Circular economy transition or environmental collapse
The president of Ireland recently called for a new socio-ecological model for the Irish people that provides “sufficiency for all, not accumulated wealth for a few”.
“Funding for public services must be seen as investment, not a burden”…
“Many economists remain stuck in an inexorable growth narrative, or at best a ‘green growth’ narrative. A fixation on a narrowly defined efficiency, productivity, perpetual growth has resulted in a discipline that has become blinkered to the ecological challenge – the ecological catastrophe – we now face”.
“That narrow focus constitutes an empty economics which has lost touch with everything meaningful, a social science which no longer is connected, or even attempts to be connected, with the social issues and objectives for which it was developed over centuries. It is incapable of offering solutions to glaring inadequacies of provision as to public needs, devoid of vision.”
“The challenge for all of us here today, is, therefore, to find a way of building, with all our distinctive contributions, an alternative to that hegemonic discourse that casts competitiveness, productivity, efficiency, as the ultimate purpose of economic activity, and inexorable growth in output and trade as an end in itself”.
“I suggest that all of the prevailing ruling concepts in our present economic discourse – flexibility, globalisation, productivity, efficiency, innovation, indeed economic growth itself – are capable of being redefined within an active citizen participative state context, given a shared moral resonance, reimagined sustainably within the context of the new ecological-social model.”
To hear this kind of speech from a leader of a country at a time like this is almost unheard of but such common sense it feels like. How do we save our planet with our current global economic model still forging ahead, were companies are rewarded based on the amount of resources they consume. If our economic model was radically transformed in such a way that proved beneficial for all people in that country and the environment a domino effect might be seen around the world. But who would be brave enough to take such a radical step and how would you even start such a transformation. The first thing would be to start talking about it on a global stage, surely if we could invent an economic model that is so effective at destroying our natural resources we could invent an economic model that defines rules that preserve them as best as possible by using materials that are aligned with a circular economy like hemp and hempcrete and completely eradicating business practices that are not in alignment with preserving our planet. Could we not do this.
