Post-Growth Living - Rambling Readers

240 pages

English language

Published April 8, 2020 by Verso Books.

ISBN:: 978-1-78873-887-3

(1 review)

An urgent and passionate plea for a new and ecologically sustainable vision of the good life

The reality of runaway climate change is inextricably linked with the mass consumerist, capitalist society in which we live. And the cult of endless growth, and endless consumption of cheap disposable commodities, isn’t only destroying the world, it is damaging us and our way of being. How do we stop the impending catastrophe, and how can we create a movement capable of confronting it head-on?

In Alternative Prosperity, philosopher Kate Soper offers an urgent plea for a new vision of the good life, one that is capable of delinking prosperity from endless growth. Instead, Soper calls for renewed emphasis on the joys of being that are currently being denied, and shows the way to creating a future that allows not only for more free time, and less conventional and more creative ways of using …

An urgent and passionate plea for a new and ecologically sustainable vision of the good life

The reality of runaway climate change is inextricably linked with the mass consumerist, capitalist society in which we live. And the cult of endless growth, and endless consumption of cheap disposable commodities, isn’t only destroying the world, it is damaging us and our way of being. How do we stop the impending catastrophe, and how can we create a movement capable of confronting it head-on?

In Alternative Prosperity, philosopher Kate Soper offers an urgent plea for a new vision of the good life, one that is capable of delinking prosperity from endless growth. Instead, Soper calls for renewed emphasis on the joys of being that are currently being denied, and shows the way to creating a future that allows not only for more free time, and less conventional and more creative ways of using it, but also for fairer and more fulfilling ways of working and existing. This is an urgent and necessary intervention into debates on climate change.

4 editions

Kantolope reviewed Post-Growth Living by Kate Soper

Terminal Capitalist Realism

1 star

For some reason, I've found myself reading a lot of radlib books this summer. This book, despite claiming to be leftist, certainly earns its spot with the other radlib books I've read. As my title says it is terminally capitalist realist in that even when it acknowledges the failures of postwar social democracy and correctly articulates that it failed because it gave the bourgeoise time to fight back against it, this book argues that a return to such a system, albeit with a lower consumption rate, is the best that we can hope for. Furthermore, although it correctly notes that degrowth is antithetical to capitalism, it still advocates for social democracy as a means for degrowth because then the capitalism will be "regulated". Finally, it advocates for class collaboration because "the bourgeoise will be affected by climate change too" and seems outright hostile to the idea of an organic working-class …

For some reason, I've found myself reading a lot of radlib books this summer. This book, despite claiming to be leftist, certainly earns its spot with the other radlib books I've read. As my title says it is terminally capitalist realist in that even when it acknowledges the failures of postwar social democracy and correctly articulates that it failed because it gave the bourgeoise time to fight back against it, this book argues that a return to such a system, albeit with a lower consumption rate, is the best that we can hope for. Furthermore, although it correctly notes that degrowth is antithetical to capitalism, it still advocates for social democracy as a means for degrowth because then the capitalism will be "regulated". Finally, it advocates for class collaboration because "the bourgeoise will be affected by climate change too" and seems outright hostile to the idea of an organic working-class movement for ecological sustainability. The previous points aside, were I a professor marking this book as a monograph, I would have to say that it failed. This is not because it is poorly written, but because it fails at every opportunity to prove or even defend its thesis. The central thesis of the book is that we can argue for degrowth on hedonist grounds because consumer society makes people unhappy. All well and good. However, the book does not give a single example of how a society based on degrowth would make people happier, and just assumes that the reader will agree that it would. This sucks because I do agree that a society based on degrowth would be both more fulfilling and more hedonically desireable. However, I can't reccommend this book to someone on the fence about these issues because there is no argument regarding this claim. Do yourself a favour and give this book a pass in favour of a better book on degrowth.