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Ethical shopping is just another way of showing how rich you are
George Monbiot, The Guardian
The middle classes congratulate themselves on going green, then carry on buying and flying as much as before
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…Dozens of new books seem to provide an answer: we can save the world by embracing “better, greener lifestyles”. Last week, for instance, the Guardian published an extract from A Slice of Organic Life, the book by Sheherazade Goldsmith – married to the very rich environmentalist Zac – in which she teaches us “to live within nature’s limits”. It’s easy. Just make your own bread, butter, cheese, jam, chutneys and pickles, keep a milking cow, a few pigs, goats, geese, ducks, chickens, beehives, gardens and orchards. Well, what are you waiting for?
Her book contains plenty of useful advice, and she comes across as modest, sincere and well-informed. But of lobbying for political change, there is not a word. You can save the planet from your own kitchen – if you have endless time and plenty of land. When I was reading it on the train, another passenger asked me if he could take a look. He flicked through it for a moment, and then summed up the problem in seven words: “This is for people who don’t work.”
The media’s obsession with beauty, wealth and fame blights every issue it touches, but none more so than green politics. There is an inherent conflict between the aspirational lifestyle journalism that makes readers feel better about themselves and sells country kitchens, and the central demand of environmentalism – that we should consume less. “None of these changes represents a sacrifice,” Goldsmith tells us. “Being more conscientious isn’t about giving up things.” But it is if, like her, you own more than one home when others have none. Uncomfortable as this is for both the media and its advertisers, giving things up is an essential component of going green. But it says nothing about buying less.
Green consumerism is becoming a pox on the planet. If it merely swapped the damaging goods we buy for less damaging ones, I would champion it. But two parallel markets are developing – one for unethical products and one for ethical products, and the expansion of the second does little to hinder the growth of the first.
(24 July 2007)
Another salvo in an ongoing debate. For what it’s worth, I think it’s important to encourage green consumerism as a step in the right direction, rather than to condemn it. On the other hand, George Monbiot is accustomed to going up against powerful antagonists, and it may be difficult for him to dial down the vehemence when dealing with well-meaning allies.
Tactically, I think that Monbiot is wrong. Consumer action has been a key part in social movements, such as the table grape boycott in support of the farmworkers union. A reader comment to a related article, pointed out:
One of the earliest examples of ethical consumption was the boycott of sugar as the product of slave labour.
Where Monbiot is right, I think, is in advocating a more critical attitude towards green consumerism. -BA
Yes, we can shop our way to a cleaner Earth
Ed Mayo, The Guardian
George Monbiot says that “no political challenge can be met by shopping” (Ethical shopping is just another way of showing how rich you are, July 24). I believe he is wrong.
There is a long history of consumer action focused on politics: in the 19th century the UK cooperative movement brought together consumers and workers and, in the United States, Josephine Shaw Lowell founded the first Consumers League in New York to tackle sweatshops that employed children, with the motto “to live means to buy, to buy means to have power, to have power means to have duties”.
As Monbiot sees it, consumer action can promote ethical products but it can’t dampen down demand for unethical ones: “If it merely swapped the damaging goods we buy for less damaging ones, I would champion it. But two parallel markets are developing – one for unethical products and one for ethical products, and the expansion of the second does little to hinder the growth of the first.” But in each of the above cases, what people did as consumers helped lead to exactly that. The point is not that consumer action persuaded everyone to take part, but that it persuaded enough people to, and this was part of the process that changed laws.
(26 July 2007)
Open season on ethical consumers?
Bibi van der Zee, The Guardian
A couple of weeks ago I was sitting in a lecture hall in Leeds writes Bibi van der Zee listening to three men: Benedict “Newbury” Southworth head of the World Development Movement; our very own George Monbiot; and an extremely passionate man called Mark who is one of the organisers of next month’s Climate Change camp – all talking to us about rising up and take direct action against climate change.
I can’t remember how the discussion moved on from our general consensus that climate change was bad and we were good, but all of sudden George and Mark were, as one, laying into ethical consumerism, or, as George poetically describes it, “people buying bits of soap with leaves in”.
And now George is having another go at us in his Guardian column: apparently “green consumerism is becoming a pox on the planet”. Could it not perhaps be seen as a useful signal to politicians about what we want? (That’s the question I asked them all after their speeches.) Mark explained to silly little me that it was “a very weak signal”.
…But what makes it all the more annoying is the fact that George and his friends have a point. We may be talking up a fine ethical existence but the reality is different.
…So perhaps the actual impact of so-called ethical consumption is negligible. But the people doing it – the ethical consumers (what a horrible title) – are on your side, for God’s sake. They may be on a far earlier stage of the long journey into greenness, but they’re going in the right direction.
(24 July 2007)
Can ‘green chic’ save the planet?
Moises Velasquez-Manoff, Christian Science Monitor
Ecofriendly buying choices alone can’t sustain America’s lifestyle, experts warn – unless ‘looking green’ becomes ‘voting green.’
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Green, it seems, has gone mainstream. Magazines like Elle, Fortune, and Vanity Fair have published “green issues” in the past year, and the Academy Awards were carbon neutral. The Vatican recently announced plans to offset its 2007 emissions, while Costa Rica pledged to arrive at “net zero” by 2021.
Green has also gone trendy. Last week, Whole Foods Market released a limited edition, $15 cotton bag with “I’m not a plastic bag” emblazoned on its side. When the bag went on sale at outlets in Taiwan, a stampede followed. In Hong Kong, throngs shut down a shopping mall. In New York City last week, lines formed at dawn. Later that day, bags were offered on Craigslist for between $200 and $500. “These bags are walking billboards,” says Isabel Spearman, a spokeswoman for the bag’s designer, Anya Hindmarch. “You do have to make something trendy, and it becomes a habit. That’s the whole point.”
Savvy marketers have clearly tapped into something. But the green craze has many asking how, if at all, it addresses what many characterize as an impending climate catastrophe.
In what it implies about changing consumer awareness, some see “green-lightenment” as heartening. And since it creates demand for more environmentally friendly products, many think it’s moving in the right direction. Yet, as one professor put it, “We’re basically rushing toward a cliff, full speed ahead.” Can a fad save us? Experts’ replies run the gamut from “it’s a mockery,” to it’s the beginning of – and maybe a catalyst for – greater changes to come. But no one thinks that green consumption alone can get humanity out of its climate predicament. As Alex Steffen, cofounder of worldchanging.com, an environmental- commentary website, writes: “There is no combination of purchasing decisions which will make the current affluent American lifestyle sustainable. You can’t shop your way to sustainability.”
The problem, say experts, is the magnitude of the problem. According to the World Wildlife Foundation’s Living Planet report, as of 2003, the demands of humanity as a whole exceeded Earth’s capacity by 25 percent. Americans, the biggest consumers, consume at a rate that’s twice what the planet can sustain.
Saving the planet requires nothing short of overhauling civilization’s energy infrastructure, say many. This would include a multipronged effort to increase energy efficiency and advance renewable technologies, while also rethinking cities, agriculture, and public transportation, among other things.
Some compare the effort needed to achieve this to that of World War II, when, in the face of a clear and substantial threat, American society mobilized – and sacrificed – toward a common goal. (The analogy breaks down when you recall that Americans intended to return to “normalcy” after the war. But as Dale Jamieson, director of Environmental Studies at New York University points out, getting off carbon implies a permanent shift.) Others compare it to Teddy Roosevelt’s Progressive Era, a time when corporations and other private interests had accumulated much power at the expense of public institutions and society at large.
But the most apt comparison may be to the founding of the United States, when, with history as their guide, the framers of the Constitution attempted to establish a socially and politically “sustainable society.”
(26 July 2007)
Pressure Builds to Ban Plastic Bags in Stores
Ian Urbina, New York Times
ANNAPOLIS, Md.- Paper or plastic? It is a question that has long dogged grocery shoppers. But the debate may soon be settled for this maritime city, where a bill aimed at protecting marine life would ban plastic bags from all retail stores.
San Francisco enacted a ban in April, but it applies just to larger groceries and drugstores. Similar measures are being considered in Boston; Baltimore; Oakland, Calif.; Portland, Ore.; Santa Monica, Calif.; and Steamboat Springs, Colo.
Alexandra Cousteau, granddaughter of Jacques Cousteau and director of EarthEcho, an environmental education group in Washington, said, “Banning plastic makes sense for the simple reason that it takes more than 1,000 years to biodegrade, which means that every single piece of plastic we’ve ever manufactured is still around, and much of it ends up in the oceans killing animals.”
(23 July 2007)
Advocates hope to turn tide against bottled water
Stevenson Swanson, Chicago Tribune
Just say H-2-No.
That’s what an increasing number of public officials, environmental advocates and restaurateurs are urging people to do when they’re tempted to reach for bottled water.
Rather than spend their dollars on costly plastic containers of water, consumers should boot the bottle and turn on their taps, according to such officials as San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, Salt Lake City Mayor Ross “Rocky” Anderson and Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak.
…bottled-water companies have enjoyed strong sales growth since the early 1990s. A once-laughable idea — Who’d pay for water when you can get it for free? — has become the second-biggest category in the beverage industry.
…”It tends to appeal to younger consumers,” said Gary Hemphill, Beverage Marketing’s managing director, referring to bottled water. “A lot of it has to do with active lifestyles — you’re mobile and out and about. The portability is important.”
(22 July 2007)
The power of marketing! If portability is an issue, why not use refillable containers at a fraction of the price and environmental impact? -BA
