{"id":163742,"date":"2020-06-29T12:00:21","date_gmt":"2020-06-29T11:00:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=163742"},"modified":"2020-06-28T09:09:41","modified_gmt":"2020-06-28T08:09:41","slug":"affluence-is-killing-the-planet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2020\/06\/affluence-is-killing-the-planet\/","title":{"rendered":"Affluence Is Killing the Planet"},"content":{"rendered":"
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25 Jun 2020 – How can we reduce consumption as much as necessary in a socially-sustainable way, while still\u00a0safeguarding human needs and social security?<\/em><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
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Would you like to be rich? Chances are your answer is: ‘Yes! Who wouldn\u2019t want to be rich?’\u00a0Clearly, in societies where money can buy almost everything, being rich is generally perceived as something good. It implies more freedom, fewer worries, more happiness, higher social status.<\/p>\n

But here is the catch: affluence trashes our planetary life support systems. What\u2019s more, it also obstructs the necessary transformation towards sustainability by driving power relations and consumption norms. To put it bluntly: the rich do more harm than good.<\/p>\n

This is what we found in a new\u00a0study for the journal Nature Communications<\/em><\/a>. Together with co-author Lorenz Key\u00dfer from ETH Z\u00fcrich, we reviewed recent scientific literature on the links between affluence and environmental impacts, on the systemic mechanisms leading to overconsumption and on possible solutions to the problem. The article is one of a series of\u00a0Scientists\u2019 Warnings to Humanity<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Responsibility\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

The facts are clear: the wealthiest 0.54 percent, about 40 million people, are responsible for\u00a014 percent\u00a0of lifestyle-related greenhouse gas emissions<\/a>, while the bottom 50 percent\u00a0of income earners, almost four\u00a0billion people, only emit around 10 percent.<\/p>\n

The world\u2019s top 10 percent\u00a0income earners are responsible for\u00a0at least 25 percent\u00a0and up to 43 percent\u00a0of our environmental impact<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Most people living in developed countries would fit into this category, meaning you don\u2019t have to consider yourself rich in order to be globally affluent. Even many poorer people in wealthy countries have a disproportionately large and unsustainable resource footprint compared to the global average.<\/p>\n

It is less clear, however, how to address the problems that come with affluence. Progressive mainstream policymakers talk about\u00a0\u201cgreening consumption\u201d or \u201csustainable growth\u201d<\/a>\u00a0to \u201cdecouple\u201d affluence from climate breakdown, biodiversity loss and other planetary-scale destruction.<\/p>\n

Yet our research confirms that, in reality, there is\u00a0no evidence that this decoupling is actually happening<\/a>. While technological improvements have helped to reduce emissions and other environmental impacts, the worldwide growth in affluence has consistently outpaced these gains, driving all the impacts back up.<\/p>\n

And it appears\u00a0highly unlikely that this relationship will change in the future<\/a>. Even the cleanest technologies have their limitations and still require specific resources to function, while efficiency savings often simply lead to\u00a0more consumption<\/a>. If technology alone is not enough, it is therefore imperative to\u00a0reduce the consumption of the affluent<\/a>, resulting in\u00a0sufficiency-oriented lifestyles<\/a>: \u201cbetter but less\u201d. This is all easier said than done though, for there is a problem.<\/p>\n

Consumption\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

The lockdown has seen a massive drop in consumption. But the resulting unprecedented dive in\u00a0CO\u2082 and air pollutant emissions<\/a>\u00a0was merely incidental to the lockdown, not a deliberate part of it, and will not last.<\/p>\n

So how can we reduce consumption as much as necessary in a socially-sustainable way, while still\u00a0safeguarding human needs and social security<\/a>? Here it turns out the main stumbling block is not technological limits or economics itself, but the\u00a0economic imperative<\/a>\u00a0to grow the economy, spurred by overconsumption and the political power of the super-affluent.<\/p>\n

Affluent, powerful people and their governments<\/a>\u00a0have a vested interest in deliberately promoting high consumption and hampering sufficiency-oriented lifestyles. Since consumption decisions by individuals are strongly influenced by information and by others, this can\u00a0lock in high-consumption lifestyles<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cPositional consumption\u201d is another key mechanism, where people increasingly consume status goods once their basic needs are satisfied. This creates a\u00a0growth spiral<\/a>, driven by the affluent, with everyone striving to be \u201csuperior\u201d relative to their peers while the overall consumption level rises.<\/p>\n

What appears average or normal in a developed country then rapidly becomes a top contribution at the global level.<\/p>\n

Solution\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

We reviewed a variety of different approaches that may have the solution. They range\u00a0from reformist to radical ideas<\/a>, and include post-development, degrowth, eco-feminism, eco-socialism and eco-anarchism. All these approaches have in common that they focus on positive environmental and social outcomes and not on economic growth.<\/p>\n

Interestingly, there seems to be quite some strategic overlap between them, at least in the short term. Most agree on the necessity to \u201cprefigure\u201d bottom-up as much as possible of the new, less affluent, economy in the old, while still demonstrating sufficiency-oriented lifestyles to be desirable.<\/p>\n

Grassroots initiatives such as\u00a0Transition Initiatives<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0eco-villages<\/a>\u00a0can be examples of this, leading to cultural and consciousness change.<\/p>\n

Eventually, however,\u00a0far-reaching policy reforms<\/a>\u00a0are needed, including maximum and minimum incomes, eco-taxes,\u00a0collective firm ownership<\/a>\u00a0and more. Examples of policies that start to incorporate some of these mechanisms are the\u00a0Green New Deals in the US, UK and Europe<\/a>or the\u00a0New Zealand Wellbeing Budget 2019<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Social movements<\/a>\u00a0will play a crucial role in pushing for these reforms. They can challenge the notion that riches and economic growth are inherently good and bring forward \u201csocial tipping points<\/a>\u201d. Ultimately, the goal is to establish economies and societies that protect the climate and ecosystems and enrich people with\u00a0more wellbeing, health and happiness<\/a>\u00a0instead of more money.<\/p>\n

___________________________________________<\/strong><\/p>\n

Thomas Wiedmann\u00a0<\/em><\/a>is professor of sustainability research at\u00a0UNSW.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Julia K. Steinberger<\/a>\u00a0is professor in social ecology and ecological economics at the\u00a0University of Leeds.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Manfred Lenzen<\/a>\u00a0is professor of sustainability research, at the School of Physics, University of Sydney.<\/em><\/p>\n

Go to Original – theecologist.org<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

25 Jun 2020 – Would you like to be rich? Chances are your answer is: ‘Yes! Who wouldn\u2019t want to be rich?’ How can we reduce consumption as much as necessary in a socially-sustainable way, while still safeguarding human needs and social security?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":163744,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[1405,232,120,954,401,1495,1714,1213,330],"class_list":["post-163742","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-in-focus","tag-basic-needs","tag-capitalism","tag-conflict","tag-consumerism","tag-environment","tag-human-needs","tag-right-to-food","tag-super-rich","tag-sustainability"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163742","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=163742"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163742\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/163744"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=163742"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=163742"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=163742"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}