has historically been born and reborn.
