Slow Down: The Degrowth Manifesto - The Library of the Uncommons

loppear reviewed Slow Down by Brian Bergstrom

growth will kill us faster, and marx maybe knew it too?

3 stars

Two fascinating books smooshed together, neither what I was expecting, both earnest enough. First, a very readable light explanation that "green growth" and any ecological turn that leaves capitalism in place will be insufficient to avoid extractive exploitation beyond ecological limits we're facing. Second, a niche academic journey through Marx' years after Capital Vol 1 arguing from thin circumstance that he too realized some of the ecological necessities of degrowth rather than unerring progress. If that's what you needed to hear to slow down, well ok!

Bastian Greshake Tzovaras reviewed Slow Down by Brian Bergstrom

On Rebuilding the Commons

5 stars

This was a brilliant read on the folly of "green growth". Saito does an amazing job at collating the evidence for why trying to implement any "green growth" is bound to fail and how capitalism would subsume those efforts. He also does a great job at providing a potential alternative model - degrowth communism - that could help us overcome those barriers.

These efforts center around re-building the commons, both in the local, environmental sense (e.g. land water) but also the communal, local ownership (of infrastructures) and how co-operative ownership of the commons can bring about those changes. A worthy read to think about how we can collectively act at avoiding even worse-case scenarios in the future.

The one thing that somewhat negatively stood out to me: I get that it's not "just" a collection of evidence but a manifesto, but I was nevertheless surprised how little room Ostrom's work …

This was a brilliant read on the folly of "green growth". Saito does an amazing job at collating the evidence for why trying to implement any "green growth" is bound to fail and how capitalism would subsume those efforts. He also does a great job at providing a potential alternative model - degrowth communism - that could help us overcome those barriers.

These efforts center around re-building the commons, both in the local, environmental sense (e.g. land water) but also the communal, local ownership (of infrastructures) and how co-operative ownership of the commons can bring about those changes. A worthy read to think about how we can collectively act at avoiding even worse-case scenarios in the future.

The one thing that somewhat negatively stood out to me: I get that it's not "just" a collection of evidence but a manifesto, but I was nevertheless surprised how little room Ostrom's work on governing the commons got, in light of how central the commons are to his argument.

As an aside: It's hilarious to me that the non-US versions of this book actually comes in a bright red cover with the subtitle "How Degrowth Communism Can Save the Earth" instead of the tamer, green "The Degrowth Manifesto"

secondperson

rated it

Jul 15