Although economists might have you
believe that capitalism is a new phenomenon, the essential building blocks
of capitalist economy -- private property, shared work effort, agriculture
and tool-making -- began about 30,000 years ago, as the predominant human
culture on Earth changed rapidly from a hunter-gatherer culture (which had
been dominant for three million years) to an acquirer-settler culture. This
new, acquisitive economy dominates human activity to this day, and defines
how we 'make our living': by selling our labour to commercial-industrial
enterprises (extractors, producers, distributors, and servicers) whose economic
mission is to create and distribute ever more goods & services to ever
more consumers.
As such, this acquisitive, capitalist economy might be better called a
consumer economy: It requires the human citizens of Earth to
be insatiable consumers, and relegates us to be merely that. We are largely
valued, as individuals, by how much we produce and how much we consume --
our wealth -- and most commercial-industrial enterprises aspire to be
the largest, most profitable and fastest-growing enterprises in Earth's history.
We have become wage-slaves to this economy, toiling away at an unprecedented
rate so we can afford to consume more, believing this is the only way
to 'make a living'.
In addition to our indentured state as 'human capital' in the life-long
service of commercial-industrial enterprises, the cost of this new economy
is:
- the requirement to produce more than a replacement level of new
consumers every generation,
- the ravaging of our natural environment,
- the production of massive amounts of pollution and waste as by-products
of our enterprise, and
- the occupation of most of the planet's livable land area,
so that much of the planet's land, air and water have been poisoned, and
our planet's biodiversity is in a tailspin.
Some economists have postulated that the change from a hunter-gatherer to
an acquirer-settler culture, with its associated acquisitive economy, was
an adaptation by man to sudden scarcities of food 30,000 years ago, as the
large, slow game that was our natural and easy prey became scarce as Earth's
climate changed.
We face comparable challenges today: Overpopulation, inefficiency in enterprise
production and the endless drive to produce and consume more every generation,
have made us realize that our 30,000-year-old acquisitive economy is unsustainable.
We know we have to change. What we need is a new model.
Time
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Culture
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Economy
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Why it Ended
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3 million - 30,000 years ago
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Hunter-Gatherer
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Subsistence
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Food Shortage
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30,000 years ago - today
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Acquirer-Settler
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Consumer-Capitalist
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Unsustainable
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today forward
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?
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?
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Perhaps the best way to identify this new culture, and new economy, is
to describe what it would look like and how we might achieve it, and then
give it a name.
In an earlier
post, I proposed that the first step must be a radical shift in our tax
system, to tax non-renewable resource use, pollution and waste (the activities
shown with red arrows in the chart above), instead of taxing activities,
as we do today, that create employment and are neutral or even beneficial
to our environment. The consequence of such a tax shift would be to make
products produced from non-renewable resources, or from processes that pollute,
much more expensive. Other goods, and almost all services, would become much
cheaper. That would inevitably lead to a shift in our consumption patterns,
to a dramatic reduction in importation of goods that can be produced locally,
and to a cleaner and less destructive world. As one example, a music CD would
no longer cost as much as a tank of gasoline. Natural foods would become
much cheaper than processed foods, and vegetable products would become much
cheaper than animal products.
The next step is more difficult. It requires a complete change to our
value system, a repudiation of excess consumption and excess wealth,
so they are viewed as something deplorable, not admirable. It requires us
to value freedom and mobility highly, such that our 'possessions' become
a burden rather than a blessing. It requires us to refuse to consume,
and refuse to be treated as consumers. Instead, our new value system
should be based on the elements of well-being instead of wealth
. These elements include health, learning, enjoyment of each other's company
and of nature, and the pleasure that comes from sharing and self-sufficiency
and recreation. It would be a much simpler life, but arguably a much richer
one, and certainly one with much less toil.
There are two ways in which this change to our value system can occur,
one economic and one social. The economic change requires people to walk
away from the capitalist economy and to establish new collaborative
enterprises that are motivated strictly by the well-being of their
members and not by profit or growth. I will be writing a great deal about
such ventures in the next few months. If enough such enterprises were established,
a parallel economy would be created that would use its members lack of
consumption of shoddy, overpriced goods produced by traditional
enterprises (i.e. the power of the consumer) to undermine and eventually
replace the acquisitive economy.
The social change is more subversive, and if it occurs will probably be
led by the group that almost certainly ushered in the acquirer-settler economy
30,000 years ago by developing agriculture when the men no longer brought
home the beef: women. Throughout our culture, women ultimately do
the choosing of partners and dictate how the household is run. It is women's
leadership that drives human culture. It is their willingness to adapt
their lifestyle to the needs of our acquisitive economy -- staying home to
raise the family, or bringing in a second income, and providing the support
and sustenance that men need to operate in the economy (vastly more than
men reciprocate), that allows the economy to continue. If they refuse the
life-style choices that perpetuate the economy, the economy will change.
How could women do this? By refusing to work for, or allow their spouses
to work for, or deal with, enterprises that take excessive time away from
the family. By refusing to support governments that put corporate profits
above citizens' well-being. By refusing to buy products that are exorbitantly
priced, or poorly made, or imported at the cost of local jobs. By establishing
new collaborative enterprises of their own to show men how
to do it. By choosing mates that have the values and qualities necessary
for the next economy -- fairness, tolerance, pacifism, strong interpersonal
skills, recognition of the importance of well-being versus wealth, sensitivity
to the needs of others -- and not choosing aggressive, materialistic,
competitive, emotionally shallow men. And, most important of all, by educating
themselves and their children on the horrendous consequences of continuing
to try to sustain our unsustainable economy.
I am sure you are incredulous. Surely four changes:
- a tax shift,
- a small minority of people setting the example by walking away
from the acquisitive economy,
- the leadership of women in selection of mates and establishing
cultural values and family ground-rules, and
- the education of future generations on the non-viability of our
current culture
couldn't undermine and replace an economy and culture that have dominated
for 30,000 years? I would argue that the huge economic and cultural change
that occurred 30,000 years ago happened with even fewer levers of change than
this. So did the industrial revolution. As it was then, our survival is at
stake.
Until someone comes up with better designations for the next human culture
and economy, I would suggest the following uninspiring but accurate working
names:
Next Human Culture:
Relater-Sharer Culture
Next Economy:
The Collaborative-Well-Being
Economy
I'll conclude with two quotes, for the skeptics:
"You never change things by fighting the existing reality.
To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete."
(Buckminster Fuller)
"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful,
committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing
that ever has." (Margaret Mead)
Stay tuned for a blueprint for new collaborative enterprises, within the
next week.
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MADE IN CANADA
trust your
instincts 
