Great synthesis, thanks for sharing you insights and advice and putting a spotlight on the increasing wealth inequality.
In addition, wouldn't it also help to show people/policy makers that we've historically been in this position multiple times, as shown by Bas van Bavel in his book The Invisible Hand: How Market Economies have Emerged and Declined since ad 500?
Based on the long-term historical analysis of three premodern and three modern market economies he deduces a cyclical nature of market economies. Simply being confronted with this was a huge eye-opener for me as I believed, like Bas point out and disproves, that (economic) history tends to be rather teleological…
Not saying that what he is proposing is directly a natural law but its fact-based and a useful map to plot the things on that we see happening and determine strategic steps.
Bas is convinced that given the rate of globalization, all economies are pecked to the cycle of the American economy which is - based on the signs of inequality in income, wealth, access to markets, political power and regulatory power - in its declining phase and will drag all other economies down.
He speculatively proposes three ways that could alter this outcome:
First, a new cycle overtaking the American one (e.g. India or China), however chances, according to him, are rather low. Which would simply kick the can down the road…
Secondly, war - a historically known cycle breaker
Third, a civilian movement aiming to rebalance the societal playing field, as you mentioned "If inequality trends intensify beyond a certain threshold, resistance could mobilize quickly."
For me, it is all the more reason to amplify the common's movement (in a responsible way, preferably in combination with ecological understanding) to have at least some kind of communal foundation in place to fall back on for when we're forced to degrow and/or when extraction gets the best of the real economy.
I'm working on a story to share with people in order to open their eyes to the commons and all the reasons why it would be a worthwhile to already start building a community. Luckily there's this positive trend of an increasing amount of citizen's initiatives on a fundamental societal level (e.g. housing, food, work etc.) that I can use to illustrate.
Hi Hans,
Great synthesis, thanks for sharing you insights and advice and putting a spotlight on the increasing wealth inequality.
In addition, wouldn't it also help to show people/policy makers that we've historically been in this position multiple times, as shown by Bas van Bavel in his book The Invisible Hand: How Market Economies have Emerged and Declined since ad 500?
Based on the long-term historical analysis of three premodern and three modern market economies he deduces a cyclical nature of market economies. Simply being confronted with this was a huge eye-opener for me as I believed, like Bas point out and disproves, that (economic) history tends to be rather teleological…
Not saying that what he is proposing is directly a natural law but its fact-based and a useful map to plot the things on that we see happening and determine strategic steps.
Bas is convinced that given the rate of globalization, all economies are pecked to the cycle of the American economy which is - based on the signs of inequality in income, wealth, access to markets, political power and regulatory power - in its declining phase and will drag all other economies down.
He speculatively proposes three ways that could alter this outcome:
First, a new cycle overtaking the American one (e.g. India or China), however chances, according to him, are rather low. Which would simply kick the can down the road…
Secondly, war - a historically known cycle breaker
Third, a civilian movement aiming to rebalance the societal playing field, as you mentioned "If inequality trends intensify beyond a certain threshold, resistance could mobilize quickly."
For me, it is all the more reason to amplify the common's movement (in a responsible way, preferably in combination with ecological understanding) to have at least some kind of communal foundation in place to fall back on for when we're forced to degrow and/or when extraction gets the best of the real economy.
I'm working on a story to share with people in order to open their eyes to the commons and all the reasons why it would be a worthwhile to already start building a community. Luckily there's this positive trend of an increasing amount of citizen's initiatives on a fundamental societal level (e.g. housing, food, work etc.) that I can use to illustrate.
Curious about your thoughts!
~Alex
Post Growth Institute