innovations for a sustainable economsustainable … for a sustainable economsustainable economyy...

T H E W O R L D W AT C H I N S T I T U T ET H E W O R L D W AT C H I N S T I T U T E

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Innovations for aSustainable EconomyInnovations for aSustainable Economy

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In a small apartment in the sprawling suburbsof Mumbai, the financial capital of India, 35-year-old George Varkey wakes at dawn tothe sound of his newborn baby’s unevenbreathing. Already the apartment is hot andhumid, the air stirred rather than cooled bysmall electric fans. His wife, Binnie, is prepar-ing breakfast. His elderly parents, four-year-old son, and younger brother are all still inbed. George is keen to be ready early. Todaya news team from the BBC in London iscoming to visit.1

George’s apartment has three rooms anda tiny kitchen. The modern apartment blockhas running water and electric power. Thereis a small fridge in the kitchen and a TV inevery other room. The family’s latest acqui-sition is a DVD player. Outside is George’sSuzuki sedan, essential to his small advertis-ing business. He takes home 55,000 rupees(a little under $1,200) a month. Togetherwith his brother’s earnings as a mechanic and

his wife’s part-time nursing, the family livesreasonably well on just over 1 million rupees($24,000) a year, well above the averagehousehold income in India of $3,000 a year.2

George and his family are part of a rapidlygrowing consumer market—India’s “bird ofgold.” In the last two decades, householdincome has roughly doubled. In the nexttwo decades, average incomes are expected totriple. By 2025 India will be the fifth largestconsumer market in the world, surpassingeven Germany in terms of overall spending.On a per capita basis, however, India willstill be poor. Each person will still spend onaverage less than 50,000 rupees, a little over$1,000, a year. Yet in only 20 years the shareof the population classified as “deprived” willbe more than halved—from 54 percent todayto 22 percent by 2025. And this is in spite ofthe fact that by then India will nearly havepassed China to become the most populousnation on Earth.3

C H A P T E R 4

Tim Jackson

The Challenge ofSustainable Lifestyles

Dr. Tim Jackson is Professor of Sustainable Development at the University of Surrey in the UnitedKingdom.

Someone who might benefit from thiseconomic “miracle” is 26-year-old VidyaShedge, another participant in the BBC pro-gram. Vidya lives with 10 members of herfamily in a single room in the considerablypoorer outskirts of Mumbai. There is no run-ning water, no fridge, and no DVD player.But they do now have electricity—enough toburn three incandescent lightbulbs and acouple of fans during the hottest part of theday. Vidya’s ambition is to save enough fromher 7,500 rupees ($160) a month job in abank to afford a car. She, too, is looking for-ward to her visit from the BBC. They wantto talk to her about “carbon footprints.”

Perhaps surprisingly, both George andVidya already know something about climatechange. They understand that human activ-ities are responsible for global warming.George has even discussed what his householdcan do to reduce their carbon emissions.Every room in the apartment has energy-efficient lightbulbs. A little more surprisingly,and in spite of believing that the industrialworld must lead the way, both George andVidya are relatively optimistic that somethingcan be done to halt climate change.

A recent international survey confirmsthese counterintuitive findings. In June 2007the HSBC Bank published a Climate Confi-dence Index. People in India showed thehighest level of concern about climatechange—60 percent of respondents placed itat the top of their list of concerns—the high-est commitment to change (alongside Brazil),and the highest level of optimism that soci-ety will solve this problem. Skepticism andintransigence, it seems, are mainly the domainof industrial nations. The United States andthe United Kingdom scored lowest on com-mitment. France and the United Kingdomscored lowest on optimism. India’s optimismin finding solutions is driven in particular bythe younger age groups. A whole new gen-

eration of Indians see hope in the future.4Justifying that hope will not be easy. For

George’s family, life has clearly improvedsince his parents’ generation. And yet hisstandard of living—measured in conventionalterms—is modest at best. Vidya’s family hasa massive hill to climb. Eleven people livingin one small room with a combined incomeof $16 a day is a level of poverty long con-signed to history in the West. So how is itgoing to be possible for George, Vidya, 1billion other Indians, and great numbers ofChinese (not to mention people in Africa,Latin America, and the rest of Southeast Asia)to achieve the standard of living taken forgranted in the United States—and still “solvethe problem” of climate change?

How can a world of finite resources andfragile environmental constraints possiblysupport the expectations of 9 billion peoplein 2050 to live the lifestyle exemplified for solong by the affluent West? That is the chal-lenge that guides and frames this chapter.5

The Math of SustainabilityBroadly speaking, the impact of human soci-ety on the environment is determined by thenumber of people on the planet and the wayin which they live. The math of the relation-ship between lifestyle and environment ispretty straightforward. It was set out severaldecades ago by Paul Ehrlich of Stanford Uni-versity and has been explored in detail inmany other places since. In essence, the les-son is simple. Reducing the overall impact thatpeople have on the environment can happenin only a limited number of ways: changinglifestyles, improving the efficiency of tech-nology, or reducing the number of people onthe planet.6

The question of population is clearly crit-ical. Population is one of the factors that“scales” humanity’s impact on the planet.

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STATE OF THE WORLD 2008

The Challenge of Sustainable Lifestyles

Another is the expectations andaspirations of the increasing pop-ulation. This chapter focuses pri-marily on the latter. But a simpleexample based on George andVidya’s carbon footprints helpsillustrate the relationship.

In George’s household, thecarbon footprint is around 2.7tons of carbon dioxide (tCO2) perperson. In Vidya’s, it is less thana fifth of this, under 0.5 tCO2 perperson. (The average carbon foot-print in India is 1 tCO2 per per-son.) The difference is mainly dueto the different level and patternof consumption in the two house-holds, since the efficiency of tech-nology providing goods andservices is pretty much the same.Basically, George’s household enjoys a muchhigher standard of living in conventionalterms. If India’s 1 billion people all lived asGeorge does now, that country would havemoved from fifth place in the list of carbonemitters in 2004 to third, below only theUnited States and China. (See Table 4–1.)Their personal carbon footprints would stillbe low by western standards, however.7

The technological efficiency of providinggoods and services is higher in the EuropeanUnion (EU) and the United States than it isin India. All other things being equal, then,this should lower the carbon footprint inindustrial nations. So huge regional dispari-ties in per capita footprint are almost entirelydue to the pattern and level of consump-tion—to differences in lifestyle.

Clearly, western nations have been the keydriver of climate change so far. Between 1950and 2000, the United States was responsiblefor 212 gigatons of carbon dioxide, whereasIndia was responsible for less than 10 percentas much. So it is clear that the richest people

on the planet are appropriating more thantheir fair share of “environmental space.” Yetthis lifestyle is increasingly what the rest of theworld aspires to.8

Much is made of efficiency improvements.And some relative improvements in the car-bon intensity of growth are evident in somecountries. (See Figure 4–1.) But these gainsare slow at best, and in China they have beenreversed in recent years. This is one reasonthat China’s carbon dioxide emissions recentlysurpassed those of the United States. Acrossthe world as a whole, greenhouse gas emis-sions grew by 80 percent between 1970 and2004 and could double again by 2030.9

In summary, any gains in technologicalefficiency are simply being swamped by thesheer scale of rising aspirations and an increas-ing population. If everyone in the world livedthe way Americans do, annual global CO2emissions would be 125 gigatons—almostfive times the current level—by the middle ofthe century. In stark contrast, the Intergov-ernmental Panel on Climate Change has esti-




Country CO2 Emissions or Region Population Emissions per Person

(million) (million tons) (tons of CO2)United States 294 5,815 19.8China 1,303 4,762 3.7Russia 144 1,553 10.8Japan 128 1,271 10.0India 1,080 1,103 1.0Germany 83 839 10.2United Kingdom 60 542 9.1France 62 386 6.2Bangladesh 139 35 0.3European Union(15 countries) 386 3,317 8.6

World 6,352 26,930 4.2

Source: See endnote 7.

Table 4–1. Population and Carbon Dioxide Emissions, Selected Countries, 2004

mated that the world needs to reduce globalemissions by as much as 80 percent over1990 levels by 2050 if “dangerous anthro-pogenic climate change” is to be averted.This would mean getting global emissionsbelow 5 gigatons and reducing the averagecarbon footprint to well under 1 ton per per-son, lower than it now is on average in India.10

This challenge clearly calls for an exami-nation of assumptions about the way peoplelive. What is it that drives and frames people’saspirations for the “good life”? What liesbehind the runaway aspirations that seem sounstoppable in the West and are rapidlybecoming the object of desire in every othernation?

The “Science of Desire” In the conventional economic view, con-sumption is the route to human well-being.The more people have, the better off they aredeemed to be. Increasing consumption leadsto improved well-being, it is claimed.

This view goes a long way toward explain-ing why the pursuit of the gross domestic

product (GDP) hasbecome one of theprincipal policy objec-tives in almost everycountry. Rising GDPsymbolizes a robust andthriving economy,more spending power,richer and fuller lives,increased family secu-rity, greater choice, andmore public spending.The rise of India’s “birdof gold,” its consumerclass, is heralded infinancial markets withhuge delight. China’svigorous economy has

led to an equally striking sense of marketoptimism.11

Economics has remained almost willfullysilent, however, on the question of why peo-ple value particular goods and services at all.The “utilitarian” model has become so widelyaccepted that most modern economic text-books barely even discuss its origins or ques-tion its authenticity. The most that economistscan say about people’s desires is what theyinfer from patterns of expenditure. If thedemand for a particular automobile or house-hold appliance or electronic device is high, itseems clear that consumers, in general, pre-fer that brand over others. Their reasons forthis remain opaque within economics.12

Fortunately, other areas of research—suchas consumer psychology, marketing, and“motivation research”—have developed asomewhat richer body of knowledge. This“science of desire” has mainly been dedi-cated to helping producers, retailers, mar-keters, and advertisers design and sell productsthat consumers will buy. Little of the researchconcerns itself explicitly with the environ-mental or social impacts of consumption.




1990 1992 1994 1996 1998 2000 20042002

kilo

gram

s of

CO

2 pe

r do

llar

GD

P (p

pp)

Source: IEA

Figure 4–1. Carbon Intensity of GDP, 1990–2004

0.0

0.3

0.6

0.9

1.2

1.5

China

India

United States

World

EU15

Indeed, some of it is downright antitheticalto sustainability. But its insights are extremelyvaluable for a proper understanding of con-sumer motivation.13

For a start, it is immediately clear thatconsumption goes way beyond just satisfyingphysical or physiological needs for food, shel-ter, and so on. Material goods are deeplyimplicated in individuals’ psychological andsocial lives. People create and maintain iden-tities using material things. “Identity,” claimconsumer researchers Yiannis Gabriel andTim Lang, “is the Rome to which all theoriesof consumption lead.” People narrate thestory of their lives through stuff. They cementrelationships to others with consumer arte-facts. They use consumption practices toshow their allegiance to certain social groupsand to distinguish themselves from others.14

It may seem strange at first to find that sim-ple stuff can have such power over emotionaland social lives. And yet this ability of humanbeings to imbue raw stuff with symbolicmeaning has been identified by anthropolo-gists in every society for which records exist.Matter matters to people. And not just inmaterial ways. The symbolic role of merestuff is borne out in countless familiar exam-ples: a wedding dress, a child’s first teddybear, a rose-covered cottage by the sea. The“evocative power” of material things facilitatesa range of complex, deeply ingrained “socialconversations” about status, identity, socialcohesion, and the pursuit of personal andcultural meaning.15

Material possessions bring hope in times oftrouble and offer the prospect of a betterworld in the future. In a secular society, con-sumerism even offers some substitute for reli-gious consolation. Recent psychologicalexperiments have shown that when peoplebecome more aware of their own mortality,they strive to enhance their self-esteem andprotect their cultural worldview. In a con-

sumer society, this striving has materialisticoutcomes. It is almost as though people aretrying to hold their existential anxiety at bayby shopping.16

At a recent Consumer Forum organizedfor the Sustainable Consumption Round-table in the United Kingdom, people wereasked to talk about their hopes and fearsfor the next decade or so. They spoke abouttheir desire to do well for their children andgrandchildren. There was a strong wish tolive in safe, sociable communities. Peopleexpressed spontaneous concern about oth-ers, about poverty in the developing world,and—without being told the interests of thesponsors—about the environment: climatechange, resource scarcity, recycling. Shotthrough these expressions of concern, how-ever, like a light relief, were recurrent, per-sistently materialist themes: big houses, fastcars, and holidays in the sun. Getting onand getting away pervades narratives oflifestyle success.17

This deep reliance on material goods forsocial functioning is not unique to the west-ern world. George and Vidya also say theywant to see a good future for their children.They want to do well and be seen to do wellamong their peers. Just below the surface,these aspirations are cashed out in broadlywestern terms. Vidya’s overriding ambition isto afford a car. For the first time in theirlives, George and Binnie are planning a hol-iday outside India. Getting on and gettingaway means as much there as it does in Lon-don, Paris, New York, and Sydney.18

Very similar values and views are clearlydiscernible in China, Latin America, andeven parts of Africa. The consumer societyis now in effect a global society—one inwhich, to be sure, there are still “islands ofprosperity, oceans of poverty,” as Indianecologist Madhav Gadjil puts it. But one inwhich the evocative power of material goods




increasingly creates the social world andprovides the dominant arbiter of personaland societal progress.19

The Paradox of Well-being In the conventional view, the recipe forprogress is simple: the more people consume,the happier they will be. A close look at whatmotivates consumers uncovers a whole rangeof factors—family, friendship, health, peerapproval, community, purpose—known tohave a strong correlation with reported hap-piness. In other words, people really do con-sume in the belief that it will deliver friends,community, purpose, and so on. But there isa paradox at work here that at one level istragic. People have a good grasp of the thingsthat make them happy but a poor grasp of howto achieve these things. The assumption thatmore and more consumption will deliver moreand more well-being turns out to be wrong.20

Using data collected in the World ValuesSurvey, Ronald Inglehart and Hans-DieterKlingemann examined the hypothesis thathappiness (or life satisfaction) is linked toincome growth. The good news is that theequation just about works for George andVidya. There is an increasing trend in lifesatisfaction at lower levels of income. (See Fig-ure 4–2.) The bad news is that the relation-ship will begin to diminish as their incomesrise further. Across most industrial countriesthere is at best only a weak correlationbetween increased income and reported hap-piness. And in countries with average incomesin excess of $15,000, there is virtually nocorrelation between increased income andimproved life satisfaction.21

The same paradox is found within indi-vidual nations over time. Real income perhead has tripled in the United States since1950, but the percentage of people reportingthemselves to be very happy has barely

increased at all—in fact, it has declined sincethe mid-1970s. In Japan, there has been lit-tle change in life satisfaction over severaldecades. In the United Kingdom, the per-centage reporting themselves very happydropped from 52 in 1957 to 36 today.22

Some key aspects of people’s well-being, farfrom improving, appear to have declined inwestern nations. Rates of depression havebeen doubling every decade in North Amer-ica. Fifteen percent of Americans age 35 havealready experienced a major depression. Fortyyears ago, the figure was only 2 percent. Onethird of people in the United States now expe-rience serious mental illness at some point intheir lives, and almost half of these will sufferfrom a severe, disabling depression. During anysingle year, about 6 percent of the populationwill suffer from clinical depression; suicide isnow the third most common cause of deathamong young adults in North America.23

Teasing out the underlying causes of thisunhappiness is not particularly easy. But thereare two fairly compelling sets of data sug-gesting that consumerism itself is partly toblame. The first set suggests a negative cor-relation between materialistic attitudes andsubjective well-being. Philosopher Alain deBoton has shown how an unequal societyleads to high levels of “status anxiety” in itscitizens. Psychologist Tim Kasser and his col-leagues have shown how people with morematerialistic attitudes—people who defineand measure their own worth through moneyand material possessions—report lower levelsof happiness. Striving for self-esteem throughmaterial wealth appears to be a kind of “zero-sum game” in which the constant need forbetterment and approval only serves toentrench people in an almost neurotic spiralof consumption.24

A second, equally compelling set of evi-dence relates rising unhappiness to the under-mining of certain key institutions. Subjective




well-being depends critically on family stabil-ity, friendship, and strength of community. Butthese aspects of life have suffered in the con-sumer society. Family breakdown, for exam-ple, has increased by almost 400 percent in theUnited Kingdom since 1950. The percentageof Americans reporting their marriages as“very happy” declined significantly over just20 years during the latter part of the last cen-tury. People’s trust and sense of communityhave fallen dramatically over the last 50 years.

In the middle of the twentieth century, morethan half of all Americans believed that peo-ple were “moral and honest.” By 2000 theproportion had fallen to little over a quarter.Participation in social and community activi-ties declined markedly over the same period.25

In other words, there appears to be a cor-relation between rising consumption and theerosion of things that make people happy—particularly social relationships. This correla-tion does not necessarily mean, of course,




Mea

n of

Per

cent

Hap

py a

nd P

erce

nt S

atisf

ied

with

Life

as

a W

hole

90

100

30

40

50

60

70

80

Source: : Inglehart and Klingemann

Figure 4–2. Subjective Well-being and Per Capita Income, 2000

GNP per Person (ppp estimates, 1995 dollars)

1000 90005000 13000 17000 21000 25000

BelarusUkraine

Russia

BulgariaArmenia

Lithuania

Georgia

Romania

Estonia

LatviaAzerbaijan

PeruMacedonia

SlovakiaHungaryCroatia

South AfricaSlovenia

Turkey

Poland

Mexico

Dom. Rep.

Argentina

ChileUruguay

Venezuela

TaiwanSouth Korea

Puerto Rico

Spain

NewZealand

IrelandN. Ireland

FinlandSweden

AustraliaBritain Canada

BelgiumNorway

DenmarkSwitzerland

UnitedStatesItaly

FranceJapan

Austria

IcelandNetherlands

CzechRepublic Portugal

IndiaPakistan

NigeriaBangla-desh

GhanaPhilippines Brazil

Colombia

China

Moldova

that one thing “causes” the other. But inpractice, as described later, there are somepretty compelling reasons to take seriously theidea that the structures and institutions thatare needed to maintain growth simultane-ously erode social relationships. As economistRichard Layard describes it: consumptiongrowth has “brought some increase in hap-piness, even in rich countries. But this extrahappiness has been cancelled out by greatermisery coming from less harmonious socialrelationships.”26

One tragic result of this elusive search forhappiness is that industrial societies are clos-ing off options for other people, both nowand in the future, to lead fulfilling lives—without even being able to show reward forit in the here and now.

Live Better by Consuming Less?

The paradox of well-being begs the ques-tion, Why do people continue to consume?Why not earn less, spend less, and have moretime for families and friends? Couldn’t peo-ple live better—and more equitably—thisway and at the same time reduce humanity’simpact on the environment?

This idea has provided the motivation fornumerous initiatives aimed at living moresimply. “Voluntary simplicity” is at one levelan entire philosophy for life. It draws exten-sively on the teachings of Mahatma Gandhi,who encouraged people to “live simply, thatothers might simply live.” In 1936, a studentof Gandhi’s described voluntary simplicityin terms of an “avoidance of exterior clutter”and the “deliberate organisation of life for apurpose.” Former Stanford scientist DuaneElgin picked up this theme of a way of life thatis “outwardly simple, yet inwardly rich” as thebasis for revisioning human progress. Morerecently, psychologist Mihály Csíkszentmi-

hályi has offered a scientific basis for thehypothesis that people’s lives can be more sat-isfying when they are engaged in activities thatare both purposive and materially light.27

Sociologist Amitai Etzioni has identifiedthree kinds of people pursue simplicity.“Downshifters” are those who, having achieveda given level of wealth, make a conscious choiceto reduce their income; they then moderatetheir lifestyle so they can spend more timewith family or pursuing community or personalinterests. “Strong simplifiers” are those whogive up highly paid, high-status jobs altogetherand accept radically simpler lifestyles. The mostradical contingent are the “dedicated, holisticsimplifiers,” who embrace radical change andadjust their entire lives around an ethical visionof simplicity, sometimes motivated by spiritualor religious ideals.28

Some of these initiatives, such as the Find-horn community in northern Scotland,emerged initially as spiritual communities,attempting to create space in which to reclaimthe contemplative dimension of living thatused to be captured by religious institutions.Findhorn’s character as an eco-village devel-oped more recently, building on principles ofjustice and respect for nature. Another mod-ern example is Plum Village, the “mindful-ness” community established by an exiledVietnamese monk, Thich Nhat Hahn, in theDordogne area of France, which now providesa retreat for at least 2,000 people. At onelevel these initiatives are modern equivalentsof more traditional religious communities likethose of the Amish in North America or Bud-dhist monasteries in Thailand, which everyyoung male is expected to spend some time inbefore going out into professional life.29

Not all networks have this explicit spiritualcharacter, however. The Simplicity Forum, forexample, launched in North America in 2001is a loose secular network of “simplicity lead-ers” who are committed to “achieving and




honoring simple, just and sustainable ways oflife.” Downshifting Downunder is an evenmore recent initiative, started following aninternational conference on downshifting inSydney in 2005; its aim is to “catalyze and co-ordinate a downshifting movement in Aus-tralia that will significantly impactsustainability and social capital.”30

The downshifting movement now has asurprising allegiance across a number of indus-trial economies. A recent survey in Australiafound that 23 percent of respondents hadengaged in some form of downshifting inthe preceding five years. A staggering 83 per-cent felt that Australians are too materialistic.An earlier study in the United States foundthat 28 percent of those surveyed had takensome steps to simplify and 62 percentexpressed a willingness to do so. Very similarresults have been found in Europe.31

Research on the success of these initia-tives is quite limited, but existing studiesshow that simplifiers really have less materi-alistic values and show greater respect for theenvironment and for others. More impor-tant, simplifiers appear to show a small but sig-nificant increase in subjective well-being.Consuming less, voluntarily, can improvewell-being—completely contrary to the con-ventional model.32

The backlash against consumerism bearswitness to an emerging counterculture thatrecognizes the limits of the consumer societyand is looking for something beyond it. BuyNothing Day every November—dedicatedto persuading people to resist consumerism—is now an international phenomenon. In2006 there were initiatives on the streets inalmost 30 countries and in scores of cities,including, for the first time, a demonstrationon the streets of Mumbai.33

Equally striking is the rise of the TransitionTowns concept—towns and cities that havedeclared unilateral action against the twin

threats of peak oil and climate change.Launched in September 2006 in the smalltown of Totnes in southwest England, theU.K. network expanded to over 20 townsand cities in only a year. In the United States,400 cities have signed the U.S. Mayors Cli-mate Protection Agreement, which pledges tomeet the Kyoto Protocol targets on reducingCO2 emissions, in spite of the federal gov-ernment’s refusal to ratify the protocol.34

It is important not to get too carried awaywith this evidence. Simple living communitiesremain marginal. The religious basis for themdoes not appeal to everyone, and the secularversions seem less resistant to the incursionsof consumerism. Downshifting Downundergenerated a flurry of activity in Australia for sixmonths or so, for instance, but barely func-tions as a working network only two yearslater. Some of these initiatives depend heav-ily on individuals having sufficient personalassets to provide the economic security neededto pursue a simpler lifestyle. Finally, it is clearthat forced or involuntary simplicity is quiteanother story. Subjective well-being plum-meted in the “transition economies” (formerSoviet states) during the 1990s.35

As the evidence on global consumerismmakes abundantly clear, mainstream con-sumer values show little sign of slowing downthe pace of material and environmental profli-gacy. Existing attempts to live better by con-suming less remain marginal at best. So thequestion remains, Why do people continue toconsume, knowing the social and environ-mental consequences, even beyond the pointat which it adds to their satisfaction?

Competing for Status—and for Survival

Is the urge to consume somehow “natural,”hardwired through evolution? Certainly, thedesire for comfort, a decent home, good




relationships with friends and family, doingwell in the community, and perhaps broad-ening horizons through experience appear tobe very widespread. The emerging field ofevolutionary psychology suggests that humandesires do indeed have their roots in ances-tral origins.36

Genetic succession depends on two criticalfactors: surviving long enough to reach repro-ductive age and finding a mate. So humannature is conditioned by the need to get thematerial, social, and sexual resources requiredfor these tasks. In particular, argues evolu-tionary psychology, people are predisposed to“position” themselves constantly in relation tothe opposite sex and against their sexual com-petitors. As a (male) reviewer of one book onevolutionary psychology noted with someglee: “Animals and plants invented sex to fendoff parasitic infection. Now look where it hasgot us. Men want BMWs, power and moneyin order to pair-bond with women who areblonde, youthful and narrow-waisted.”37

To make matters worse, this fundamen-tal element of sexual competition neverabates. People adapt to any given level of sat-isfaction and continually expand their aspi-rations. This response may be conditioned bythe fact that everyone else is engaged in thesame unending struggle. There is an evolu-tionary advantage in never being satisfied.But the result is that people find themselvescondemned to run faster and faster, like theRed Queen in Lewis Carroll’s novel Throughthe Looking Glass, just to maintain their posi-tion in the race.38

The idea that consumerism may havesomething to do with sex has a clear reso-nance with common wisdom. Advertisersand media executives are extraordinarily cre-ative in using sex and sexual imagery to selltheir products. In a recent study of people’sbehavior in three completely different cul-tures, researchers found that consumer moti-

vations are almost inextricably entwined inthe language and imagery of sexual desire.The fact that material things play a role increating and maintaining desire is centralhere. As a respondent in the study remarked:“No one’s gonna spot you across the otherside of a crowded room and say: ‘Wow! Nicepersonality!’”39

Survival itself is mediated by social status.This is most graphically illustrated by theplight of India’s 170 million Dalits. Literallytranslated, Dalits means “the broken peo-ple,” and life at the bottom of India’s castesystem is tough. Infant mortality and under-nourishment are high; literacy, access to healthcare, and life expectancy are all significantlylower than the national average. Workers inthe stone trade—almost exclusively Dalits—can have a life expectancy as low as 30 years,compared with a national average of 62.40

This effect is by no means confined topoorer countries. Recent evidence has shownhow closely health and well-being are relatedto social status in industrial countries. A fas-cinating example of this was revealed by theU.K. government’s research on life satisfac-tion across different “life domains.” (SeeFigure 4–3.) Poorer people reported lowerlife satisfaction in almost all domains. Onenotable exception was higher satisfactionwith their community. People employed inhigher-status jobs pay a price, it seems, interms of social relationships. Being poormay have some limited advantages in this onearea. On the whole, however, inequalityfavors the rich. Though it might underminesocial relationships, reduce overall well-being, and even corrupt values in patho-logical ways, the evidence suggests that beingbetter off really does pay in terms of indi-vidual well-being.41

The problem for society is threefold. First,at the aggregate level, this intense status com-petition leads to less happy societies. Unequal




societies systematicallyreport higher levels of“distress” than moreequal ones. Second,this mechanism forachieving happinessappears to have no end-point. There is no get-ting off the “hedonictreadmill” of risingincome and increasingconsumption. Third,the environmental andresource implications ofthis unproductive “raceto the top” are quitesimply unsustainable.Taken together withthe vast inequalities—the “oceans of pov-erty”—that still persistacross the world, thesethree problems repre-sent an enormous chal-lenge to consumerism.But they also begin topoint toward theimportance of socialstructure in determining whether or not soci-ety is sustainable.42

The “Iron Cage” of Consumerism

Left to their own devices, it seems, there is notmuch hope that people will spontaneouslybehave sustainably. As evolutionary biologistRichard Dawkins has concluded, sustainabil-ity just “doesn’t come naturally” to human-kind. But it is a mistake to assume thatevolutionary motivations are all selfish. Evo-lution does not preclude moral, social, andaltruistic behaviors. Social behaviors evolved in humans precisely because they offer selec-

tive advantages to the species. An importantlesson from evolutionary psychology is that thebalance between selfish and cooperative behav-iors depends critically on the kind of societythey occur in.43

Social behavior can exist—to someextent—in all societies. In very competitivesocieties, self-serving behavior tends to bemore successful than cooperation. But in asociety characterized by cooperation, altruis-tic behaviors tend to be favored over selfishones. In other words, the balance betweenaltruism and selfishness is not hardwired inpeople at all. It depends critically on socialconditions: rules, regulations, cultural normsand expectations, government itself, and the




Source: Defra

Figure 4–3. Domain Satisfaction by Social Group, England

Relationships

Accommodation

Standardof living

Local area

Day-to-dayactivities

Health

Leisure

Control

Achievementof goals

Future financialsecurity

Community

-15 -10 -5 0 5 10

Key (examples of occupations in each social group)

AB: doctor, lawyer, accountant, teacher, nurse, police officerC: junior manager, student, clerical worker, foreperson, plumberD: manual worker, shop worker, apprenticeE: casual laborer, unemployed

Percentage difference from overall average

ABCDE

set of institutions that frame and constrain thesocial world.44

So there are some searching questions toask about the balance of the institutions thatcharacterize modern society. Do they pro-mote competition or cooperation? Do theyreward self-serving behavior or people whosacrifice their own gain to serve others? Whatsignals do government, schools, the media,and religious and community institutionssend out to people? Which behaviors are sup-ported by public investment and infrastruc-ture and which are discouraged?

Increasingly, it seems, the institutions ofconsumer society encourage individualismand competition and discourage social behav-ior. Examples are legion: private transport isencouraged through incentives over publictransport; motorists are given priority overpedestrians; energy supply is subsidized andprotected, while demand management isoften chaotic and expensive; waste disposal ischeap, economically and behaviorally, whilerecycling demands time and effort. Thesekinds of asymmetry represent an “infrastruc-ture of consumption” that sends all the wrongsignals, penalizing pro-environmental behav-ior, making it all but impossible even forhighly motivated people to act sustainablywithout personal sacrifice.45

Equally important are the subtle but dam-aging signals sent by government, regula-tory frameworks, financial institutions, themedia, and education systems. Salaries inbusiness are higher than those in the publicsector, particularly at the top; nurses andthose in the caring professions are consis-

tently poorly paid; private investment capitalis written down at high discount rates, mak-ing long-term costs invisible; success iscounted in terms of material status; childrenare becoming a “shopping generation”—hooked on brand, celebrity, and status.46

At one level, the task facing sustainabilityis as old as the hills: balancing individual free-doms against the social good. This relies cru-cially on being able to make prudent choices,at the individual and the social level, betweenthe present and the future. Rampant indi-vidualistic behavior that seeks short-termgratification ends up undermining well-beingnot just for the individual but for society asa whole. So the task for sustainability—indeed, for any society—is to devise mecha-nisms that prevent this “undermining ofwell-being” and preserve the balance betweenpresent desires and future needs.

Oxford economic historian Avner Offeraddresses exactly this task in The Challenge ofAffluence. Unaided, argues Offer, individualchoices tend to be irredeemably myopic. Peo-ple favor today too much over tomorrow, inways that—to an economist—are entirelyinexplicable under any rational rate of dis-counting of the future. Offer’s unique con-tribution is to suggest that this fallibility has(or in the past had) a social solution. And thatsolution is precisely what affluence is in theprocess of eroding.47

To avoid trading away long-term well-being for the sake of momentary pleasures,society has evolved a whole set of “commit-ment devices”: social and institutional “mech-anisms” that constrain people’s choices inways that moderate the balance of choiceaway from the present and in favor of thefuture. Savings accounts, marriage, normsfor social behavior, government itself in somesense—all these can be regarded as examplesof mechanisms that make it a little easier forpeople to curtail their evolutionary appetites




Increasingly, it seems, the institutionsof consumer society encourageindividualism and competition anddiscourage social behavior.

for immediate arousal and protect their ownfuture interests. And, indeed, the interestsof affected others.

The “challenge” Offer addresses is thataffluence is eroding and undermining thesecommitment devices. The increase in familybreakdown and the decline in trust havealready been noted. Parenthood has beenplaced under increased financial and socialpressure in industrial countries. And in termsof economic commitment, it is telling thatsavings rates fell worldwide in the secondhalf of the last century, declining by 5–10 per-centage points across the United States andEurope. Meanwhile, consumer debt hassoared, rising from $1 trillion to $2.5 trillionin the United States alone between 1995 and2007. The role of government itself has beenincreasingly “hollowed out” as politicians onboth left and right sought to bolster eco-nomic output and free up the “invisible hand”of the market.48

The drivers behind these trends are com-plex, but a key responsibility, argues Offer,lies with the relentless stream of noveltyinherent in consumption growth. Evidenceseems to bear this out. “Accelerating therate of innovation is a top priority for tech-nology managers,” notes the U.S.-basedIndustrial Research Institute. The rate ofinnovation is driven in turn by the structuralreliance of businesses and the economy ongrowing consumption. Novelty keeps peo-ple buying more stuff. Buying more stuffkeeps the economy going. The continuingexpansion of the market into new areas andthe continuing allegiance of consumersappear to be vital to this process—even asthey erode commitment devices and under-mine well-being.49

The end result is a society “locked in” toconsumption growth by forces outside thecontrol of individuals. Lured by humanity’sevolutionary roots, bombarded with per-

suasion, and seduced by novelty: consumersare like children in a candy store, knowingthat sugar is bad to eat, but unable to resistthe temptation. This is a system in whichno one is free. People are trapped by theirown desires. Companies are driven by theneed to create value for shareholders, tomaximize profits. Nature and structure com-bine to lock people firmly into the “ironcage” of consumerism.50

Living Well—and Within Limits

Put simply, sustainability is about living well,within certain limits. For this to happen,across a global population approaching 7billion and expected to reach 9 billion by2050, people’s patterns of consumption haveto change.51

Achieving this is a colossal task. But it is notan impossible one. A proper understanding ofthe relationship between individual desiresand the social good is vital here. As noted ear-lier, consuming comes naturally tohumankind. Restraint does not. Changerequires a supportive social environment.People are torn constantly between self-enhancement and self-transcendence. Thereis little individuals can do to shift their under-lying nature. But the balance between self-serving and social behaviors is malleable at thesocial level. In one social context, selfishnesswill imprison us, impoverish people’s lives,and may ultimately destroy the living envi-ronment. In another, the common good willprevails and people’s lives will be richer, moresatisfying, and more fulfilling.

There is clear evidence of an appetite forchange. During an 18-month project, theSustainable Consumption Roundtable in theUnited Kingdom identified a strong desire forcollective action. I Will If You Will—the titleof the Roundtable report—was a common




theme emerging from a range of socialresearch. This effect is not confined to theUnited Kingdom. The evidence on down-shifting and simplicity, reactions against con-sumerism, the high levels of commitment tochange (even in developing countries) foundin the HSBC survey, a rising interest in alter-natives to consumerism: all these are real,demonstrable effects. But good intentionsare not enough, and they will continue to beundermined unless physical infrastructure,institutions, and social structures change.52

Who is capable of influencing these widerstructures? Ultimately, of course, all sectionsof society must take responsibility for change.Government, business, and consumers allhave some role to play; the media, commu-nity groups, religious institutions, and tradi-tional wisdom are all essential influences onthe social environment. But without strongleadership from government, change will beimpossible. Individuals are too exposed tosocial signals and status competition. Busi-nesses operate in competitive markets. A tran-sition from self-interest to social behaviorsrequires changes in underlying structures—changes that strengthen commitment andencourage social behavior. Government isthe principal agent in protecting the socialgood. A new vision of governance thatembraces this role is critical.

Two or three key tasks are vital here. Inthe first place, policies need to support aninfrastructure of sustainability: access to reli-able public transport, recycling facilities,energy efficiency services, maintenance andrepair, re-engineering and reuse. Systematicbiases against these facilities have to be dis-mantled and policies to encourage thembrought into place.53

The second key task lies in establishingfiscal and institutional frameworks that sendconsistent signals to businesses and consumersabout sustainable consumption. A core exam-

ple of this is the role of a “social cost of car-bon” in providing incentives for investmentsin low-carbon technologies and behaviors.The Stern Review on the economics of cli-mate change suggests that this cost mightbe as high as $85 per ton of CO2. There is nodoubt that internalizing this cost in marketprices and investment decisions would havea major influence on reducing carbon emis-sions. The review also cast doubt on prevail-ing discounting practices, suggesting thatzero or even negative discount rates might beappropriate when looking at projects withlong-term impacts on the environment.54

But the role of government is not confinedto fiscal frameworks. The way energy indus-tries are regulated, for instance, has a pro-found effect on the incentives for demandmanagement and energy service companies.Product policy can have a significant influenceon access to durable, efficient products thatminimize environmental harm. Recent EUlegislation, for example, has already led to pro-gressive improvements in the efficiency ofenergy-consuming appliances. Australiapledged early in 2007 to outlaw incandescentlightbulbs before 2010. The 27 EU nationshave now followed that example. Surveyingevidence of policy successes, the SustainableConsumption Roundtable found that pro-gressive standards, clearly signaled to manu-facturers in advance, are a particularly effectiveinstrument for moving toward more-sus-tainable consumption.55

The influence of government on socialnorms and expectations is, at first sight, lessobvious. Policymakers are uncomfortablewith the idea that they have a role in influ-encing people’s values. But the truth is thatgovernments intervene constantly in the socialcontext. Myriad different signals are sent out,for example, by the way education is struc-tured, by the importance accorded to eco-nomic indicators, by guidelines for public




sector performance, by public procurementpolicies, by the impact of planning guide-lines on public and social spaces, by the influ-ence of wage policy on the work-life balance,by the impact of employment policy on eco-nomic mobility (and hence on family struc-ture and stability), by the effect of tradingstandards on consumer behavior, by thedegree of regulation of advertising and themedia, and by the support offered to com-munity initiatives and faith groups. In allthese arenas, policy shapes and helps create thesocial world.

As this chapter suggests, the drift of theseinfluences over the last few decades has beenaway from encouraging commitment and infavor of encouraging consumption. But thereare some striking counterexamples: placeswhere strenuous efforts have been made torein in consumerism and focus more specifi-cally on well-being. Several nations, includ-ing the United Kingdom, Canada, and China,have begun to develop “well-beingaccounts”—new ways of measuring nationalprogress alongside or in place of the GDP.(See Chapter 2.) In late 2007, the Organisa-tion for Economic Co-operation and Devel-opment, the European Commission, andseveral nongovernmental groups cohosted amajor international conference, “BeyondGDP,” designed to look at more effectivemeasures of social progress.56

A crucial arena for action lies in advertis-ing, particularly ads directed at children.Global advertising expenditures now amountto $605 billion (with the United States aloneaccounting for $292 billion). The figure isgrowing at the rate of 5–6 percent a year,with online advertising growing faster thanany other sector, at between 30 percent and40 percent a year. The impact of this, par-ticularly on children, is pernicious. Market-ing pressure has been linked explicitly torising childhood obesity.57

At an international conference in 2006,the World Health Organization stopped shortof banning advertising to children, but Scan-dinavian nations have taken a more proactivestance. In Sweden, TV advertising to chil-dren under 12 is banned. Norway, too, hasrestrictions on children’s advertising, and theConsumer Ombudsman has an educationalrole in Norwegian schools. Recent advertis-ing guidelines in Norway include a ban onadvertising cars as “green,” “clean,” or “envi-ronmentally friendly.” Although a Norwe-gian plan to develop anti-consumption advertsfailed to attract funding in the United Nations,the nongovernmental group Adbusters, basedin Vancouver, Canada, remains a focus ofresistance to commercial advertising. Perhapsmost striking of all, São Paulo, Brazil, thefourth largest city in the world, has recentlybecome the first city outside socialisteconomies to ban outdoor advertising.58

Religious leadership has declined sub-stantially in industrial countries. But tradi-tional wisdom is still an important influenceon the debate about living well. In less sec-ular societies, religion plays a number ofroles. It warns against material excess; it pro-vides a social and spiritual context for self-transcendence, altruism, and other-regardingbehavior; and it offers a space for contem-plation in which to make sense of people’slives in deeper and more meaningful waysthan those provided by the fleeting consola-tions of consumerism.

One thing is clear: if a part of the functionof consumerism is to deliver hope—as indi-cated earlier—then countering consumerismmeans building new avenues of hope thatare less reliant on material goods. In countries




Australia pledged early in 2007 to outlawincandescent lightbulbs before 2010.

where religious institutions are still strong, thistask is much easier. In Southeast Asia, forexample, in response to the economic crisis ofthe mid-1990s, the King of Thailand revivedthe traditional concept of the SufficiencyEconomy, built on Buddhist principles, andprovided a much-needed frame of referenceto help countless microenterprises in ruralvillages survive the economic shocks of therecession and build a sustainable future inits aftermath. In the mountain Kingdom ofBhutan, progress is being reconceived in partas a spiritual endeavor. In many Islamicnations, the framework for moral restraint isalready in place. From a western perspective,this framework is often seen as oppressive ofindividual freedoms, particularly for women.But Islam—and other religious traditions—are important sources of understanding thelimits of relying on human nature to protectthe public good.59

In the final analysis, the consumer societyoffers neither a durable sense of meaning inpeople’s lives nor any consolation for losses.The erosion of religious participation in theWest offers one more example of crumblingcommitment devices. The examples in thischapter bear testament to the desire forchange and the visionary courage of individ-uals, communities, and a handful of politicalleaders prepared to initiate that change. Mil-lions of people have already discovered thattreading more lightly allows them to breathemore easily. And it offers a new creative spacefor social change—a place where family,friendship, community, and a renewed senseof meaning and purpose are possible.

A sustainable world is not an impover-ished world but one that is prosperous indifferent ways. The challenge for the twenty-first century is to create that world.




ject, at www.naturaledgeproject.net, 30 October2006.

47. General Electric, at www.ge.com/ecomagi-nation; Gunther, op. cit. note 1.

48. Kevin Voigt, “Business Sees Green in GoingGreen,” CNN Report, 21 December 2006.

49. David Reilly, “Profit as We Know It Could BeLost With New Accounting Statements,” WallStreet Journal, 12 May 2007.

50. John Elkinton, Cannibals With Forks: TheTriple Bottom Line of 21st Century Business(Oxford: Capstone Publishing Ltd., 1997).

51. Margo Alderton, “Green Is Gold, Accordingto Goldman Sachs Study,” The CRO (CorporateResponsibility Officer), at www.thecro.com, 11July 2007.

Chapter 4.The Challenge of Sustainable Lifestyles

1. “Ethical Man,” BBC Newsnight, 22 May2007.

2. Data on income, household structure andsize, and energy consumption supplied by BBCteam.

3. Historical data and forecasts from J. Ablettet al., The “Bird of Gold”: The Rise of India’s Con-sumer Market (London: McKinsey Global Insti-tute, 2007); population projections from U.S.Bureau of the Census, International Data Base,Suitland, MD, updated 16 July 2007.

4. HSBC Holdings plc, HSBC Climate Confi-dence Index 2007 (London: 2007).

5. U.N. Population Division, World Popula-tion Prospects: The 2004 Revision (New York: 2006).

6. See Gary Gardner, Erik Assadourian, andRadhika Sarin, “The State of ConsumptionToday,” in Worldwatch Institute, State of the World

2004 (New York: W. W. Norton & Company,2004).

7. Carbon footprints based on data suppliedby the BBC Newsnight team and only includethe carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from theburning of fossil fuels; they include the directhousehold emissions from electricity, cooking,and transport and an estimate of indirect emissionsbased on the household income. Table 4–1 basedon data in International Energy Agency (IEA)CO2 Emissions from Fuel Combustion 1971–2004(Paris: Organisation for Economic Co-operationand Development (OECD), 2006).

8. Cumulative CO2 emissions in different coun-tries from World Resources Institute, EarthTrends:Environmental Information, online database,Washington, DC, 2007.

9. Figure 4–1 from IEA, op. cit. note 7; Nether-lands Environmental Assessment Agency, “ChinaNow No. 1 in CO2 Emissions: USA in SecondPosition,” Climate Change Dossier, 19 June 2007;“Summary for Policymakers,” in Intergovern-mental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), ClimateChange 2007: Mitigation of Climate Change (NewYork: Cambridge University Press, 2007).

10. IPCC, Climate Change 2001: Third Assess-ment Report (New York: Cambridge UniversityPress, 2001).

11. D. Farrell et al., From ‘Made in China’ to‘Sold in China’: The Rise of the Chinese UrbanConsumer (London: McKinsey Global Institute,2006).

12. For examples of utilitarian model, see AndreuMas-Colell, Michael D. Whinston, and Jerry R.Green, Microeconomic Theory (Oxford: OxfordUniversity Press, 1995), and David Fischer, Stan-ley Dornbusch, and Rudiger Begg, Economics,7th ed. (Maidenhead, U.K.: McGraw-Hill, 2003);for the theory of “revealed preference,” see PaulSamuelson, “A Note on the Pure Theory of Con-sumers’ Behaviour,” Economica, February 1938,pp. 61–71.

13. “Science of desire” from Ernest Dichter, A



Notes

Handbook of Consumer Motivations (New York:McGraw Hill, 1964).

14. For the social role of goods, see Mary Dou-glas and Baron Isherwood, The World of Goods(New York: Basic Books, 1996); quote from Yian-nis Gabriel and Tim Lang, The UnmanageableConsumer (London: Sage Publications Ltd., 2006),p. 81.

15. For symbolic role of consumer goods, seeHelga Dittmar, The Social Psychology of MaterialPossessions—To Have Is to Be (New York: St Mar-tin’s Press, 1992); for “evocative power,” seeGrant McCracken, Culture and Consumption(Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana Univer-sity Press, 1990); Mihály Csíkszentmihályi andEugene Rochberg-Halton, The Meaning ofThings—Domestic Symbols and the Self (New York:Cambridge University Press, 1981).

16. On self-esteem striving, see Jamie Arndt et al.,“The Urge to Splurge: A Terror ManagementAccount of Materialism and Consumer Behav-ior,” Journal of Consumer Psychology, vol. 14, no.3 (2004), pp. 198–212.

17. Opinion Leader Research, 2006 ShiftingOpinions and Changing Behaviour, Commissionedby Sustainable Consumption Roundtable (Lon-don: 2006).

18. “Ethical Man,” op. cit. note 1.

19. “Islands of prosperity” from Madhav Gadjiland Ramachandra Guha, Ecology and Equity—The Use and Abuse of Nature in ContemporaryIndia (New York: Routledge, 1995), p. 34.

20. On the correlates of subjective well-being(or reported life-satisfaction), see, for example,John F. Helliwell, “How’s Life? Combining Indi-vidual and National Variables to Explain Subjec-tive Wellbeing,” Economic Modelling, March 2003,pp. 331–60.

21. Figure 4– 2 from Ronald Inglehart and Hans-Dieter Klingemann, “Genes, Culture, Democ-racy, and Happiness,” in Ed Diener and EunkookSuh, Culture and Subjective Well-being (Cam-

bridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2000). Income fig-ures are World Bank purchasing power parity esti-mates in 1995 dollars.

22. Ruut Veenhoven, World Database of Happi-ness, Erasmus University, Rotterdam, Netherlands.

23. Richard Layard, Happiness—Lessons from aNew Science (London: Penguin, 2005); The WHOWorld Mental Health Survey Consortium, “Preva-lence, Severity and Unmet Need for Treatment ofMental Disorders in the World Health Organiza-tion World Mental Health Surveys,” Journal of theAmerican Medical Association, 2 June 2004, pp.2581–89.

24. Alain de Boton, Status Anxiety (London:Penguin Books, 2005); Tim Kasser, The HighPrice of Materialism (Cambridge, Mass: The MITPress, 2002); Tim Jackson, Wander Jager, andSigrid Stagl, “Beyond Insatiability—Needs Theoryand Sustainable Consumption,” in Lucia A. Reischand Inge Røpke, eds., The Ecological Economics ofConsumption (Cheltenham, U.K.: Edward ElgarPublishing, 2004).

25. Data on “moral lives” and happiness fromLayard, op. cit. note 23, pp. 29, 81; see alsoRobert D. Putnam, Bowling Alone (New York:Simon and Schuster, 2000); family breakdowndata from Population Trends (London, Office forNational Statistics, various years), cited in TimJackson, Chasing Progress? Beyond Measuring Eco-nomic Growth (London: New Economics Foun-dation, 2004), p. 3.

26. Layard, op. cit. note 23, p. 34.

27. Richard Gregg (Gandhi’s student) originallypublished his paper on voluntary simplicity in theIndian Journal Visva Bharati Quarterly; DuaneElgin, Voluntary Simplicity (New York: WilliamMorrow, reprinted 1993); Mihály Csíkszentmi-hályi, “The Costs and Benefits of Consuming,”Journal of Consumer Research, September 2000,pp. 262–72.

28. Amitai Etzioni, “Voluntary Simplicity: Char-acterisation, Select Psychological Implications andSocietal Consequences,” Journal of Economic Psy-



Notes

chology, October 1998, pp. 619–43.

29. Findhorn Foundation, Annual Report2005/6 (Forres, Scotland: 2006); Plum Village, atwww.plumvillage.org/.

30. Simplicity Forum, at www.simplicityforum.org/index.html; Downshifting Downunder, atdownshifting.naturalinnovation.org/index.html.

31. Clive Hamilton and Elizabeth Mail, Down-shifting in Australia: A Sea-change in the Pursuitof Happiness, Discussion Paper No. 50 (Canberra:The Australia Institute, January 2003); U.S. datafrom Merck Family Fund, Yearning for Balance:Views of Americans on Consumption, Material-ism, and the Environment (Takoma Park, MD:1995).

32. Kasser, op. cit. note 24; Kirk Warren Brownand Tim Kasser, “Are Psychological and Ecolog-ical Well-being Compatible? The Role of Values,Mindfulness, and Lifestyle,” Social IndicatorsResearch, November 2005, pp. 349–68.

33. Buy Nothing Day, at adbusters.org/metas/eco/bnd/index.php.

34. Transition Towns, at transitiontowns.org;“U.S. Mayors Climate Protection Agreement,”endorsed by the U.S. Conference of Mayors Meet-ing, Chicago, June 2005.

35. Limits of voluntary simplicity from Etzioni,op. cit. note 28, and from Seonaidh McDonald etal., 2006, “Toward Sustainable Consumption:Researching Voluntary Simplifiers,” Psychologyand Marketing, June 2006, pp. 515–35; invol-untary downshifting from Inglehart and Klinge-man, op. cit. note 21.

36. Robert Wright, The Moral Animal—WhyWe Are the Way We Are: The New Science of Evo-lutionary Psychology (London: Abacus, 1994).

37. The quotation is from a review of Matt Rid-ley, The Red Queen: Sex and the Evolution ofHuman Nature (London: Penguin Books, 1994),cited on book cover.

38. Ridley, op. cit. note 37; Leigh van Valen,“A New Evolutionary Law,” Evolutionary The-ory, vol. 1 (1973), pp. 1–30.

39. Russell W. Belk, Güliz Ger, and SørenAskegaard, “The Fire of Desire: A MultisitedInquiry into Consumer Passion,” Journal of Con-sumer Research 30, December 2003, pp. 325–51.

40. S. Venkatesan, “Pathology of Power: Casteand Capabilities,” OneWorld South Asia, 24 Octo-ber 2006; life expectancy in India from RegistrarGeneral of India, “SRS Based Abridged LifeTables,” SRS Analytical Studies, Report No. 3(New Delhi: 2003).

41. Richard G. Wilkinson, The Impact of Inequal-ity: How to Make Sick Societies Healthier (Lon-don: Routledge, 2005). Figure 4–3 from Office forNational Statistics, Sustainable Development Indi-cators in Your Pocket 2007 (London: Departmentfor Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra),2007).

42. Distress in unequal societies from OliverJames, Affluenza (London: Vermillion, 2007),Appendix 1 and 2.

43. See, for example, W. Hamilton, “The Evo-lution of Altruistic Behavior,” American Natu-ralist, vol. 97 (1963), pp. 354–56; a moreaccessible description can be found in Wright, op.cit. note 36; quote from Richard Dawkins, “Sus-tainability Does Not Come Naturally: A Darwin-ian Perspective on Values,” The Values Platform forSustainability Inaugural Lecture at the Royal Insti-tution, 14 November 2001 (Fishguard, U.K.: TheEnvironment Foundation).

44. Robert M. Axelrod, The Evolution of Coop-eration (New York: Basic Books, 1984).

45. For infrastructure of consumption, seeOECD, Towards Sustainable Consumption: AnEconomic Conceptual Framework (Paris: 2002),p. 41.

46. Wage disparities from Stephen Bradley, InGreed We Trust: Capitalism Gone Astray (Victoria,BC: Trafford Publishing, 2006); discounted long-



Notes

term costs from Nicholas Stern, The Economics ofClimate Change: The Stern Review (Cambridge:Cambridge University Press, 2007); materials sig-naling status from Juliet B. Schor, The OverspentAmerican (New York: Basic Books, 1998);National Consumer Council, Shopping Genera-tion (London: 2006).

47. Avner Offer, The Challenge of Affluence(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006).

48. Parenthood from ibid., Chapter 14; savingsrates from Norman Loayza et al., Saving in theWorld: The Stylized Facts (Washington DC: WorldBank, 1998); consumer debt from Ben Woolsey,“Credit Card Industry Facts and Personal DebtStatistics (2006–2007),” at Creditcards.com, andfrom William Branigin, “Consumer Debt Growsat Alarming Pace, at msnbc.msn.com, 12 January2004.

49. Quote from Rio Rivas and David H. Gobeli,“Accelerating the Rate of Innovation at HewlettPackard,” Industrial Research Institute, undated.

50. “Iron cage” was first applied to capitalism byMax Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit ofCapitalism, tr. Talcott Parsons (New York: CharlesScribner’s Sons, 1958); application to consumerismin George Ritzer, The McDonaldization of Society(New York: Pine Forge Press, 2004).

51. U.N. Population Division, op. cit. note 5.

52. Sustainable Consumption Roundtable, I WillIf You Will: Towards Sustainable Consumption(London: Sustainable Development Commission,2006).

53. Role of policy from ibid.; Tim Jackson,“Challenges for Sustainable Consumption Pol-icy,” in Tim Jackson, Earthscan Reader in Sus-tainable Consumption (London: Earthscan/Jamesand James, 2006); sustainable consumption pol-icy from Defra, Securing the Future: ImplementingUK Sustainable Development Strategy (London:Her Majesty’s Stationery Office, 2005), Chapters2 and 3.

54. Stern, op. cit. note 46.

55. Darren Murph, “Australia to Phase OutIncandescent Bulbs by 2010,” Engadget.com, 20February 2007; Conrad Quilty-Harper, “All ofEU to Switch Off Energy Inefficient Lights WithinThree Years,” Engadget.com, 10 March 2007;Sustainable Development Commission, LookingBack, Looking Forward (London: 2006).

56. Defra, “Wellbeing and Sustainable Develop-ment,” at www.sustainable-development.gov.uk ,updated 6 June 2007; Canada from Andrew C.Revkin, “A New Measure of Wellbeing from aHappy Little Kingdom,” New York Times, 4 Octo-ber 2005; State Environmental Protection Agency,China Green National Accounting Study Report2004 (Beijing: 2006).

57. “Global Ad Spending Expected to Grow6%,” Brandweek, 6 December 2005; “InternetAdvertising Nears £1 Billion for First Six Monthsof 2006,” Internet Advertising Bureau, 4 October2006.

58. Proceedings and publications from the WHOconference available at www.euro.who.int/obesity/conference2006; Ministry of Children andEquality, “The Norwegian Action Plan to ReduceCommercial Pressure on Children and YoungPeople,” at www.regjeringen.no/en; ban on adver-tising green cars reported in Edmonton Journal, 7September 2007; David Evan Harris, “São Paulo:A City Without Ads,” Adbusters, September-Octo-ber 2007.

59. Local Development Institute, A Model ofLocal Economy in 200 Districts Based on Suffi-ciency Economy: An Action Research Project(Bangkok, Office of Village Fund National Com-mittee, 2002–03); Yuwanan Santitaweeroek,“Thailand’s Silk Microenterprises and the Suffi-ciency Economy,” PhD Dissertation (Guildford,U.K.: University of Surrey, forthcoming); Bhutanfrom Revkin, op. cit. note 56.

Chapter 5. Meat and Seafood:The Global Diet’s Most Costly Ingredients

1. Meat and seafood production, Figure 5–1,and Table 5–1 from U.N. Food and Agriculture



Notes

innovations for a sustainable economsustainable … for a sustainable economsustainable economyy...

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