Slow Down - The Library of the Uncommons

Published Jan. 9, 2024 by Astra House.

ISBN:: 978-1-6626-0236-8

(2 reviews)

Why, in our affluent society, do so many people live in poverty, without access to health care, working multiple jobs and are nevertheless unable to make ends meet, with no future prospects, while the planet is burning?

In his international bestseller, Kohei Saito argues that while unfettered capitalism is often blamed for inequality and climate change, subsequent calls for “sustainable growth” and a “Green New Deal” are a dangerous compromise. Capitalism creates artificial scarcity by pursuing profit based on the value of products rather than their usefulness and by putting perpetual growth above all else. It is therefore impossible to reverse climate change in a capitalist society—more: the system that caused the problem in the first place cannot be an integral part of the solution.

Instead, Saito advocates for degrowth and deceleration, which he conceives as the slowing of economic activity through the democratic reform of labor and production. In …

Why, in our affluent society, do so many people live in poverty, without access to health care, working multiple jobs and are nevertheless unable to make ends meet, with no future prospects, while the planet is burning?

In his international bestseller, Kohei Saito argues that while unfettered capitalism is often blamed for inequality and climate change, subsequent calls for “sustainable growth” and a “Green New Deal” are a dangerous compromise. Capitalism creates artificial scarcity by pursuing profit based on the value of products rather than their usefulness and by putting perpetual growth above all else. It is therefore impossible to reverse climate change in a capitalist society—more: the system that caused the problem in the first place cannot be an integral part of the solution.

Instead, Saito advocates for degrowth and deceleration, which he conceives as the slowing of economic activity through the democratic reform of labor and production. In practical terms, he argues for:

the end of mass production and mass consumption
decarbonization through shorter working hours
the prioritization of essential labor over corporate profits

By returning to a system of social ownership, he argues, we can restore abundance and focus on those activities that are essential for human life, effectively reversing climate change and saving the planet.

1 edition

LordBowlich reviewed Slow Down by Kōhei Saitō

Really Disappointing Read

2 stars

The author is in dire need of a literary review.

Slow Down has an extraordinarily myopic view of theory that doesn't appear to have incorporated anything (maybe a little Graeber) that has been written outside of Marx in the last 150 years. The author attempts to reproduce anarchism from first principles relying on some unpublished musing by Marx near the end of his life rather than just reading the writers who've already addressed these ideas, at length, and much better. But that would require them to stick their head outside of the sphere of academic Marxism.

If you dumped all of Chapter 4 (Marx and the Anthropocene) and struck everything that mentions Marx from the text... you might have a descent essay outlining some of the broader ideas in the area Degrowth. But still nothing that a reading of Wikipedia wouldn't have gotten you.

I guess if you have any …

The author is in dire need of a literary review.

Slow Down has an extraordinarily myopic view of theory that doesn't appear to have incorporated anything (maybe a little Graeber) that has been written outside of Marx in the last 150 years. The author attempts to reproduce anarchism from first principles relying on some unpublished musing by Marx near the end of his life rather than just reading the writers who've already addressed these ideas, at length, and much better. But that would require them to stick their head outside of the sphere of academic Marxism.

If you dumped all of Chapter 4 (Marx and the Anthropocene) and struck everything that mentions Marx from the text... you might have a descent essay outlining some of the broader ideas in the area Degrowth. But still nothing that a reading of Wikipedia wouldn't have gotten you.

I guess if you have any ML friends who insist on some kind of Marxist orthodoxy for their praxis -- you can give them this book.

imagineutopia@wyrms.de

rated it

Mar 14