Real Green Consumption

Prefiguring New Socioeconomic Social Relations

For a long list of reasons, economic relations must change. Yet, it seems as though the most immediate reason involves ecological catastrophe; exponential profit margins are not compatible with finite ecosystems. Hence, the need for a plethora of ideas. I plan to offer such a vision.

I must make some clarifications in advance. First, I acknowledge similarities between the preceding ideas and others. In all fairness there’s nothing new here; it is ultimately a 21st century vision for libertarian communism, or anarchist-communism, with elements of participatory economics, council communism, and perhaps even autonomous Marxism.

While we’re doing housekeeping, I want to make clear that this article, or the author, is not making an attempt at vanguardism. If anything, I would like to encourage others to think more about anarchist economic relations, and so that we might be able to offer articulate responses to those who say: “Well, what’s your alternative to capitalism/ centrally-planned socialism?”

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For a long list of reasons, economic relations must change. Yet, it seems as though the most immediate reason involves ecological catastrophe; exponential profit margins are not compatible with finite ecosystems. Hence, the need for a plethora of ideas. I plan to offer such a vision.

I must make some clarifications in advance. First, I acknowledge similarities between the preceding ideas and others. In all fairness there’s nothing new here; it is ultimately a 21st century vision for libertarian communism, or anarchist-communism, with elements of participatory economics, council communism, and perhaps even autonomous Marxism.

While we’re doing housekeeping, I want to make clear that this article, or the author, is not making an attempt at vanguardism. If anything, I would like to encourage others to think more about anarchist economic relations, and so that we might be able to offer articulate responses to those who say: “Well, what’s your alternative to capitalism/ centrally-planned socialism?”

I also do not want anyone to get the impression that I would desire an all-encompassing, homogenous, global economic system that functions as such. I certainly think that, unlike the age of state-capitalism and all its homogeneity and authoritarianism, communities should determine what their economic and social relationships look like, from the bottom-up.

I also did not discuss how this vision of 21st century anarcho-communism with an emphasis on ecological-consciousness could come about. I do not see much merit in discussing step-by-step how some tangible revolution or insurrection will come about. I imagine that if such a thing ever occurs, it will be so utterly spontaneous and libertarian in nature, that there will be no need for armchair revolutionists to give advise to the masses. And I certainly do not see any dichotomy between reform and revolution. I see merit in a plethora of tactics, from infoshops to clashes with the police (all can be futile and deeply effective). In other words, if such concepts were practiced by businesses or housing co-ops or communes, I think this is effective in the sense that individuals are creating the social relationships they want to see in the new world, one example of many what might be called prefigurative politics.

I also think more directly antagonistic tactics like occupations and blockades can be meaningful. I certainly do not have blind faith in either tactic.

What this particular vision discusses is how the economic, like the political, is personal. But it also discusses how we must find a harmony with the environment, unlike many of the 19th and 20th century visions of socialism aforementioned. At the heart of this economic, and in turn, political vision, is a desire to prefigure a way of life in which humans can live in harmony with the nature they are intimately part of, instead of treating nature as something we are separate from, for which we ultimately dominate.

Basically, the two alternatives I’ve heard to halt further environmental catastrophe aren’t very attractive. The first is the primitivist/anti-civilization critique: move away from everything we now know in life, i.e., math, technology, art, even language, for a simple way of life that is analogous to the hunter/gatherer societies of day’s past.

The other alternative is perhaps just as naive: moralize morally bankrupt institutions. Force capitalism to become “green.” We’ve seen multiple propositions here: Buy re-usable bags; recycle goods; eat “whole” foods instead of hyper-processed foods; eat organic; stop eating meat; ride a bike to lower your carbon footprint; and go to farmer’s markets to support the moribund small farm instead of big conglomerate factory farms. The solution to environmental consumption comes in… changing consumer behavior? As if!

Both seem to present an impossibility: one suggests we abandon everything we know for a simple way of life, and the other suggests we fetishize different commodities than we do at present, eg, ditch the bourgeois steak-house for that trendy “locovore” eatery down the street that does all organic. Also, both lack appeal outside of white-privilege circles, like many revolutionary left theories.

There’s no secret why. For the average struggling working-class community, it’s doubtful if many are studying up on the alienating affects of language and mathematics on the population; survival, rather, is the topic du-jour.

As for the more liberal, and completely co-opted by capitalism solution, i.e., eat right and ride a bike and everything will be alright, it’s viewed as this sort of hippie-dippy aristocratic thing. And rightfully so, perhaps. Anyone who doesn’t see that it takes a great level of privilege to completely change one’s lifestyle is wearing rose-colored spectacles.

I see merit, certainly, in people eating better, and a paradigm shift. We certainly consume a steady diet of poison and pseudo-foods in the west. But this paradigm shift musn’t present itself as a commodity within the Spectacle.

While I find major flaws in both approaches, I certainly see a need to move on from capitalism and the State, as they have shown to be ill-equipped to deal with the problem of environmental catastrophe or provide anything close to what is referred to as climate justice. This article articulates the idea of moving on from individual consumption, and discusses a vision of social consumption. I will also discuss what I call a libertarian rationing of goods. I believe that social consumption, coupled with the idea of a libertarian rationing of goods, would make up a gift economy that not only functioned from the ability of communities to the needs of communities (to paraphrase the hackneyed definition of communism), but also maximized human leisure, pleasure, and desire without re-establishing the cycle of hyper-consumption/hyper-production.

On the Idea of Social Consumption

What I mean by social consumption is perhaps very different to similar ideas articulated. When I refer to consumption here, I am referring to the sphere of life that moves away from biological needs. Even my definition of “needs” must be defined, as it is itself subjective. By biological needs, I refer to food, water, shelter, health care, hygiene, clothing, sexuality, a comfortable place to lay our heads and sleep, reliable means of communication (this includes a free press), and all goods that would be associated with such things. I would isolate social consumption to all aspects of life that do not fit in with such needs.

The reason I make this separation is because, while I certainly think finding and maintaining our creative bliss is vital, i.e., meaningful activity, it varies from individual to individual. Hence, the need for what I call social consumption.

The point here is to move from the fetishizing of commodities, to the appropriation of goods to take part in meaningful activity for individuals. Let me explain. I’m interested in playing musical instruments like the drums and guitar. That said, there’s really no need for every individual who plays the guitar to own her or his own, personal guitar, since they spend such a great amount of time not playing these instruments (even the most dedicated player, between work and sleep, is not using their instrument very much in the scheme of things). Top-of-the-line guitars do not contain the planned obselesense of some of the cheapest models on the shelf, like all other goods. There’s no reason why there couldn’t be guitar archives in every community, which would be stocked with well-made guitars.

Continuing with the guitar example, instead of an industry that needlessly wasted resources such as steel for the guitar strings, wood for the guitar, and fossil fuels for the plastic created for the pick guard (and the guitar picks themselves), a democratically controlled industry could use the knowledge they have to produce way less, and higher quality guitars, for these hypothetical guitar archives. In other words, this frees up the worker from working as much, but it also liberates the consumer, in turn giving the consumer greater access to a higher quality product. So, the junk guitar that is produced merely to make a profit, which also required the extraction of finite natural resources, would no longer exist. The same might apply to fishing poles, paint brushes, records, films, or even televisions and computers. This is an obvious paradigm shift from the individual owning everything for themselves; most objects obtained by the masses in the west are sub-par to begin with due to planned obselesence.

In summation, what this brand of social consumption offers are those things that give rise to creative play and meaningful activity in our lives. This social consumption would give rise to many positive aspects for the consumer/producer. For the consumer, she or he needn’t worry about going in debt to obtain some perceived commodity of high quality; everything is for everyone in social consumption, and currency needn’t apply. Goods used for creative play and meaningful activity would be archived in respective spaces. Examples of such goods would be anything from electronic transportation devices, to skateboards, bicycles, and laptops.

It also frees the consumer from not having access to high quality goods, as everything in said archives would be built to last for a long period of time. In the current system of supply and demand economics, i.e., capitalism, it makes no sense to build things to last a very long time. Hence, most goods are made to have a relatively short shelf-life. This would change in a system of social consumption, for which the great majority of these commodities would become free to the public.

Also, since there would be much less being produced (possibly 70 percent of production could be eliminated quickly using such a system in its earliest stages), the producer is spending much less time at work. Probably in its earliest stages, this brand of social consumption could cut the traditional western 40 hour work-week down to 15 hours, or maybe 10 hours weekly. This, in turn, gives the producer much more time to be a social consumer. For example, if they want to read a book, or watch a film, or check out sporting supplies like skis or snowboards, they would have more time to do this. Perhaps they could check out an electric car and drive to the beach more often.

There would obviously be limits to how much one could use such things in a period (we may say a month is a period). However, with our hectic lives in capitalist society, scrounging to pay this bill, and attend that meeting, pick up the kids, all while trying to have a life in the process, perhaps allots us even less time to joy our supposed personal belongings than would a system of checking out archived goods. So, such a system of using goods might actually allow more enjoyable leisure time than our current paradigm.

Again, it is worth mentioning that money is never mentioned. If we’re to change hyper-consumption/production, it seems that we must dismantle the macro systems that perpetuate these things, rather than simply changing our consumer behavior. Hence, we must consider moving away from markets with currency exchanges, as this seems to be what has caused such ecological devastation. For this reason, this kind of economic relation is a sort of gift economy.

Gift economies do not rely on the exchange value of a good, remuneration in currency or labor notes (e.g., a voucher explaining how many hours one has worked for a day/ pay period), and certainly not profit/surplus value. Gift economies provide all for all. That is, participants in said economy work together to provide both needs and desires for each other; we could call this mutual aid in action.

We certainly see micro-gift-economies pop up in our lives all the time. We’ve all been invited to dinner at someone’s home. When we walked into their home, we weren’t charged for the food or drink, or an admission fee. And as someone who’s been on both sides, i.e., the cook and the diner, I can tell you from experience that this act is not done for the purpose of future exchange. the overwhelming majority of people who have friends and loved-ones to their home in order to eat food they prepared are not doing so for some kind of exact reciprocity, or any, for that matter. If we can imagine an economy that works like this from the municipal level, to its totality, spanning the globe through both federalism and confederations of these municipal areas, we might imagine an economy that works just like the dinner party that was provided at no expense to the diner.

A form of social consumption that focuses on sharing of goods, using archives, and dramatically less production, is in line with living ecologically sustainably. I say this because of its focus on re-using goods instead of producing cheap goods that will break down, and only make sense in a supply and demand economy for which the main incentive is profit.

The Libertarian Rationing of Goods

It’s true that we can think of many items that we cannot share, or should be re-used for others at a later date. We can think of a whole list of items, whether it be the goods in for which we literally consume like a pizza, beer, or a cigar, or goods that we use for sanitation or sex, like a toothbrush or a condom (the latter are certainly goods most of us wouldn’t want to share with anyone else).

I don’t see it as likely that we will move on from using such goods as the recreational drugs mentioned, or the hygienic and profelactc item. Nor do I believe these things are hinderances upon human progress or ecological landscapes, per se (though the production of such goods certainly could be).

So, in order to distribute such goods in a gift economy (for lack of a better term), which I would lump together in the category of biological needs, a system other than social consumption is necessary.

How would such goods be facilitated, though? Would it be efficient simply to apply the labor theory of value (LTV), i.e., the amount of labor gives rise to the value of said good? Or should we apply similar conditions of exchange value, or use value? While these theories have merit, and the value of labor power shouldn’t be underestimated (nor should the merit of leisure time), it is doubtful that a true communistic economy, or a gift economy, could come to fruition if we merely have a marketplace that consists of a bunch of citizens exchanging their labor power; this would probably give rise to a system involving labor notes. It’s hard to make the case that labor notes are not money. Since such an economy doesn’t involve money, it’s doubtful that the LTV would be at the crux of such a system.

Ultimately, there are a number of models that would be more efficient than the current embodiment of capitalism, from mutualist banks to a federation of workers’ controlled firms using syndicalism. But this model is different in the fact that it wouldn’t function much like a market at all. This system would not involve barter, or people selling their labor, even if the system is akin to market socialism, i.e., a market without surplus value. And it would not be based on a scheme of utilitarianism or reciprocal altruism. Quite simply, it is based on notions of non-dogmatic ( the small-c should be emphasized) communism: a gift economy where the community contributes what it can, and gets back not only what they need, but what they desire.

This may sound overtly simplified, and it is. The way in which a society organizes to facilitate needs and desires should not be the stuff of esoteric banter. As the micro-gift-economies work quite well, not based on utilitarianism or promised reciprocity, but because of maximized mutual aid (a sort of 21st century Kropotkinism), I believe it could easily work at the municipal level, and at a federal level.

The libertarian rationing of goods is a concept that would come into play when social consumption is not appropriate, as mentioned. Things that are utterly personal and private, like an undershirt or socks, even shoes, is something that could be rationed to a community, produced by the community. Also, however, per se biological needs like food and water (the maximal possible amount per capita instead of the least possible) could be distributed in this manner, as well as housing and health care. Local communities could determine their own cultures, whether in what they determine to be food (as this is certainly subjective), or what fashion looks like.

But it seems almost certain that the way in which we are commanded to produce (because it’s not as if we’re producing for ourselves, but for large, multi-national firms) cannot be done much longer if we seek to avoid complete environmental catastrophe. Yet, if products like shoes were designed to last, we wouldn’t need to attain so many pairs. For example, if someone lives 78 years on average, and shoes can be manufactured to last 5 years (which they most certainly can), then the average person needs less than 16 pair of shoes in their lifespan. I, personally, cannot imagine how many shoes I’ve owned in my lifetime at the age of 28; I would extrapolate that I’ve had hundreds of shoes, which is asinine. Unfortunately, my situation is typical amongst the middle class.

The situation is obviously pitiful twofold. Citizens in wealthy countries like the US and Canada consume what we are told, which is an ungodly amount, whilst citizens in poor countries do not have what they need. So while affluent, working-class individuals in the US have an abundance, the working-class of the global south is in dire need of the basic fundamentals.

On a different note, this over-consumption is obscene because of the fact that we are extracting finite resources for such goods. Since we now have a scientific understanding of ecosystems that empirically shows we cannot burn the candle at both ends, we must curb our production dramatically, hence our consumption.

It is true that we might have to rethink seasonal changes in fashion and what is “in style.” But it’s highly doubtful that this isn’t a product of hyper-alienation, that we need to possess some barrage of new commodities every few months. It’s true that we might have to think about redefining our culture; shudder to think we attain less clothes, shoes, and home appliances. It seems as though these things, like what is called “high fashion”, has to be a symptom of hyper-consumption/production; we may have to move on from such banalities.

It’s not to say that fashion, if it is meaningful occupation in one’s life, can’t be explored; a current example, and prefiguration of this, is the popularity of what is called consignment, or thrift shops. This is the acknowledgement that fashion can come in the form of lost treasures; items that have lost importance to one individual and become incredibly meaningful, and en vogue, to other individuals.

To conclude, the libertarian rationing of goods is the concept of communities distributing the maximal amount of services that provide biological needs, or personal goods like tooth brushes and condoms, without monetary remuneration; they get this maximum amount of goods with the simple criteria of living. Hence, it actually goes beyond the mantra “From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs.” The libertarian rationing of goods is merely something like breathing; it is something that is automatically assumed. It is the antithetical economic arrangement that assumes one owns her or himself, hence they can sell their labor; the libertarian rationing of goods theory assumes an individual “is”, rather than said individual being the “owner” of her or his body, as if they, themselves, are a commodity.

So instead of assuming there to be an economic exchange, every individual (who has the capability) is presupposed to have contributed since, after all, somehow the goods were produced.

How the Decisions are Made

The aforementioned explanations of social consumption and libertarian rationing of goods, basically nothing short of an articulation of 21st century anarcho-communism with an ecological consciousness, involve brief summations of the processes themselves, without an explanation of who will make these decisions and how they will be made.

If one is familiar with anarchism, or communism, it might be advantageous to think about what these two words mean, and simply amalgamate them. So, we might think of anarchism as defining a sociopolitical theory that seeks to maximize equality and freedom through the abolition of authoritarian hierarchy, domination, and oppression. Communism may define a classless, stateless society that does not use money for exchange. Amalgamating these two concepts gives us a sociopolitical theory that is anti-authoritarian, non-hierarchical, and seeks a classless, stateless society without money, for which equality and freedom are of the highest regard.

There is a rather eclectic tradition of anarchist-communism, ranging from Peter Kropotkin, who is credited as the “father” of this sect of anarchism, to current “Platformists” like an organization called NEFAC, or the North Eastern Federation of Anarcho-Communists. Although I’m highly sympathetic to the writings of Kropotkin on the subject, as well as present-day anarcho-communists, here I am writing about the prefiguration of a society that combines the best of what anarcho-communist thinkers have offered on the subject with an eco-conscious view that the socially is inherently ecological.

A 21st century vision of anarcho-communism, or libertarian communism (which is essentially a historic synonym for anarcho-communism) may involve the dual concepts of social consumption and a libertarian rationing of goods. Essentially, these two concepts encapsulate most things we do in a community. Of course, the political realm has not been discussed, or how communities could go about making these decisions.

And I must admit, my vision here sounds close to ideas like council communism, more than analogous to Michael Albert’s and Robin Haenel’s vision of participatory economics or “parecon”, and quite similar to both the Zapatista movement’s popular assemblies, as well as the workers’ councils used by the anarcho-syndicalists during the Spanish Civil War in the ’30’s. This doesn’t even account for the democratic soviets in the beginning of the Russian Revolution, before the movement was co-opted by the Bolsheviks.

Despite all of these different strains of socialism, I still always come back to the idea of anarcho-communism which, as I described before, is basically an amalgamation of the words “anarchism” and “communism.”

So how are decisions made? First, it must be stressed that an anarchist program is more than sanguine about people in communities making decisions for themselves; otherwise it would be a rather futile exercise to dismantle what is called the State and capitalism, or systems of power that give us “rulers.” Anarchist thinkers, since Bakunin and Malatesta, have always believed in power coming from the people, what could best be defined as direct democracy. I like to differentiate direct democracy with (what many of us believe to be rather oxy-moronic) representative democracy as contrasting self-governance with a so-called government of the people, respectively.

In other words, instead of formal, representative bodies a la parliamentarian structures like the Senate and the Congress, there would be (for example) popular assemblies and councils in their place.

In regards to a gift economy that distributes goods instead of remuneration in the form of money, i.e., communism, I believe that a system involving assemblies and councils at a municipal level would be the most pragmatic, and democratic.

First, I will discuss how the social consumption decisions are made. To simplify the situation, there are three popular assemblies (certainly the assemblies could consist of many of the same individuals): the goods archive assembly, the producers’ assembly, and the community assembly. These three assemblies have respective councils. The councils never make decisions different from the popular assembly; they merely relay messages.

The goal for the three types of assemblies, vis-a-vis social consumption, is for the community, the good’s archives, and the producers to reach as much common ground as possible, and of course, make decisions. Since the ideal is as much archival of goods, and production of goods, happening within respective communities, many people would wear three hats, e.g., someone who produces bicycles may also contribute time to running a goods archive, and be a citizen in the community.

To remind the reader, the ultimate goal here is to provide people with meaningful activity and curb as much waste as humanly possible for the sake of living in harmony with our finite ecosystems. Also, to reiterate, anarchism is a social theory that is optimistic about the community as a whole. It is not to say that anarchism, or anarchists are naive and have a firm grasp on the notion of human nature (i.e., humans are inherently good); yet we are optimistic that the human being is a rational animal, one that grasps the concept of mutual aid, i.e., success and survival of the species is higher amongst groups who use cooperation, and that there tends to be innate solidarity between humans.

What I am eluding to is the notion that communities left to their own vices would be more cognizant of what is happening to ecosystems around them in regards to production, rather than a handful of capitalists who stand to profit immensely from treating the environment like a toilet bowl or ashtray.

In regards to the libertarian rationing of goods, decisions for how much would be produced, for whom, how much per capita, etc., would be made directly by communities via councils and popular assemblies. In this case, we can also simplify and think of three groups: the producers, the citizens of a respective community, and those that run the spaces that distribute the goods, i.e., freestores (this concept will be developed more in future writings).

In regards to how councils emerge from assemblies, there are a number of ways this could be done. Firstly, we should think about what the assembly is. In my vision here, the assembly refers to (in regards to the community) any members of the community who want to participate politically, or (in regards to production) anyone who plays a role in the production of a good, or performs a service. So the council is merely a conduit for the assembly.

After decisions are pounded out by the assemblies (certainly the sausage-making part of the process), the assembly must decide how it will give rise to a council (I hesitate to use the word “elect” because I’m not terribly fond of the concept of voting). The best way I can imagine assemblies and councils working, pragmatically, is dividing municipal areas into approximately 100 individuals, with a ten-person council, which functions on a rotating basis, i.e., every three-month period, the council rotates to another ten individuals from the assembly. Obviously only those who voluntarily participated would do so; anyone who opted out of the process could either live with the decisions made in said municipal area or move onto another community, upholding the concept of free-association.

After decisions have been made in municipal areas, or work-places, or goods archives, councils must hold meetings with other councils to report decisions made by assemblies. To illustrate an example, in regards to social consumption, a community council, producers’ council, and a goods archive council would meet to present decisions made by their respective assemblies. A good way to proceed with these types of meetings may be to have meetings every two weeks. From the meetings, the councils report the discussion to the assemblies, in order for them to decide whether or not they think the assembly should try to reach consensus about decisions, block decisions, or step aside from decisions. For example, a producers’ assembly may decide that they want to produce less than a community council believes they need, whereas the goods archive council supports the producers’ assemblie’s decision. The community council may choose to block, or step aside, signaling that they do not support the decision, per se, but it is not absolutely vital that they prohibit such an action from occurring.

Ultimately, however, what may be the most effective means of making decisions would come in the form of councils, with permission from their respective assemblies, working together through conversation and presentation, to reach the maximal possible beneficiary agreement for the councils involved. This, of course, would be left up to the popular assembly. But, I would argue, that pragmatically speaking, this would be the most libertarian and workable scenario. If, for example, all councils involved in a process, whether discussing the libertarian rationing of goods or social spending, succeeded in 70 to 80 percent of their goals, this suits all interested parties well, and suggests a certain amount of compromise will be reached.

Such a system would insure federalism, which is basically the acknowledgement that our actions do not occur in a vacuum, and that we are all interconnected. As mentioned, too, there is possibility that many councils and assemblies will contain many of the same individuals.

Ending With a Brief Summation

This paper is a brief summation of my vision for a 21st century anarcho-communism with an ecological consciousness. I discussed in brief the dual concepts of social consumption, i.e., archived goods that we can share as a community or society, and the libertarian rationing of goods, i.e., a facilitation of goods that are either biological needs or personal items we wouldn’t feel comfortable sharing with others like sexual devices or toothbrushes.

I also discussed how these decisions would be made using popular assemblies, which give rise to councils as conduits for such decisions.

This vision of a 21st century anarcho-communism needs further development, and although it deals with a great deal of what we do in life, it primarily focuses on economic issues; I did not focus a great deal on how this 21st century, eco-conscious anarcho-communism will deal with cultural issues like religion, human sexuality, ethics, and law. These are also ideas I plan to discuss further in the future. This paper serves as an overview to the economic realm of a free society, or a prefiguration of such a society.