A postcapitalist politics of dwelling : ecological humanities and community economies in conversation

Capitalist industrialization the world over, but predominantly in the global north, has extracted vast quantities of surplus value from working people, and comparably vast quantities of non-renewable resources from nature. ‘Drunk on oil', as Gore Vidal describes the wasteful extravagance of the last century, our economies have depleted the natural environment upon which life depends and damaged the ability of distant others to sustain non-capitalist livelihoods. Those of us who have benefited from increased consumption have been shielded by our geography from the worst effects of the drawdown of our environmental commons—though we have only to open our eyes to see species extinction at our back door. Contemporary eco-economic crises suggest that we can no longer think about economic growth as an infinite human project. The scientific evidence for, and widespread popular acceptance of, global climate change is a daily reminder that the drive for economic growth, fuelled by capitalist profit-making, is not sustainable. Examples of complex interdependence, such as those above, could be multiplied many times over if we cared to turn our minds to the task. Perhaps we don't because of the dismay this exercise produces, or the guilty paralysis it induces. J.K. Gibson-Graham argues that these emotions of resistance stand in the way of reparative action that generates hope and engages new possibilities (Postcapitalist Politics). Plumwood urges us to abandon homo faber and become homo reflectus. We ask here, what might it take to become the different kinds of humans/humanity that are required for ethical living in the anthropocene