“Localization” Can Help Free the Planet From Neoliberal Globalization

• by: C.J. Polychroniou

Helena Norberg-Hodge – Photo: nl.wikipedia.org

Localization offers the means to return to a real and stable economy not based on speculation, exploitation and debt.

Is there a viable alternative to the economic, social, political and environmental problems stemming from globalization? How about “localization”? This is the antidote to globalization propounded by Helena Norberg-Hodge, founder and director of Local Futures, an organization focused on building a movement dedicated to environmental sustainability and social well-being by rejuvenating local economies. Norberg-Hodge is a pioneer of the new economy movement, which now has spread to all continents, and the convener of World Localization Day, which was endorsed by the likes of Noam Chomsky and the Dalai Lama. Norberg-Hodge is the author of several books and producer of the award-winning documentary, The Economics of Happiness.

In this interview, Norberg-Hodge discusses in detail why localization represents a strategic alternative to globalization and a way out of the climate conundrum, the ways through which localization challenges the spread of authoritarianism, and what a post-pandemic world might look like.

C.J. Polychroniou: The global neoliberal project, under way since the early 1980s following the so-called “free-market revolution” launched by Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher in the U.S. and U.K., respectively, has proven to be an unmitigated disaster on all fronts. Why does a shift toward economic localization, a movement which you have initiated on every continent of the world, represent a superior strategic alternative to the existing socioeconomic order, and how do we go about making this transition?

Helena Norberg-Hodge: The process of globalization with its disastrous effects is a consequence of governments systematically using taxes, subsidies and regulations to support global monopolies at the expense of place-based regional and local businesses and banks. This process has been going on in the name of supporting growth through free trade, but it has actually impoverished the majority, that has had to work harder and harder just to stay in place. Even nation states have become poorer, relative to the trillions of dollars circulating in the hands of global financial institutions and other transnational corporations. This has systematically corrupted virtually every avenue of knowledge, from schools to universities, from science to the media.

As a consequence, instead of questioning the role of the economic system in causing our multiple crises, people are led to blame themselves for not managing their lives well enough, for not being efficient enough, for not spending enough time with family and friends, etc., etc… In addition to feeling guilty, we often end up feeling isolated because the ever more fleeting and shallow nature of our social encounters with others fuels a show-off culture in which love and affirmation are sought through such superficial means as plastic surgery, designer clothes and Facebook likes. These are poor substitutes for genuine connection, and only heighten feelings of depression, loneliness and anxiety.

I see a shift toward economic localization as a powerful strategic alternative to neoliberal globalization for a number of reasons. For starters, the increasingly planetary supply chains and outsourcing endemic to corporate globalization are systematically making every region less materially secure (something that became starkly apparent during the COVID crisis) and enabling ecological and labor exploitation cost shifting such that feedback loops that could promote greater transparency and thus responsibility are severed. A recent study showed that one-fifth of global carbon emissions come from multinational corporations’ supply chains. Localization means getting out of the highly unstable and exploitative bubbles of speculation and debt, and back to the real economy — our interface with other people and the natural world. Local markets require a diversity of products, and therefore create incentives for more diversified and ecological production. In the realm of food, this means more diversified production with far less machinery and chemicals, more hands on the land, and therefore, more meaningful employment. It means dramatically reduced CO2 emissions, no need for plastic packaging, more space for wild biodiversity, more circulation of wealth within local communities, more face-to-face conversations between producers and consumers, and more flourishing cultures founded on genuine interdependence.

This is what I call the “solution-multiplier” effect of localization, and the pattern extends beyond our food systems. In the disconnected and over-specialized system of global monoculture, I have seen housing developments built with imported steel, plastic and concrete while the oak trees on-site are razed and turned into woodchips. In contrast, the shortening of distances structurally means more eyes per acre and more innovative use of available resources.

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The Global Green New Deal Can Pave the Way for the Formation of a United Left Front in 2022

• by: C.J. Polychroniou

CJ Polychroniou

Environmental and labor movements need to join forces by embracing the global Green New Deal.

2021 was a year marked by destruction, frustration, and perplexity. The pandemic killed more people in 2021 than in 2020, while also deepening inequality and worsening living conditions for poor people across the world; Trump supporters invaded Capitol Hill; the Taliban returned to power in Afghanistan; democracy continued to backslide across the world; supply chains faltered;  the global refugee crisis continued with unabated force; and countries kept failing the climate crisis challenge.

2021 also offered us a ray of hope. Neofascist attempts by Trump and his allies to overturn the 2020 presidential election failed; billions of people were vaccinated; activists scored some significant victories for conservation and climate; and Latin America’s politics made a decisive turn to the left.

What the new year will bring to the world depends on a myriad of action-outcome contingencies that sometimes are even difficult to imagine, let alone predict. However, what we do know is that transformative change requires collective effort. Only through determined, long-term, energetic efforts can we hope to make the world a better place. And that, as far as the vision of the political left is concerned, requires strategic unity, especially on the climate front.

The left remains deeply divided across the world. True, the left has a long history of failing to keep its ranks together, which is not the case with the rightist and reactionary forces. Yet, this is no time to engage in battles over ideological purity. We need a United Left Front. In the age of neoliberalism and global warming, progressive forces need to mobilize behind a shared vision of democracy, equality, justice, security, and sustainability. Issues of race, class, gender and the environment must be structured around the vision of a society beyond capitalism and with an understanding that socialism is about democratic participation, human dignity, and freedom.

To be sure, the challenges ahead are daunting. We have to deal with massive inequality, authoritarianism, systemic racism, widespread environmental destruction, and climate breakdown. Moreover, there is no magic formula for tackling all of these problems simultaneously. But there are good reasons to believe that an effective strategy for dealing with the climate crisis can also tackle economic inequality, racism, and authoritarianism.

The global Green New Deal is a sweeping plan to shift away from dirty fossil fuels towards clean, renewable energy sources. Its implementation requires international cooperation, yet both the know-how and the financial resources are available to create a green economy which will keep the global temperature rise well below 2 degrees Celsius. But as if saving the planet is not enough, a global Green New Deal will also create more than 24 million green jobs, according to the International Labour Organization.

A study at the renowned Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst found that every $1 million dollars shifted from fossil fuels to green energy results in a net increase of 5 jobs. PERI researchers have also produced specific studies that develop just transition programs, which are absolutely essential for the successful implementation of the green economy project.

A global Green New Deal will not merely expand job training for skilled workers, but will also revitalize the role of trade unions, shrink income inequality and do away with environmental racism since poor air and water quality affect disproportionally racial minorities.

Finally, it is quite conceivable that stronger, fairer economic growth, combined with a just transition, will contain the spread of authoritarianism. People across the world are dissatisfied with the functioning of society and politics in the age of neoliberalism. The social-psychological effects of neoliberalism haven’t yet been widely studied, but they could very well be related to the apparently inexplicable support granted to authoritarian rulers by a large segment of the citizenry across the world.

The climate crisis is the greatest challenge humanity has ever faced. This fact alone should be sufficient to bring about the formation of a United Front Left in the second year of the third decade of this century. Environmental and labor movements need to join forces by embracing the global Green New Deal. Climate activists need to speak to coal miners because both sides are facing a common challenge: survival.

We have just 12 years to limit a climate catastrophe, according to a much publicized United Nations report.

The global Green New Deal is possible. And it can indeed pave the way for the formation of a United Front Left. After all, we have a world to win.

Source: https://www.commondreams.org/

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C.J. Polychroniou  is a political economist/political scientist who has taught and worked in numerous universities and research centers in Europe and the United States. His latest books are The Precipice: Neoliberalism, the Pandemic and the Urgent Need for Social Change (A collection of interviews with Noam Chomsky; Haymarket Books, 2021), and Economics and the Left: Interviews with Progressive Economists (Verso, 2021).