7. Green localism
Green discourse
Green economics
Against growth
Economics as alienation
Zen and consumption
Bad trade
Green Localism
Green alternatives to globalisation Green economics as functionalism? Wall (2005) Ch 4.Woodin, M. and Lucas, C. (2004) Green Alternative to Globalisation: A Manifesto. London: Pluto Press. A few years ago I was eating at a St. Paul, Minnesota, restaurant. After lunch, I picked up a toothpick wrapped in plastic. On the plastic was printed the word Japan. Japan has little wood and no oil; nevertheless, it has become efficient enough in our global economy to bring little pieces of wood and barrels of oil to Japan, to wrap the one in the other, and send the manufactured product to Minnesota. This toothpick may have travelled 50,000 miles. But never fear, we are now retaliating in kind. A Hibbing, Minnesota, factory now produces one billion disposable chopsticks a year for sale in Japan. In my mind’s eye, I see two ships passing one another in the northern Pacific. One carries little pieces of Minnesota wood bound for Japan; the other carries little pieces of Japanese wood bound for Minnesota. Such is the logic of free trade. (Morris 1996: 222) The more people consume, the better it is. It’s not so much a question of consumer durables as of durable consumers. […] Consumption becomes an end in itself. Even when the market reaches saturation, the process doesn’t stop; for the only way to beat a glut is to turn everybody into gluttons. (Porritt 1984: 47)
Seminar questions
1. what is green economics?
2. Why are greens ‘localists’?
3. Why do greens criticise ‘accumulation’?
Morris, D. (1996) Free Trade: The Great Destroyer, Mander, J. and Goldsmith, E. (eds.) (1996) The Case Against the Global Economy: and for a turn towards the local. San Fransisco: Sierra Club.
Wall (2005) Ch 4.
Woodin, M. and Lucas, C. (2004) Green Alternative to Globalisation: A Manifesto. London: Pluto Press.
Useful Links
www.greeneconomics.org.uk/www.psr.keele.ac.uk/area/uk/e01/man/green/2001/manifesto/gpm01-just_economics.htm
http://www.leftbusinessobserver.com/Globalization.html A critique of green economics from the left.
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