Moral Economy Project Symposium and Outreach
Building a Whole Earth Economy
The Moral Economy Project (Quaker Institute for the Future) held a symposium in Montreal on May 15-16, 2009, to discuss issues of ecology and governance. The purpose of this WiserEarth group is to encourage follow-up discussion on questions and ideas arising from the symposium, to make symposium materials (papers and videos) available to attendees and others ...learn more
GROUP DETAILS
Created: Oct 27, 2008
Updated: Oct 25, 2009
Membership: Open
Semi-Private
Topic: SOME PRELIMINARY THOUGHTS FROM AN OUTSIDER
Posts (1 - 3 of 3)
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Welcome, Sololeum!
These are very interesting points. I'd like to expand on your physics analogy, and comment that the concept of "work" in physics has a very specific definition (energy transmitted by a force over a distance), whereas in economics it encompasses a much wider field of different endeavours, all of which use or consume different amounts of physical energy. So the equation that less energy=less work is true in physics, but not necessarily in economics; if I were to, for instance, go from driving a bulldozer half-time to being a math teacher full-time, I would be doing "more work" in an economic sense, but "less work" in a physics sense. So maybe having less energy available doesn't strictly correlate with less work being done by our society as a whole, but rather it means that our focus will need to be on doing *different* work - smaller-scale and more hands-on work (like you were saying about gardening), more spiritual work, and so on; so that we stabilize at a lower total energy level even if the "amount of work" remains roughly the same. (I put this in quotes because I don't know enough economics to know how economists quantitise the work that is done.) I think this is sort of what Ed Dreby's paper for the symposium was about: trying to avoid the social dislocations involved in less work being available, while still reducing society's total energy input/output. At least that's how I understood it. Grace |
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G'Day Grace,
You're right - we can engage in more non-material work - spiritual work - knowledge transmission - massage etc. but at the end of the day most people will feel poorer if they can access less goods - from furniture to clothes - and have to travel on public transport to go anywhere.
I was focusing on the physical aspects of work - as our society uses fossil based energy for most of the material things we see around us - less energy = less work = less material goods.. Now I think this is a good thing, but most will need a lot of help to transition.... Unfortunately , Ed Dreby's paper, amongst others appears to have been taken down, however what you say about it is true - we must share the work, and create more meaningful work in non-material areas - however as no-one in control acknowledges the elephant in the room, that is peak resources, and may never do so as they are dependant on the support of the status quo - the business as usual crowd.... that means that we need a grass roots - bottom up movement for change.. Therefore the importance of transitioning to a Whole Earth Economy cannot be overstated - I have ordered my book from Amazon and will be able to comment further after reading it all - but it sounds like something that I will be supporting...
BTW is this blog going to transition to a blog on bringing about the WEE? It could be an important way to focus people from all over the world - I come from the New England area of New South Wales - Australia and would need the support of a wider group to.
Cheers,
John
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I came to your site from an article in the Energy Bulletin. Book review: Right Relationship Building a Whole Earth Economy
My soul leaped with joy – there is indeed light in the darkness – there are those who understand that the golden rule should not be limited to Homo Sapien Sapiens, but to the whole world and those who sail on her…
A part of western materialistic culture I can understand the desire for a clean, shinny and physically easy world, full of technology - however my own experiences and reflections point to a future that is close to the earth, technology limited, physically demanding and personally restrictive in work and movement. The basic reasoning for my stance is resource constraints including oil and other fossil fuel sources.
Having failed to succeed in a biofuel project based on the nut species Aleurites Moluccana, and noting that venture capitalists needed huge returns on capital the better half and myself decided to buy a small farm and prepare for the inevitable economic collapse that follows peak energy – for those who don’t see a correlation between energy and the economy I would ask you to contemplate that in physics energy = work. Less energy = Less work. To get out of recession we need to perform more work, more goods and more services which is impossible with less energy.
Energy production has declined and will not in my view increase to the levels of mid 2008. Also browse http://www.theoildrum.com/
Anne and I now work part time, and are continuing to increase our self reliance in gardening for food production, and other life skills.
I follow Chandi in that I see that my role in promoting a better future is living the change that I wish to see in the world. We live a simple healthful life that does not require much in the way of energy or other resources.
We are using simple techniques to make Terra Preta Nova which will make our gardens more resilient and more productive and the next project is to grow living fences for stock control – a real need in a world where steel for posts and wire are becoming ever more expensive.
I would like to put up three thoughts:-
1. The future will be poorer in material resources,
2. The future will be less materialistic – less material culture, and more non-material culture, and
3. There is a real need to preserve knowledge – this is not a given when a culture collapses – but it is very important to preserve and promote knowledge it is our bastion against a descent into tribal fundamentalism.