How the Rich are Destroying the Earth - book launch, co-sponsored by rabble.ca

I don't get it. Kempf's book title points to how the rich are destroying the planet. But then in the youtube interview linked to above, he seems to be talking about, yes, his friends are Marxists and Maoists, and then distances himself from Soviet economies and says in his personal opinion that that system is not for us , as if Chernobyl should be proof enough that way is the wrong way. So let's wipe that example from our psyches and focus on laying a guilt trip on people everywhere for consuming too much. And maybe I've misunderstood him already. But it's not me who's been manufacturing mountains of plastic crap and dumping billions of tons of GH gases into the air - that's industrial capitalism. Nationalized industries were so much easier for democratically-elected governments to control than marauding multinational conglomerates today. If it's a guilt trip he wants to socialize and project onto me and billions of ordinary people struggling day to day just to live, then I'm not buyin' This setup isn't flexible enough for us to make the "market choices" required to do what's necessary.

[ 26 October 2008: Message edited by: Fidel ]

Okay, I haven't actually read the book adn am always weary on commenting on things I haven't read so I will offer teh caveat that these impressions are based on teh review and interview.

First, I know the title is designed to be provocative but it's inaccurate and unfair. Trying to pin the blame for a serious global issue on any one particular groupis never right and that he pins this particualr one on "the rich" is no more excusable than had he pinned it on "the Jews" or "the blacks" or "the gays." The rich are not a monolithic group and practices and attitudes vary wildly among them as they would among any group. Many "rich" (Al Gore, T. Boone Pickens) ahve great environmental consciences and otehrs doa great deal to alleviate pain and suffering around the world (see Bill Gates, Warren Buffet).

Now, I do not consider myself "rich" or "wealthy" but when I look at it objectively, now that my wife and I ahve paid off our massive student loans and actually get to keep our salaries, we're probably in the top few percent of income earners in teh United States.

The reality I've found (and many otehrs have noted) is that environmental consciousnes has become a "luxury good". It shouldn't necessarily be, but it is. This works on a macro as well as micro level. So on a macro level, you'll see that the poorest countries also tend to have the elast stringent environmental policies and the lowest environmental quality. Because when a country's short-term issues include trying to prevent tehir citizens from imminent starvation, trying to provide medical treatment agaisnt easily treatable diseases that are nontheless killings thousands every day or preventing people from coming to villages and massacring citizens, they don't ahve the luxury of worrying about reducing emissions, improving air quality or cleaning up the water supply.

Similarly, now that I'm in a financial position to do so, I've been able to take many steps to reduce my environmental impact that people in less fortuante positions may not be able to make. It includes stuff like trading in my beat up old gas-spewing car for a hybrid. Or purchasing locally grown, organic products instead of cheap, overly processed, chemical laden shit. And buying it at a local store within walking distance rather than driving out to some urban sprawl wal-mart to do my shopping.

I know that there's a lot of resentment-fueled invective that people love to hurl around at the residents of, say, Rosedale or Forest Hill in Toronto as selfish fat cats completely indifferent to the world around them. But if you actually analyze their actions compared to people in middle and lwoer classes, their negative environmental impact may in fact be less. If someone buys a 5 million dollar home in Rosedale, it will have less impact than some middle class person buying a 300K one out in whitby or oshawa. the home and the neighbourhood are already established. it didn't involve bulldozing a forest to build. The infrastrucutre is already there so the costs of delivering services are low comapred to urban sprawl places where pipes, sewers, hydro grids, etc. all need to be laid from scratch. And a person in rosedale who works on say, bay Street, can take teh subway to work or drive 10 minutes instead of driving an hour each way spewing exhaust fumes into the air and necessitating more forsts to be pved over to build yet more highways.

Sorry to get off on a rant. Hoepfully, this can start a discussion. I'd be interested in hearing both agreements and disagreements.

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Originally posted by genstrike:
[b]
Also, by looking at the suburban sprawl here in Winnipeg, and the number of SUVs coming out of those rich suburbs with only one person in them, I have to come to the conclusion that a lot of rich people don't care about the environment. Also, there are issues if gentrification at play as well when we start talking about rich people moving into a formerly poor working class central area en masse because it is close to their downtown offices.[/b]

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Okay, but if you took your line about rich people driving SUVs and concluding that "a lot of rich people don't care about the environemnt" and replaced the word "rich" with "Jewish," "black" or "gay", you've got the same problem. It's completely anectodatal. I'm sure plenty of rich people don't care about the environment. I know that many do. just as I'm sure there is no shortage of Jewish, gay and black people who care passionately about the environment as well as no shortage or jewish, black and gay people who don't give a damn. The problem is that by directing the blame towards any group, it is absolving people outside of that group and the environment is a global issue to which we all contribute and are all effected and we each need to take personal responsibility and take individual actions, regardless or race, gender, geography or, yes, tax bracket.

And I'm not sure exactly what your point was about gentrification. Often, issues of environmental consciousness and concern for people in poverty are at odds. Obviously, gentrification isn't good for poor people being squeezed out of neighbourhoods but it IS good for the environment. If someone has a decent amount of money to spend on a home, I'd much rather they buy a condo in a high-rise building downtown that doesn't contribute to sprawl and allows them to take transit to work instead of spewing exhaust into the air for a couple hours a day.

As I mentioned, now that I've achieved a higher income level, I feel as though I am able to be a lot more environmentally conscious than I could ahve been when I was a broke student - through the car I drive, where I shop, what I buy, etc.

At teh same time, I find it hard to condemn lower income people for not making the same choices as a consumer that I make. I personally like going to a local market and buying quality products from a local merchant and keeping small businesses in the neighbourhood. I also realize that I'm lucky to have teh option to do that. If I were lower income with kids to support and struggling to get by, making the drive to wal-Mart to save some money would probably seem like a pretty attractive option.

I have read the book and had the chance to speak to the author at some length. He's trying to very loudly make the precise opposite case of what too often is the limited scope of environmentalism (small actions by ordinary people are the key, lifestyle changes etc.) And he's trying to get the left to take ecology more seriously.

The book - and its title - is an urgent wake up call to environmentalism to see the important of class differences and inequality, and to see that the problem lies in unrestrained power of corporations under neo-liberalism. He also makes important links to the increasingly authoritarian character of capitalism in the 'developed countries,' with a chapter devoted to the security society and crackdowns on civil liberties.

It's true, he rejects the marxist tradition in its entirety - it could be argued he conflates it with the Stalinist or bureaucratic communism of the past century (where regimes had atrocious records on both human rights and the environment). Kempf is coming at these issues as an ecologist, but he has reached quite radical and anti-capitalist conclusions.

Obviously, I think this is an important book - hope folks in Toronto can make the launch event on Thursday.

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Originally posted by derrick_okeefe:
[b] it could be argued he conflates it with the Stalinist or bureaucratic communism of the past century (where regimes had atrocious records on both human rights and the environment)[/b]

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According to U.S. EPA estimates, GHG emissions from the USSR still didn't equal North American output during peak years in the mid 1980's. Their people were told by our people that we had a better way, and that they should accept the neoliberal mumbo jumbo

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Originally posted by genstrike:
[b]

Maybe we need another thread for this, but I really don't think you can say that talking about class struggle is the same as anti-semitism, racism or homophobia. Class struggle exists, and the ruling class doesn't hesitate to attack the working class, so we shouldn't hesitate to fight back. Associating talking about class struggle with things like anti-semitism, racism and homophobia is simply wrong on many levels and playing into the hands of the right by associating class struggle and criticism of capitalism with racism and prejudice (similar to how the term anti-Americanism is used to discredit criticism of American foreign policy by associating it with things like anti-semitism).

Also, the rich can do a lot more damage to the environment than the poor. The rich can afford bigger houses, bigger cars, and more stuff. There is no way a person working at minimum wage can possibly do more damage than a person who drives his Hummer every day from a suburban mansion full of stuff to his downtown office.

That being said, I think we also need to distinguish between the well-off working class (I believe the embourgeoisified proletariat is the Marxist term) and the ruling class. Sure, they can both afford expensive toys which damage the environment, but there is a huge difference in terms of their relations to production. While individual solutions are a baby step in the right direction, we need to really look at how we produce in a capitalist system with class divisions in order to seriously address this problem. The well-off working class has very little control over production, while the ruling class has pretty much complete control. Also, the ruling class profits the most from overproduction and overconsumption (and encourages it through things like advertising), while the working class suffers. So, we can place the blame for overproduction and overconsumption squarely on the ruling class.[/b]

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Good points and I agree with much of it.

I really wasn't trying to compare holding the rich accountable for environmental problems to anti-semitism or racism. I was jsut pointing out the unfairness of singling out any one group for a global problem for which we are ALL responsible and should all take actions. It's easy to just say "the rich caused this problem and they should solve it" than to look at what each of us are doing and what we COULD be doing to reduce our impact.

And you may be aprtly right that the rich can do a lot more damage to the environment, though I'm not entirely sure. They can also do a lot more FOR the environment by doing things like driving hybrids, buying more expensive but less environmentally costly products, etc. It's pretty unlikely you'll see a welfare recipient driving a Prius to the local farmer's market to pick up organic tomatoes or heading voer to the local independent coffee shop to buy a $5 cup of fair trade, shade-grown coffee. My point is that all of us can be examining our actions and making efforts to do our part. And, yes, SOME may drive their hummers from their urban sprawl homes, but I think urban sprawl is more of a middle class (even lower middle class) phenomenon. The very rich tend to live in the best areas of urban centres like Rosedale, Forest Hill, Yorkville in Toronto.

And, yes, obviously saying "the rich" is very broad. Bill Gates' household and my household are both probably in the highest 1% of income earners in the U.S. but the differences are vast worlds apart. But this too makes the extremes more pronounced. Gates is in a position to cause far more damage by, say, flying around in a private jet. He's also in a position to do far more good by, say, giving 1 billion dollars to a good organization that can make far more of an impact than a $500 donation from me ever could.

It's not working class slobs with controlling interest shares in old world economy, Exxon-Imperial and the like.

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Originally posted by Fidel:
[b]It's not working class slobs with controlling interest shares in old world economy, Exxon-Imperial and the like.[/b]

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Of course not. The people with that kind of wealth and power can all fit in the same small room.

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Originally posted by Star Spangled Canadian:
[b]but I think urban sprawl is more of a middle class (even lower middle class) phenomenon. The very rich tend to live in the best areas of urban centres like Rosedale, Forest Hill, Yorkville in Toronto.[/b]

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I don't know about that, in Winnipeg it is a very upper class phenomenon. Pretty much all the new houses being built in these new developments on the periphery are large and expensive. Generally, houses get bigger and bigger the further you get from the downtown core (with the possible exception of a few working class areas near big industrial zones such as Transcona).

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Originally posted by Star Spangled Canadian:
[b]And, yes, obviously saying "the rich" is very broad. Bill Gates' household and my household are both probably in the highest 1% of income earners in the U.S. but the differences are vast worlds apart. But this too makes the extremes more pronounced. Gates is in a position to cause far more damage by, say, flying around in a private jet. He's also in a position to do far more good by, say, giving 1 billion dollars to a good organization that can make far more of an impact than a $500 donation from me ever could.[/b]

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While it is nice to see the super-rich part with their money, we need to question why they have such concentrations of wealth in the first place. Pickens made his money off of oil and gas. 20 years ago, Warren Buffet bought over a billion in stock from Coca-Cola, a company that kills union activists in Colombia. A lot of the money of the super-rich is dirty money, made through exploitation of workers (causing poverty) and the environment (causing environmental damage) worldwide. They shouldn't have had it in the first place. It is like arguing that it is good that the profits from a Hummer dealership go to environmental programs. The Hummer dealership shouldn't exist in the first place.

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Originally posted by derrick_okeefe:
[b]I meant to mention that in addition to checking out Kempf and his book, people should check out the writings of Joel Kovel on ecosocialism. John Bellamy Foster has written a book called 'Marx's Ecology' which is quite academic but it's been highly recommended to me by a few different people.[/b]

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I have read Kovel's "The Enemy of Nature" and I found it to be way over my head at quite a few points. Basically, I didn't get a lot out of it other than feeling stupid that I had difficulty comprehending things like the "philosophical interlude" on Heidigger. Do you know if there are any books about ecosocialism that are written in a more accessible manner?

This is a fair point - Kovel's writing can also be inaccessible at times, though he has written a number of articles in less academic language than Enemy of Nature (discussion/study groups would be good for tackling this one)...

There must be a good ecosociliast reading list out there but a couple of blogs I recommend are Ian Angus (who also contributes sometimes to rabble.ca):
[url=http://climateandcapitalism.com/]http://climateandcapitalism.com/[/url]

and in the UK Green Party member Derek Wall:
[url=http://www.another-green-world.blogspot.com/]http://www.another-green-wo...

[ 27 October 2008: Message edited by: derrick_okeefe ]

Odd, I don't find Kovel's prose hard to read at all. He's an American, fer cripes' sake. I'm used to translating Parisian and Italian intellectuals...

Enemy of Nature is very "Marxian", not merely Marxist. Some grounding in Marx's works, including Capital, is a big help.

Edited to add an unrelated point: not driving at all is far better for the environment than driving a hybrid.

[ 27 October 2008: Message edited by: lagatta ]

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And it's going to be the ruin of us if we keep up this way, because we can't afford our own excesses as "middle class" northern people, much less the excesses of the richest of the rich among us.

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Do you mean Jim Balsillie, billionaire co-CEO of blackberry maker RIM has warped values, wanting to bring an American team north of the border for the edification of southern Ontario hockeyfans?

I always thought so, myself. But, then, people put it down to jealousy on my part.

Thorstein Veblen, leading critical economist in the U.S. a century back coined such things "conspicuous consumption", making fun of the 30-bedroom mansions of the Robber Barons . He compared their efforts to demonstrate their wealth to the paint and feathers of some South Pacific islanders - and won no friends among the wealthy of his day. I like to think that Stephen Leacock, a student of Veblen's, developed an early humorous appreciation of life around him from his studies in Chicago.

But did Kempf present our predicament as a "double bind", a moral question and an economic dilemma? If we're not consuming we're putting people out of work? Including bartenders?

(There's that jealous spirit sneaking in again.)

The library is producing a book for me Fidel. Order up a copy. (Then if you still disagree with it, it doesn't stay on your shelf.) [img]wink.gif" border="0[/img]

Here's the "double bind" that I was referring to, Michelle, and I hope I find that M.Kempf has "dealt" with it in his tome.

The NYTimes' Krugman today:

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October 31, 2008
Op-Ed Columnist
When Consumers Capitulate
By PAUL KRUGMAN
The long-feared capitulation of American consumers has arrived. According to Thursday’s G.D.P. report, real consumer spending fell at an annual rate of 3.1 percent in the third quarter; real spending on durable goods (stuff like cars and TVs) fell at an annual rate of 14 percent.

To appreciate the significance of these numbers, you need to know that American consumers almost never cut spending. Consumer demand kept rising right through the 2001 recession; the last time it fell even for a single quarter was in 1991, and there hasn’t been a decline this steep since 1980, when the economy was suffering from a severe recession combined with double-digit inflation.

Also, these numbers are from the third quarter — the months of July, August, and September. So these data are basically telling us what happened before confidence collapsed after the fall of Lehman Brothers in mid-September, not to mention before the Dow plunged below 10,000. Nor do the data show the full effects of the sharp cutback in the availability of consumer credit, which is still under way.

So this looks like the beginning of a very big change in consumer behavior. And it couldn’t have come at a worse time.

It’s true that American consumers have long been living beyond their means. In the mid-1980s Americans saved about 10 percent of their income. Lately, however, the savings rate has generally been below 2 percent — sometimes it has even been negative — and consumer debt has risen to 98 percent of G.D.P., twice its level a quarter-century ago.

Some economists told us not to worry because Americans were offsetting their growing debt with the ever-rising values of their homes and stock portfolios. Somehow, though, we’re not hearing that argument much lately.

Sooner or later, then, consumers were going to have to pull in their belts. But the timing of the new sobriety is deeply unfortunate. One is tempted to echo St. Augustine’s plea: “Grant me chastity and continence, but not yet.” For consumers are cutting back just as the U.S. economy has fallen into a liquidity trap — a situation in which the Federal Reserve has lost its grip on the economy.

Some background: one of the high points of the semester, if you’re a teacher of introductory macroeconomics, comes when you explain how individual virtue can be public vice, how attempts by consumers to do the right thing by saving more can leave everyone worse off. The point is that if consumers cut their spending, and nothing else takes the place of that spending, the economy will slide into a recession, reducing everyone’s income.

In fact, consumers’ income may actually fall more than their spending

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Are we talking about a more 'socialist' world? I would say we are. I know of no way to achieve what is necessary to save our society (and perhaps our species) without a collectivist mobilization. And that message is clearly found in Hervй Kempf's book.

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Hope he goes all the way to command economy on a war-time footing of rationing, etc.

Don't see how the objectives could be accomplished at any lesser degree of mobilization. Can't send the rich into the corner without their supper, eh? They didn't get that treatment even in their childhood. [img]biggrin.gif" border="0[/img]

Socialists tried land redistribution to peasants in Venezuela before. The rich found ways to take it from them. Illiteracy and poverty versus conniving land barons made for a lopsided result.

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And, yes, obviously saying "the rich" is very broad. Bill Gates' household and my household are both probably in the highest 1% of income earners in the U.S. but the differences are vast worlds apart. But this too makes the extremes more pronounced. Gates is in a position to cause far more damage by, say, flying around in a private jet. He's also in a position to do far more good by, say, giving 1 billion dollars to a good organization that can make far more of an impact than a $500 donation from me ever could.

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He's more likely to do considerable harm thorough greed and arrogance. Bill continues to 'donate' to his own advantage. For years, Microsoft 'donated' their products strategically, to gain control of certain market sectors (education being the most notable).

Few people are aware that Bill Gates is probably the largest biotech investor in the world. Little wonder then that when he 'gives' a billion dollars, [url=http://www.gmoafrica.org/2005/07/bill-gates-donates-sh13b-to-biotech_02.... goes towards the commercialization of bio-engineered agriculture.[/url]

I'm living somewhat of a solitary life on disability, and doing okay. Partly that's because I'm in a very isolated area with no strip malls, or indeed urban infrastructure of any kind. I'm paying a ten-year mortgage on a small house, and I have a good sized garden and garage. I keep tied into the outside world by satellite television and the internet. If I had an inheritance or lottery windfall, I'd love to build a small indoor swimming pool.