tag:theconversation.com,2011:/us/topics/post-capitalism-40856/articlespost-capitalism – The Conversation2019-03-15T11:25:32Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1128912019-03-15T11:25:32Z2019-03-15T11:25:32ZClimate strikes: Greta Thunberg calls for ‘system change not climate change’ – here’s what that could look like<p>Greta Thunberg, the 16-year-old Swedish climate activist, is calling for system change. At a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T7cSQ48wKek">press conference in Brussels</a>, she told the European Commission that in order to fight climate change we need to change our political and economic systems – a message that has been repeated on signs and in chants in the student climate strikes around the world.</p>
<p>The school climate strikes, which she started alone in August 2018, have become a <a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/greta-thunberg-fridays-for-future-climate-change-800675/">social movement</a> with <a href="https://twitter.com/GretaThunberg/status/1106071099165601792">1,659 strikes planned for March 15 in 105 countries</a>.</p>
<p>But what is system change? How do entire systems change? When we see “save the planet” initiatives, they often look like individual decisions that don’t cost much, like switching to a bamboo toothbrush or washing containers before you recycle them. By all means, do these things, but don’t confuse them with system change.</p>
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<p>Most people don’t know how to change political, economic and social systems. They end up making token gestures instead that <a href="https://theconversation.com/climate-change-obsession-with-plastic-pollution-distracts-attention-from-bigger-environmental-challenges-111667">may even perpetuate the problem</a>. There’s also the question of how to overcome powerful vested interests that benefit from the current system. But there is research that can help us understand system change.</p>
<p><a href="https://journals.aom.org/doi/abs/10.5465/amj.2010.57317486?journalCode=amj">Neo-institutional theory</a> is one approach to understanding how and why people organise collectively. People create meaning, follow rules and reproduce structures – such as classrooms, businesses, offices and community halls – based on assumptions of what is right and proper. Classrooms look similar, not because each time we set one up we rationally decide how to do so, but because we make assumptions about what a classroom is supposed to look like. </p>
<p>Because we are part of these meaning structures, we reproduce existing norms and beliefs and resist change. System change happens when we don’t take our assumptions for granted, which allows more and more people to question the status quo.</p>
<h2>Scanning the horizon</h2>
<p>Thunberg is telling us that our current political and economic systems are no longer fit for purpose. She is pointing out that the emperor has no clothes. </p>
<p>Changing a system takes time. My research on <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11266-019-00091-x">the LGBT movement in Ireland</a> documented efforts and achievements over 40 years. Homosexuality went from being a crime, to being celebrated <a href="https://www.irishtimes.com/news/politics/ireland-becomes-first-country-to-approve-same-sex-marriage-by-popular-vote-1.2223646">in a progressive movement</a>. While the referendum on marriage equality took one day in 2015, the efforts of many to change the system took decades.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol21/iss2/art47/">The Three Horizons Framework</a> can help explain the different factors that lead to changing systems. Horizon one is business as usual – the status quo – and the outgoing institution in times of change. Horizon three is the new institution – with newly legitimised structures and beliefs. The space between them is horizon two, which is occupied by people focused on social change – who lead the transition from an old system to the new. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/261925/original/file-20190304-92283-1uok9sh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/261925/original/file-20190304-92283-1uok9sh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/261925/original/file-20190304-92283-1uok9sh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=427&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/261925/original/file-20190304-92283-1uok9sh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=427&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/261925/original/file-20190304-92283-1uok9sh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=427&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/261925/original/file-20190304-92283-1uok9sh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=537&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/261925/original/file-20190304-92283-1uok9sh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=537&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/261925/original/file-20190304-92283-1uok9sh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=537&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Change can seem sudden, but usually it follows many years of changing beliefs.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Sheila Cannon</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
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<p>Most people recognise the problems with the present system and want to help society move to something more sustainable. Products like bamboo toothbrushes exist to monetise that concern, but because they’re sold in plastic and shipped around the world, their production and distribution still consumes fossil fuel and does nothing to change the existing economic or political system that is fuelling climate change. <a href="https://books.google.ie/books?id=VYrPtQGrKkIC&printsec">A collective challenge to political and economic elites</a> is likely to be more effective in forcing this transition. </p>
<p>When aspects of horizon three appear – glimpses of a more sustainable system – they are usually rejected as illegitimate or too radical. When Rosa Parks sat down at the front of the bus in a move to promote civil rights in America in 1955, she was condemned. Looking back after system change has happened, these people are seen as leaders.</p>
<h2>The end of capitalism?</h2>
<p>The system that needs to be changed to avert climate disaster is <a href="https://theconversation.com/capitalism-isnt-broken-but-it-does-need-a-rewrite-83291">capitalism</a>, which is <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/02/21/we-may-finally-get-talk-about-what-kind-capitalism-we-want">losing its legitimacy</a> largely due to the system’s failure to <a href="https://theconversation.com/capitalism-is-killing-the-worlds-wildlife-populations-not-humanity-106125">respond effectively to climate change</a>.</p>
<p>Applying all I’ve learned about how systems change, it’s possible to imagine that the current system which sustains business-as-usual capitalism – horizon one in the framework – is occupied by those who continue to produce, sell and consume products and services that rely on fossil fuels. That’s most of us, but horizon one is also maintained by climate deniers and investors in fossil energy, who, despite the scientific evidence, keep chugging along. </p>
<p>A more sustainable system could include policies we might currently consider “extreme”, like universal basic income. This is a guaranteed payment for all people regardless of their wealth which could help <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/jun/12/universal-basic-income-and-rewilding-can-meet-anthropocene-demands">break the cycle of production and consumption</a> that pollutes the atmosphere and fills the ocean with discarded plastic. Evidence suggests there is <a href="https://theconversation.com/survey-reveals-young-people-more-likely-to-support-universal-basic-income-but-its-not-a-left-right-thing-87554">growing support for this</a>, particularly among young people.</p>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/no-monkeying-around-animals-can-and-will-have-human-rights-32720">Extending human rights to non-humans</a> and even to ecosystems is another idea that seems radical today but is gaining traction and could define an alternative system in future. One thing is for sure, we’ll look back in horror one day at how humans treated the natural world, as many already do in the present.</p>
<p>If the climate strikers can continue to <a href="https://www.vox.com/2019/2/21/18233206/greta-thunberg-student-school-strike-climate-change">grow their movement and sustain momentum</a>, their leadership could be an important part of society’s transition to a more sustainable system in horizon three.</p>
<p>Capitalism may seem permanent, but research shows that systems inevitably change over time, and are ultimately created and reinforced by us. But in order to change anything, people must question <a href="https://www.emeraldinsight.com/doi/abs/10.1108/13673270110393185">their own role in the system</a> first.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/263883/original/file-20190314-28475-1mzxjur.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/263883/original/file-20190314-28475-1mzxjur.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263883/original/file-20190314-28475-1mzxjur.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263883/original/file-20190314-28475-1mzxjur.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263883/original/file-20190314-28475-1mzxjur.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=176&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263883/original/file-20190314-28475-1mzxjur.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=176&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263883/original/file-20190314-28475-1mzxjur.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=176&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/imagine-newsletter-researchers-think-of-a-world-with-climate-action-113443?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=TCUKengagement&utm_content=Imagineheader1112891">Click here to subscribe to our climate action newsletter. Climate change is inevitable. Our response to it isn’t.</a></em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/112891/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sheila M. Cannon does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>How can the climate strikers’ demands of system change be met?Sheila M. Cannon, Assistant Professor of Social Entrepreneurship, Trinity College DublinLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1084962018-12-13T05:19:29Z2018-12-13T05:19:29ZThe suburbs are the spiritual home of overconsumption. But they also hold the key to a better future<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/250393/original/file-20181213-110256-1tke13a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C1198%2C797&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The typical suburban backyard of the future?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://retrosuburbia.com/">Retrosuburbia.com (with permission)</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Suburban affluence is the defining image of the good life under capitalism, commonly held up as a model to which all humanity should aspire. </p>
<p>More than half of the world’s population now lives in <a href="http://www.un.org/en/development/desa/news/population/world-urbanization-prospects-2014.html">cities</a>. Yet with the global economy already in gross <a href="https://www.footprintnetwork.org/our-work/ecological-footprint/">ecological overshoot</a>, and a world population heading for more than <a href="https://www.un.org/development/desa/en/news/population/world-population-prospects-2017.html">11 billion</a>, this way of living is neither <a href="https://www.jasonhickel.org/the-divide/">fair</a> nor sustainable. </p>
<p>To live within our environmental means, the richest nations will need to embrace a planned process of economic “<a href="https://theconversation.com/life-in-a-degrowth-economy-and-why-you-might-actually-enjoy-it-32224">degrowth</a>”. This is not an unplanned recession, but a deliberate downscaling of economic activity and the closely correlated consumption of <a href="https://beyondthisbriefanomaly.org/2018/10/18/carbon-civlisation-and-the-energy-descent-future-life-beyond-this-brief-anomaly/">fossil energy</a>. We don’t argue this is likely, only that it is necessary. </p>
<p>You might naturally assume this will involve pain and sacrifice, but we argue that a “<a href="https://griffithreview.com/wp-content/uploads/GR52_Alexander_Adcock-Ebook.FINAL_.pdf">prosperous descent</a>” is possible. Our new book, <a href="https://www.palgrave.com/us/book/9789811321306">Degrowth in the Suburbs: A Radical Urban Imaginary</a>, envisions how this might unfold in the suburban landscapes that are currently emblematic of overconsumption.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-simple-life-manifesto-and-how-it-could-save-us-33081">The 'simple life' manifesto and how it could save us</a>
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</em>
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<p>The well-known documentary <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0446320/">The End of Suburbia</a> presented a coherent narrative of a post-petroleum future, but got at least one thing wrong. There is not a single end to suburbia; there are many ends of suburbia (as we know it).</p>
<h2>Reimagining the suburbs beyond fossil fuels</h2>
<p>Suburban catastrophists such as James Kunstler argue that fossil fuel depletion will turn our suburbs into urban wastelands. But we see the suburbs as an ideal place to begin retrofitting our cities. </p>
<p>This won’t involve tearing them down and starting again. Typically, Australia’s built environment is turned over at less than 5% per year. The challenge is to reinhabit, not rebuild, the suburban landscape. Here are some of the key features of this reinvigorated landscape:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>Suburbanites can and should <a href="https://retrosuburbia.com/">retrofit their homes and develop new energy practices</a> to prepare for an <a href="https://beyondthisbriefanomaly.org/2018/10/18/carbon-civlisation-and-the-energy-descent-future-life-beyond-this-brief-anomaly/">energy descent future</a>. </p></li>
<li><p>Households must be encouraged to <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1469540512444019?journalCode=joca">downshift consumerism</a>, swapping superfluous “stuff” for more free time and other sources of meaning and well-being. An <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Sufficiency-Economy-Enough-Everyone-Forever/dp/0994160615">economics of sufficiency</a> involves borrowing and sharing rather than always buying and upscaling. </p></li>
<li><p>We should reclaim and reimagine areas of the built environment that are misused or underused. The vast areas dedicated to <a href="https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/dead-space-in-the-city-the-true-scale-of-vacant-car-parking-revealed-20180626-p4znu3.html">car parking</a> are but one example. </p></li>
<li><p>Finally, and most importantly, we should realise that change must come via <a href="https://www.amazon.com/City-Grassroots-Cross-Cultural-California-Development/dp/0520047567">grassroots political organisation</a>, rather than waiting for growth-fixated governments to lead the way. This is not to deny the need for “<a href="https://sustainable.unimelb.edu.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0008/2756870/MSSI-IssuesPaper-6_Alexander_2016.pdf">top-down</a>” structural change. Our argument is simply that the necessary action from governments will not arrive until there is an active culture of sufficiency that demands it.</p></li>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/250395/original/file-20181213-110261-dqx6f6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/250395/original/file-20181213-110261-dqx6f6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/250395/original/file-20181213-110261-dqx6f6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250395/original/file-20181213-110261-dqx6f6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250395/original/file-20181213-110261-dqx6f6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250395/original/file-20181213-110261-dqx6f6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250395/original/file-20181213-110261-dqx6f6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250395/original/file-20181213-110261-dqx6f6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Sharehouse food production.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://retrosuburbia.com/">Retrosuburbia.com (with permission)</a></span>
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<p>What social forces might produce this necessary but elusive urban transformation? We think it can be driven by two broad social groups: the <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Loss-Happiness-Market-Democracies/dp/0300091060">disillusioned middle class</a> and the <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-precariat-is-recruiting-youth-please-apply-10550">exploited working class</a>. These two groups, which already blur together along a spectrum, can potentially become a cohesive urban social movement of transformative economic and political significance. </p>
<h2>The disillusioned middle class: radical downshifters</h2>
<p>Our first groups consists of employed professionals, bureaucrats, and tradespeople who have secure housing, earn decent wages, and can direct significant portions of their income to discretionary spending. This sector of society participates, consciously or unconsciously, in what is often called “<a href="http://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780199756384/obo-9780199756384-0135.xml">consumer culture</a>”. </p>
<p>This consumerism often <a href="https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/high-price-materialism">fails to fulfil its promise</a> of a rich and meaningful life. The consumer class has been sold a lie, and many affluent consumers are now developing what social scientist Ronald Inglehart calls “<a href="https://ourworldindata.org/materialism-and-post-materialism">post-materialist</a>” goals and values. This emerging way of life involves seeking purpose and satisfaction in life through things other than material riches, including deeper community engagement, more time to pursue private passions, or even increased political action.</p>
<p>This is significant, for three reasons. First, <a href="https://link.springer.com/book/10.1057/978-1-137-30427-8">history</a> shows that social movements tend to be sparked by dissatisfaction with the status quo – otherwise, why would people resist or seek alternatives? The <a href="https://www.allenandunwin.com/browse/books/academic-professional/sociology/Affluenza-Clive-Hamilton-and-Richard-Denniss-9781741146714">deep disillusionment</a> with materialistic lifestyles provides an incentive to explore alternative, more satisfying ways to <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28461433">live</a> and <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0959652611005142">self-provide</a>. </p>
<p>Second, by withdrawing their spending from the market economy, this emerging <a href="http://www.whpress.co.uk/EV/EV2214.html">social movement</a> can undermine that economy and fast-track its <a href="http://simplicityinstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/CrashOnDemandSimplicityInstitute.pdf">transformation</a>.</p>
<p>Finally, a “radical downshifting” in consumption could allow people to free up their time by working less. This will provide people with more <a href="http://samuelalexander.info/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/EthicalPerspectives.pdf">time to participate</a> in building <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Rise-Creative-Class-Transforming-Community/dp/1469281422">new forms</a> of economy and engaging in collective action for change. The “voluntary simplicity movement” already numbers as many as <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1469540512444019?journalCode=joca">200 million people</a>, although its potential depends on more organised and radical expressions.</p>
<h2>The exploited working class: economic builders</h2>
<p>Radical downshifters will never transform the economy on their own, and this is where our second group comes in. Working-class urbanites, while also drifting into superfluous consumption, are typically characterised as individuals and households who are “<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-precariat-is-recruiting-youth-please-apply-10550">battling</a>” to make ends meet.</p>
<p>Again, a growing dissatisfaction with the status quo provides the incentive to seek and participate in <a href="https://theconversation.com/karl-marx-wouldnt-agree-that-worker-power-has-been-killed-by-the-21st-century-95982">fundamental change</a>. We are often told that Australia’s economy has grown uninterrupted for a quarter-century, yet many people feel their personal circumstances have <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/mar/02/who-is-to-blame-for-australias-stalled-wages">stagnated</a>. </p>
<p>There has indeed been growth, yet almost all the benefits have been siphoned away by the <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/8/8/16112368/piketty-saez-zucman-income-growth-inequality-stagnation-chart">wealthy</a>. Why would the working class owe any allegiance to a system that only benefits the rich? As the battlers realise they are being oppressed and duped by an <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/richest-men-in-the-world-2274065153.html">unjust system</a>, they threaten to become a dynamite class of explosive <a href="https://www.amazon.com.au/Precariat-New-Dangerous-Class/dp/1472536169">potential</a>.</p>
<p>As economic crises threaten to <a href="https://www.amazon.com.au/Can-Avoid-Another-Financial-Crisis/dp/1509513736">intensify</a> in coming years – including the challenge of <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/automation-4443">automation</a> – we maintain that the exploited working class may be driven to explore alternative ways to self-provide. As incomes become more meagre and jobs less secure, more people will need to seek alternative ways of meeting economic needs “beyond the market”.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/250396/original/file-20181213-110246-82wxsq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/250396/original/file-20181213-110246-82wxsq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/250396/original/file-20181213-110246-82wxsq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250396/original/file-20181213-110246-82wxsq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250396/original/file-20181213-110246-82wxsq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250396/original/file-20181213-110246-82wxsq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250396/original/file-20181213-110246-82wxsq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250396/original/file-20181213-110246-82wxsq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">A suburban home complete with mini market garden means fewer trips to the shops (for your neighbours too).</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://retrosuburbia.com/">Retrosuburbia.com (with permission)</a></span>
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<p>Whether through necessity or choice, we foresee a growing number of people beginning to participate in informal, non-monetary, and <a href="https://www.localfutures.org/wp-content/uploads/Post-growth-Localisation.pdf">local</a> economies, including the <a href="https://www.sharing.org/information-centre/articles/sharing-economy-short-introduction-its-political-evolution">sharing economy</a>. Just as radical middle-class downshifters will help stifle economic growth by withdrawing their discretionary spending, those who are less affluent could begin to lay alternative economic foundations, and provide a <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Take-Back-Economy-Transforming-Communities/dp/0816676070/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1531972992&sr=1-1&keywords=take+back+the+economy">post-capitalist social safety net</a>.</p>
<h2>Working together</h2>
<p>We contend that these two social groups – the disillusioned middle class and the exploited working class – can conceivably form a cohesive movement with similar goals. The capitalist system isn’t working for many people, even those who are “winning” the rat race. Furthermore, historic growth trajectories seem to be coming to an end, due to both <a href="http://limits2growth.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/AETW-Policy-Briefing-No-1-digital.pdf">financial</a> and <a href="https://sustainable.unimelb.edu.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0005/2763500/MSSI-ResearchPaper-4_Turner_2014.pdf">ecological</a> constraints.</p>
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<em>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/life-in-a-degrowth-economy-and-why-you-might-actually-enjoy-it-32224">Life in a 'degrowth' economy, and why you might actually enjoy it</a>
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<p>Already, a diverse range of movements are working towards a new urbanity. These include <a href="https://theconversation.com/lets-reap-the-economic-benefits-of-local-food-over-big-farming-24478">local farmers’ markets</a> and community and home <a href="https://theconversation.com/is-it-time-to-resurrect-the-wartime-grow-your-own-campaign-66337">gardens</a>, <a href="https://3000acres.org/">urban agriculture projects</a>, freecycling groups, <a href="https://www.plutobooks.com/9780745334226/small-is-necessary/">sharing communities</a>, and repair cafes. It also includes the growing pool of climate activists, <a href="https://350.org/">divestment</a> organisers, <a href="https://www.retrosuburbia.com/">permaculture</a> groups, <a href="http://samuelalexander.info/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/The-Transition-Movement-Samuel-Alexander.pdf">transitions towns</a>, and progressive <a href="https://www.booktopia.com.au/green-bans-red-union-meredith-burgmann/prod9781742235400.html">unions</a>. </p>
<p>There is the small but vocal “<a href="https://www.saveoursuburbs.org.au/">save our suburbs</a>” network, in which we see the seeds of something more progressive. And it includes the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WeNaMlibiak">energy frugal households</a> quietly moving towards solar, batteries and increased energy self-suffiency. One by one, these households are <a href="https://reneweconomy.com.au/rooftop-solar-may-overtake-coal-by-2040-and-save-billions-20657/">undermining</a> the fossil fuel industry and subtly disrupting the status quo. </p>
<p>As financial and ecological crises deepen in coming years, the social consciousness needed to develop new systems of production and cultures of consumption will become compelling. Together these social groups (and others not yet imagined) could form an urban social movement that withdraws support for the existing system and begins building <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Take-Back-Economy-Transforming-Communities/dp/0816676070/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1531972992&sr=1-1&keywords=take+back+the+economy">new economies</a> on our suburban streets.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/108496/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Brendan Gleeson receives funding from the Australian Research Council.. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Samuel Alexander does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The average consumerist suburban lifestyle is unsustainable. But what if affluent suburbanites and battlers alike ditch the rat race and embrace economic ‘degrowth’? Here’s how it might unfold.Samuel Alexander, Research fellow, Melbourne Sustainable Society Institute, The University of MelbourneBrendan Gleeson, Director, Melbourne Sustainable Society Institute, The University of MelbourneLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1024882018-09-12T20:13:12Z2018-09-12T20:13:12ZYes, AI may take some jobs – but it could also mean more men doing care work<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/235678/original/file-20180910-123116-x75nfv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Care work isn't confined to the home, or care professions such as nursing or childcare, it also happens in professional life – and it's mostly done by women. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/customer-service-team-support-care-concept-373731340?src=Zdf68RibXEgiUIhuW9oNtg-1-24">Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>It’s now generally accepted that as <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/bernardmarr/2016/04/05/why-everyone-must-get-ready-for-4th-industrial-revolution/#422a6acd3f90">artificial intelligence (AI) advances</a> into fields of work that were formerly considered skilled labour, a huge number of manual and white collar jobs are <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/uk-job-loss-risk-ai-robots-artificial-intelligence-technology-bank-of-england-andy-haldane-a8498901.html">likely to disappear</a>. </p>
<p>These are the kinds of jobs that require <a href="https://theconversation.com/ai-can-book-a-restaurant-or-a-hair-appointment-but-dont-expect-a-full-conversation-96720">learning and applying patterns</a>, unemotional calculation and mechanistic problem solving. Think: <a href="https://theconversation.com/artificial-intelligence-wont-replace-a-doctor-any-time-soon-but-it-can-help-with-diagnosis-83353">medical diagnosis</a>, legal contracts and engineering. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/ai-doctors-and-engineers-are-coming-but-they-wont-be-stealing-high-skill-jobs-101701">AI doctors and engineers are coming – but they won't be stealing high-skill jobs</a>
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<p>Guardian columnist Simon Jenkins <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/aug/20/robots-stealing-jobs-digital-age">recently suggested</a> AI will free us up to focus on the caring work uniquely suited to humans. </p>
<p>Currently much care work is low paid, unpaid or invisible – and <a href="https://www.humanrights.gov.au/education/face-facts/face-facts-gender-equality-2018">mostly done by women</a>. It requires creativity, empathy, relationship building, and emotional and spiritual labour. I argue the advent of AI has the potential to herald a revolution in how care work is valued in society, and ensure this kind of work is spread more evenly across genders. </p>
<h2>Care work underpins our economy</h2>
<p>Market democracies may prioritise economic growth, but <a href="https://nyupress.org/books/9780814782781/">care is at the core</a> of what makes us human. </p>
<p>Economists might assume that we are all <em>homo economicus</em> (individuals who maximise rational utility), but we could also be cast as <em><a href="https://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/tpp/ijcc/2017/00000001/00000001/art00002">homines curans</a></em> (humans who care).</p>
<p>Political science professor Joan Tronto <a href="https://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/tpp/ijcc/2017/00000001/00000001/art00002">describes</a> care as:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>a species activity that includes everything that we do to maintain, continue, and repair our “world” so that we can live in it as well as possible. That world includes our bodies, ourselves, and our environment, all of which we seek to interweave in a complex, life-sustaining web.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Care is the work that builds and sustains this web. It’s done within families to provide the basic needs of life. It nurtures children, supports the elderly, and supplies the “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/nov/08/women-gender-roles-sexism-emotional-labor-feminism">emotional labour</a>” needed to keep households going. </p>
<p>But care work also happens in professional life – and not just the care professions of nursing or childcare. </p>
<p>Administrative tasks that <a href="https://throwntogetherness.com/2018/04/01/the-invisible-gender-of-deep-work/">support the collective efforts</a> of university departments are one example. Doing the dishes in the tea room is another. More important is the daily work of building community and mutual support, fostering our <a href="https://rgs-ibg.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/tran.12240">being-in-common</a>.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/a-survival-guide-for-the-coming-ai-revolution-72974">A survival guide for the coming AI revolution</a>
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<p>In the home and workplace, it’s care work that attends to the social relations underpinning institutions and organisations, farms and marketplaces, offices and factory floors. Without this largely invisible and unpaid care work, the economy would not function. </p>
<p>As Yale anthropologist James Ferguson <a href="https://www.dukeupress.edu/give-a-man-a-fish">notes</a>: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>the receipt of unconditional and unearned distribution and care must always precede any productive labour.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In other words, care comes first. Without it we wouldn’t be unable to function as organisations, manage our farms, run our factories, or participate in any kind of waged labour.</p>
<h2>Robots can’t care</h2>
<p>Care work is not well suited to new technologies. It requires empathy.</p>
<p>While AI can <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2018-06-02/can-you-trust-a-robot-that-cares/9808636">mimic</a> human emotions, it’s a long way off from being able to <a href="https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/hot-thought/201712/will-robots-ever-have-emotions">genuinely empathise</a>. Robot empathy is based on deceit: it can make you think it cares in order to shape your emotional responses. For ethicist <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1023/A:1021386708994">Rob Sparrow</a>, that also means it’s fundamentally unethical to rely on robots to provide care.</p>
<p>But if AI takes over the task-based and calculative work that people now do, could the essential, largely feminised, work of care begin to be more valued? </p>
<p>There are some signs this could happen. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/women-are-less-likely-to-be-replaced-by-robots-and-might-even-benefit-from-automation-96728">Women are less likely to be replaced by robots and might even benefit from automation</a>
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<p>The business world is paying more attention to the importance of <a href="https://hbr.org/2016/11/if-you-cant-empathize-with-your-employees-youd-better-learn-to">empathy in the workplace</a>. <a href="http://www.communityeconomies.org/key-ideas">Research</a> reveals the diversity of contemporary economic practices beyond capitalism, and is showing us how much of our economy is reliant upon putting care first. </p>
<p>Around the world, examples of <a href="https://thenextsystem.org/cultivating-community-economies">community economies</a> – livelihood practices that actively build and sustain communities rather than seeking profit – are changing economic systems. </p>
<p>In <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03098265.2017.1335295?casa_token=SDCJ-83ZhmUAAAAA:bT8YcaxemAKTTKanHrpkTnmfBKB133EJZDm6Rv4pWZE_1_KevWA-YAe1knR2VU6A6nx7wTa-qRs9">academia</a> and the <a href="https://sarahhousemansite.wordpress.com/2018/05/01/book-review-the-interdependent-organization-the-path-to-a-more-sustainable-enterprise-by-rex-draman/#more-2093">not-for-profit</a> sector, new organisational structures are being shaped around appreciation for the whole human being, with collaboration not competition as the defining mode of interaction. </p>
<p>These examples demonstrate the possibility of <a href="https://theconversation.com/after-capitalism-what-comes-next-for-a-start-ethics-44975">reconfiguring our economies</a> towards a future where an ethics of care comes first.</p>
<h2>Lessons from the global south</h2>
<p>As we anticipate a new definition of the uniquely human skills people bring to the workplace, it’s worth drawing on the knowledge of societies that place more value on community networks and interpersonal relationships than western culture does. </p>
<p>When asked to talk about their livelihoods, gender equity and their aspirations for the future, women and men in the Pacific <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/0966369X.2016.1160036?casa_token=jMNoJRxwCA8AAAAA:fN_e3vAnYJB2atFgmBQUS8GbywEBY3n8eSIODzQPAMV9bSZagS8TAfHGTlODFhraEx5F3idrEUw7">focus on relationships</a>. What concerns them most is the ability to contribute to community, to share what they have, and for the different contributions of women and men to <a href="https://iwda.org.au/resource/gender-and-economy-in-melanesian-communities-manual">be given equal value</a>. </p>
<p>We can learn from this.</p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-ai-is-helping-to-predict-and-prevent-suicides-91460">How AI is helping to predict and prevent suicides</a>
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</em>
</p>
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<p>As robots and AI “<a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/will-robots-take-your-job-humans-ignore-coming-ai-revolution-ncna845366">take our jobs</a>”, the care work that underpins all workplaces – and homes, and schools, and communities – ought to come to the fore. This would offer a long overdue corrective for our love affair with the rational, utility-maximising individual – and provide opportunity and motivation for more men to shoulder a greater share of the load.</p>
<p>Realising we are more <em>homines curans</em> than <em>homo economicus</em> gives us a chance to properly value the care work that’s at the heart of our economies.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/102488/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Katharine McKinnon has received funding from the Australian Development Research Awards. </span></em></p>Once artificial intelligence takes over task-based and calculative jobs, the invisible care work that underpins our offices, marketplaces and institutions could finally become more visible and valued.Katharine McKinnon, Tracy Banivanua Mar Senior Research Fellow, La Trobe UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/942472018-04-04T10:47:46Z2018-04-04T10:47:46ZToday’s youth reject capitalism, but what do they want to replace it?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/212860/original/file-20180402-189821-131rfk7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Today's youth are increasingly rejecting capitalism.
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Phil Sears</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Today’s youth <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/04/26/a-majority-of-millennials-now-reject-capitalism-poll-shows/?utm_term=.e8f05f5285ed">are increasingly unhappy</a> with the way their elders are running the world. </p>
<p>Their ire was most recently expressed when <a href="https://www.vox.com/2018/3/19/17139654/march-for-our-lives-dc-march-24-protest">thousands of teenagers</a> and others across the country marched on March 24 demanding more gun control, a little over a month after more than <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/15/us/florida-shooting-victims-school/index.html">a dozen of their peers</a> were shot and killed at a high school in Parkland, Florida.</p>
<p>But there’s growing evidence that today’s young adults, ranging in age from 18 to 29 or so, are strongly dissatisfied with other fundamental aspects of our political and economic system. Specifically, growing numbers are rejecting capitalism. </p>
<p>This led us – a sociologist and an <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=DWGTo1cAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">economist</a> – to wonder how would young people redesign the economic system if they could. The answer, based on recent surveys, should make any status-quo politician seriously rethink their economic policies.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/212857/original/file-20180402-189804-1tertn5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/212857/original/file-20180402-189804-1tertn5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212857/original/file-20180402-189804-1tertn5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212857/original/file-20180402-189804-1tertn5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212857/original/file-20180402-189804-1tertn5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212857/original/file-20180402-189804-1tertn5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212857/original/file-20180402-189804-1tertn5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Demonstrators march through Cincinnati during the March for Our Lives protest for gun legislation and school safety.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/John Minchillo</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Rejecting capitalism</h2>
<p>We first wanted to better understand how young people feel about the current economic system. </p>
<p>So we started by examining a <a href="http://iop.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/content/160423_Harvard%20IOP_Spring%202016_TOPLINE_u.pdf">troubling 2016 Harvard University survey</a> that found that 51 percent of American youth aged 18 to 29 no longer support capitalism. Only 42 percent said they back it, while just 19 percent were willing to call themselves “capitalists.” </p>
<p>While it may be true that young people of any generation tend to have less support for incumbent economic and political systems and tend to change their views as they age, past polls on the topic suggest this is a new phenomenon felt especially by today’s youth. A <a href="http://www.aei.org/publication/an-enduring-culture-of-free-enterprise/">2010 Gallop poll</a> showed that only 38 percent of young people had a negative view of capitalism – and that was right after the worst financial and economic crisis since the Great Depression, which <a href="https://d-nb.info/1011870347/34">hit young people</a> especially hard.</p>
<p><iframe id="FpERj" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/FpERj/6/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>What can we make of this? Do they prefer socialism, in which the government more actively regulates and intervenes in the economy and restricts individual choice? </p>
<p>It’s unclear. The Harvard poll showed just 33 percent said they favor socialism. A <a href="http://reason.com/poll">separate poll</a>, however, conducted in 2015 by conservative-leaning Reason-Rupe, found that young adults aged 18 to 24 have a slightly more favorable view of socialism than capitalism. </p>
<p>Their views contrast markedly with their older peers, who consistently tell pollsters they prefer capitalism by wide margins – more so as their age climbs. Still, the share of the overall population that questions capitalism’s core precepts is around the highest in at least 80 years of polling on the topic. </p>
<p>To be sure, the questions pollsters ask Americans vary significantly from poll to poll, and sample sizes aren’t always large enough to draw firm conclusions. </p>
<p>All the same, the data suggest that today’s young people are part of a vanguard of Americans losing faith in capitalism and ready to embrace something new. </p>
<p><iframe id="PZGWv" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/PZGWv/2/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<h2>But what do they want?</h2>
<p>So if young people are increasingly rejecting capitalism but they’re ambivalent about socialism, what do they want? </p>
<p>To answer this, we need to explore what about capitalism they find so unsatisfying. </p>
<p>A <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/04/26/a-majority-of-millennials-now-reject-capitalism-poll-shows/?utm_term=.e8f05f5285ed">follow-up focus group</a> to the Harvard study concluded that many of these young people feel that “capitalism was unfair and left people out despite their hard work.” A 2012 survey by the <a href="http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2012/01/11/rising-share-of-americans-see-conflict-between-rich-and-poor/">Pew Research Center found</a> that 71 percent of those 18-34 years of age perceive strong conflicts between the rich and the poor in American society. </p>
<p>A majority of young people said they believe that those with means got there because “they know the right people or were born into wealthy families.” </p>
<p>These views on the inequality inherent in the American economic system command majorities of Republicans, Democrats, Independents, conservatives, moderates and liberals. To us, this suggests the critical reason young people have lost faith in capitalism is that it has lost its ability to be fair. But they don’t seem to think an alternate system such as socialism can fix the problem.</p>
<p>Rather, we can begin to piece together what might work, in their view, by examining a <a href="https://www.nceo.org/assets/pdf/articles/PPP_results_employee_ownership.pdf">2015 survey by Public Policy Polling</a>, which asked participants their views on employee-owned companies and government intervention to encourage them. </p>
<p>The poll found that 75 percent of 18- to 29-year-olds support this, far more than every other age category, while 83 percent said employee-owned companies are as American as apple pie, hot dogs and baseball. </p>
<p>So these polls in a way suggest young people don’t want less capitalism, they want more of it. They just want to make sure it’s shared more broadly, such as by making it easier for more of us to become capitalists and share in the wealth we collectively create. </p>
<p>As two professors meeting this generation daily in our classrooms, we have been surprised by the strong support for these concepts in our college courses on economics and corporate governance.</p>
<p>Other surveys suggest that the desire for a more inclusive form of capitalism is becoming more widely held. A <a href="http://news.gallup.com/reports/199961/state-american-workplace-report-2017.aspx#aspnetForm">2016 Gallup State of the American Workplace</a> survey found that 40 percent of all American workers would leave their company to work for one that had profit-sharing.</p>
<p>And it’s becoming increasingly easy to do that as more companies in the U.S. embrace employee ownership in one form or another, some drawn by its <a href="http://papers.nber.org/books/krus08-1">ability to reduce turnover</a> and <a href="https://yalebooks.yale.edu/search/node/blasi">improve economic performance</a>. And just last year, a <a href="https://www.certifiedeo.com/about_us">company started up in Silicon Valley</a> offering certification of employee-owned businesses “to build an employee-owned economy.” </p>
<h2>Gunning for the economy</h2>
<p>What Americans witnessed on March 24 was an energetic, dynamic and powerful new political force in America.</p>
<p>Right now it’s focused on guns. But this force may well turn its attention to the structure of corporations and an economic system that has led to ever-widening levels of inequality. </p>
<p>Just as lawmakers may want to rethink their views on gun rights, they may also want to begin re-examining their understanding of what capitalism is supposed to look like. </p>
<p><iframe id="z4GKq" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/z4GKq/4/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/94247/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Joseph Blasi is affiliated with Rutgers University as a professor.
I also have an affiliation as a Senior Fellow with the The Aspen Institute.
I am currently co-principal investigator of a W.K. Kellogg Foundation research grant on employee ownership and modest income employees. The National Bureau for Economic Research Shared Capitalism Project received funding from the Rockefeller Foundation, the Russell Sage Foundation, and the Employee Ownership Foundation for our University of Chicago book's research. The Institute of which I serve as director, the Institute for the Study of Employee Ownership and Profit Sharing receives funding from a number of foundations and individual donors to support fellowships and conferences in this area. The professorship I hold was endowed by the Beyster Foundation.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Douglas Kruse is affiliated with Rutgers University as a professor. I also have an affiliation as a Research Fellow of the Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA) in Bonn. I am currently co-principal investigator of a W.K. Kellogg Foundation research grant on employee ownership and modest income employees. The National Bureau for Economic Research Shared Capitalism Project received funding from the Rockefeller Foundation, the Russell Sage Foundation, and the Employee Ownership Foundation for our University of Chicago book's research. The Institute of which I serve as associate director, the Institute for the Study of Employee Ownership and Profit Sharing receives funding from a number of foundations and individual donors to support fellowships and conferences in this area. I am a Beyster Faculty Fellow at Rutgers supported by the Beyster Foundation.</span></em></p>The recent March for Our Lives showed just how unsatisfied American youth are with their leaders. Recent polls suggest the economic system may be the next item on their agenda.Joseph Blasi, J. Robert Beyster Distinguished Professor and Director of the Institute for the Study of Employee Ownership and Profit Sharing, School of Management and Labor Relations, Rutgers UniversityDouglas L. Kruse, Distinguished Professor and Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, Rutgers UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/796502017-07-25T20:08:37Z2017-07-25T20:08:37ZNot jobs and growth but post-capitalism – and creative industries show the way<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/175132/original/file-20170622-3053-1m2990k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The creative economy is failing to live up to the fast-growing, young entrepreneurial image it promotes. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/arselectronica/14959708488/">Ars Electronica/flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The term “creative industries” was <a href="https://www.sagepub.com/sites/default/files/upm-binaries/42872_Flew.pdf">first applied</a> to the cultural sector by UK New Labour in 1998, and rapidly gained global traction.</p>
<p>It was a kind of Faustian bargain for the cultural sector, which gave up its traditional suspicion of commercial imperatives in return for a seat at the grown-ups’ table where the governmental big bucks were allocated. </p>
<p>Perhaps it was not so Faustian after all. It seemed the “new” economy was all about ideas and experiences, creativity and left-of-field innovation. That’s less a sell-out and more a win-win. As cities shed their dirty industries, the creative sector would provide new, more fulfilling employment, rewriting the rules of the old economy as it did so.</p>
<p>The problems with this narrative are <a href="https://currencyhouse.org.au/node/174">well aired</a>. Software (which had been included precisely to bump up the numbers) and advertising and marketing accounted for most of the <a href="https://www.acola.org.au/PDF/SAF01/6.%20Culture%20creativity%20cultural%20economy.pdf">employment growth</a>. </p>
<p>Outside these sectors (and often within) <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13504630.2015.1128800?src=recsys&journalCode=csid20">studies</a> showed persistent low wages, high debt, self-exploitation, precarious employment (the “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jul/26/will-we-get-by-gig-economy">gig economy</a>”), multiple job-holding (“don’t give up your night job”) and a nepotism that comes with excessive reliance on networking. </p>
<p>The divergence between the shiny narrative and the mundane reality is now blindingly obvious (at least outside the consultancy reports). Few in the cultural sector do more than lip-sync to its hymns. </p>
<p>But is this simply a story of deflation, of promises reneged? Might there be another narrative?</p>
<h2>A new narrative emerges</h2>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/178549/original/file-20170718-21774-10k3q7j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/178549/original/file-20170718-21774-10k3q7j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/178549/original/file-20170718-21774-10k3q7j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=916&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/178549/original/file-20170718-21774-10k3q7j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=916&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/178549/original/file-20170718-21774-10k3q7j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=916&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/178549/original/file-20170718-21774-10k3q7j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1151&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/178549/original/file-20170718-21774-10k3q7j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1151&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/178549/original/file-20170718-21774-10k3q7j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1151&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">PostCapitalism: A Guide to our Future, by Paul Mason (Allen Lane, 2015)</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PostCapitalism:_A_Guide_to_our_Future">Wikipedia</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In recent years the notion of “post-capitalism” has become more widespread. <a href="http://affirmpress.com.au/publishing/a-revolution-in-the-making/">Guy Rundle</a> has been talking about this in Australia, and <a href="https://www.bookdepository.com/Postcapitalism-Paul-Mason/9780141975290?redirected=true&utm_medium=Google&utm_campaign=Base1&utm_source=AU&utm_content=Postcapitalism&selectCurrency=AUD&w=AF45AU99ZZC1SZA80C5LAF4S&pdg=kwd-309568335522:cmp-680104063:adg-37898644947:crv-151944074570:pid-9780141975290:dev-c&gclid=CO3Vos2ky9QCFYuUvQodBOUJAg">Paul Mason</a> in the UK. </p>
<p>In part it continues the optimism about the transformative potential of new technologies that formed around the internet in the 1990s, and which gave the early “creative industries” agenda such a powerful charge. </p>
<p>But since 2008 many have felt that capitalism is no longer capable of delivering on that potential. It has been locking it up in monopoly platforms and extracting “rent” from what is essentially free.</p>
<p>Indeed, capitalism is intent on maximising short-term profit from these technologies while allowing the ecological catastrophe of climate change to let rip. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/178550/original/file-20170718-21790-vg3gfc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/178550/original/file-20170718-21790-vg3gfc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/178550/original/file-20170718-21790-vg3gfc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=933&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/178550/original/file-20170718-21790-vg3gfc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=933&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/178550/original/file-20170718-21790-vg3gfc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=933&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/178550/original/file-20170718-21790-vg3gfc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1173&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/178550/original/file-20170718-21790-vg3gfc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1173&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/178550/original/file-20170718-21790-vg3gfc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1173&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A Revolution In The Making: 3D Printing, Robots and the Future, by Guy Rundle (Affirm Press, 2014)</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://affirmpress.com.au/publishing/a-revolution-in-the-making/">Affirm Press</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Rundle and Mason evoke the enormous potential of technological innovation, not just in communications but in medicine, materials science, agriculture, transport and the rest, but this potential is stuck in the old relations of capitalism. </p>
<p>Post-capitalism evokes not just the technology but the new kinds of social relations required for it to live up to its full human potential. They argue that these new technologies – distributed, networked, ideas-rich, decreasingly expensive – are giving rise to enclaves within contemporary society that provide a glimpse into a more human future. </p>
<p>Peer-to-peer networks, sharing and gift economies (for real, not Uber), open-source movements, non-monetary labour exchanges – all of these grow out of the essentially public and democratic nature of knowledge-based production and distribution. Capitalism squats on these new democratic forces, wringing profit from a knowledge it does not produce but seeks to own. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/178551/original/file-20170718-21752-1e7hfus.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/178551/original/file-20170718-21752-1e7hfus.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/178551/original/file-20170718-21752-1e7hfus.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=918&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/178551/original/file-20170718-21752-1e7hfus.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=918&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/178551/original/file-20170718-21752-1e7hfus.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=918&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/178551/original/file-20170718-21752-1e7hfus.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1154&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/178551/original/file-20170718-21752-1e7hfus.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1154&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/178551/original/file-20170718-21752-1e7hfus.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1154&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A Postcapitalist Politics, by J.K. Gibson-Graham (University of Minnesota Press, 2006)</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.upress.umn.edu/book-division/books/a-postcapitalist-politics">University of Minnesota Press</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Rundle is the more naive politically, while Mason, re-inventing a Marxist political economy long thought dead and buried, recognises that systems are not given up without a fight. </p>
<p>What stands out, however, is a sense that things are already changing. We need not wait for the big collapse, but can work in the here and now to effect real social transformation. </p>
<p>This connects with <a href="https://www.upress.umn.edu/book-division/books/a-postcapitalist-politics">the work</a> of <a href="http://www.communityeconomies.org/people/jk-gibson-graham">J.K. Gibson-Graham</a> and others, who see older forms of social activism as working towards a different kind of post-capitalist future right here, right now.</p>
<h2>Creating a more human future</h2>
<p>There are, and will be, many objections to the coherence of the term post-capitalism and the agenda it announces. But perhaps it can help us rethink the creative industries. </p>
<p>Rather than the narrative of the fast-growing, entrepreneurial, start-up economy moving us into the next stage of knowledge capitalism, post-capitalism gives us a different story. </p>
<p>The low-waged, under-employed, precarious creative sector embarrasses the policymakers by not being really serious about growth (“lifestyle”) and failing to live up to the entrepreneurial image promoted at all those glitzy creative industry events. But these low-growth, socially embedded and ethically driven creatives may represent a future far more convincingly than those MBAs in hip clothing setting out to be the next “unicorn”.</p>
<p>The job of the creative sector is not to produce “jobs and growth” but cultural value. Those long hours on low wages and short-term contracts are accepted (mostly) as the price to create something of cultural value, to alter the world a little bit, to make us see it in a different way, to critique and to celebrate ourselves, and to bind us together. </p>
<p>This ecosystem of micro-businesses, freelancers and serial project workers represents the vast majority of <a href="https://ccskills.org.uk/supporters/blog/freelancing-and-the-future-of-creative-jobs">cultural sector employment</a>. They have been systemically sidelined from the grand creative industries narrative, but are, in fact, its main business.</p>
<p>Arguments for culture dressed up as economics no longer convince anyone. <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-brandis-plans-to-insulate-the-arts-sector-from-the-artists-42305">George Brandis</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/reagan-called-america-a-city-on-a-hill-because-taxpayers-funded-the-humanities-74721">Donald Trump</a> and 100 right-wing authoritarian cultural budget cuts across the globe testify to this. </p>
<p>It is time to give up on the fiction of the creative industries delivering post-industrial capitalism. Instead, we should acknowledge the new ways of making and sharing, the commitments to community and place, the social labour involved in creative work as a powerful resource for wider transformation of our common culture.</p>
<p>And, at the moment, the future of that common culture points us toward some kind of post-capitalism – rather than simply more of the same.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/79650/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Justin O'Connor does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The notion of the creative sector driving fulfilling work as cities shed old industries has worn thin. But those creatives might be delivering value of a different kind, offering a more human future.Justin O'Connor, Professor of Communications and Cultural Economy, Monash UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.