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Back to the Future: Today's and Tomorrow's Politics of Degrowth Economics (Décroissance) in Light of the Debate over Luxury among Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Century Utopists

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 April 2009

Alexandra Sippel
Alexandra Sippel
Affiliation:
Sorbonne University
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Abstract

French Socialists currently appear less and less convinced of the relevance of rejecting today's consumption-oriented society and turn increasingly to more center-left models in order to refound their party. (Refoundation is one of the most frequently used terms within the party.) Therefore, it is instructive to go back to the eighteenth-century roots of socialism and note the way many of its founding theorists promoted the establishment of truly social communities set in a perfectly harmonious relationship to the natural environment.

As the intellectual debate was not confined within French borders at the time of the Enlightenment, this study will create a dialogue between those who argued that luxury was absolutely essential in a modern society (Mandeville, and later Malthus, whose views are echoed in the voices of contemporary right-wing politicians) and those who, on the contrary, advocated a return to a voluntary state of nature, which implied the rejection of material accumulation and social inequality (such as Rousseau and later William Godwin, whose concerns are nowadays echoed by the defenders of décroissance). This article also explores the most utopian propositions coming from objecteurs de croissance, individuals who side with the far left while adding their concern for the environment and emphasis on humane values.

Type
Rethinking the Left in Victory and Defeat
Information
International Labor and Working-Class History , Volume 75 , Issue 1 , Spring 2009 , pp. 13 - 29
Copyright
Copyright © International Labor and Working-Class History, Inc. 2009

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References

NOTES

1. This debate was, of course, much commented on, as is exemplified in “Blair's moment: Scrapping Clause Four is the start, not the end of Tony Blair's struggle to reinvent the Labour Party. But what a good start!” The Economist, April 29, 1995.

2. The intellectual debate in the eighteenth century was not bound by national frontiers, which makes it possible, in my opinion, to compare English and French thinkers and to illustrate the relevance and continuity of décroissance arguments through English radical treaties and utopias of the modern period. For another questioning of the indebtedness of décroissance to the eighteenth century, it is possible to turn to Michéa's, Jean-ClaudeImpasse Adam Smith, de l'impossibilité de dépasser le capitalisme par sa gauche (Paris, 2002)Google Scholar, which exposes the influence of French Physiocrats on the contemporary economic debate. My paper deals with pre-Marxist socialism.

3. Décroissants also call themselves “objecteurs de croissance”in French, which is very close to “objecteurs de conscience,”conscientious objector. This definition implies a total and moral rejection of values considered as unacceptable as those of war. This is made even clearer by their definition of commerce as the contemporary form of military colonization.

4. For the theory of legitimate appropriation, the best modern illustration is Locke's theory as exposed in his Second Treaty of Government: Human beings belong to no one but their individual self. As such, their toil and activity also belong to them in the state of nature so that they have a legitimate right to appropriate the parts of nature to which they apply their energy. This right ceases to be legitimate if they allow some of the product of the earth to rot and thus deprive some of their fellow beings from resources that might have been useful.

5. Berry, Christopher, The Idea of Luxury; A Conceptual and Historical Investigation. (Cambridge, 1994), 129CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

6. Godwin, Political Justice, 308. My emphasis.

7. Latouche, Serge, Survivre au développement; de la décolonisation de l'imaginaire à la construction d'une société alternative. (Paris, 2004), 44Google Scholar. He quotes from a 1992 UNDP (United Nations Development Programme) report. My translation.

8. Berry, The Idea of Luxury, 130.

9. Bernard Mandeville, The Fable of the Bees: Or, Private Vices, Public Benefits, London: (1714), lines. 177–190.

10. This idea is found in Berry, The Idea of Luxury, 154.

11. Latouche, Survivre au développement, 15. My translation. This essay was written at the invitation of the UNESCO and was the result of the international symposium entitled “undo development to recreate the world” (“Défaire le développement, refaire le monde”) held from February 28, 2002, to March 3, 2002, at the Palais de l'UNESCO in Paris.

12. Once more, Thomas Robert Malthus would not have disagreed with the ideas promoted by the newly elected French president, Sarkozy, who claims that economic growth is needed to bring unemployment down, and that consumption is the key that will allow French economic growth to rise again.

13. Berry, The Idea of Luxury, 11.

14. François Brune, “Une aisance partagée,” www.decroissance.info. My translation.

15. Godwin, Political Justice, 316.

16. François Brune, “Une aisance partagée,” www.decroissance.info. My translation.

17. Ibid.

18. Godwin, Political Justice, 346.

19. Catherine Tarral: ‘François Partant sur la décroissance’, on www.decroissance.info. My translation.

20. Latouche, Survivre au développement, 116. My translation.

21. Godwin, Political Justice, 142. My emphasis.

22. Latouche, , Le pari de la décroissance (Paris: Fayard, 2006), 268Google Scholar.

23. Tristàn, Rosa M. ‘Ces peuples sans malades mentaux’, Courrier International, n881, September 20, 2007, 58Google Scholar. My translation.

24. Rousseau, Discours sur l'inégalité, 96. My translation.

25. Mandeville, Fable, v.403–408.

26. Godwin, Political Justice, 345.

27. Muriel Gehlen, describing an “éco-village” in an interview for the Web site ecorev: http://ecorev.org/article.php3?id_article=308. My translation.

28. Ellis, George, New Britain, (1821), in Gregory Claeys, Modern British Utopias, vol. 6 (London, 1997), 174Google Scholar.

29. Ellis, New Britain, 165.

30. Mandeville, Fable, v. 409–424.

31. Interview of Serge Latouche and Hubert Védrine by Hervé Kempf. Le Monde, May 26, 2005.

32. Godwin, William, “Of Riches and Poverty,” The Enquirer (London, 1797), 130Google Scholar.

33. Starobinski, Jean, “Introduction” to Discours sur l'origine de l'inégalité entre les hommes (Paris, 1980): 27Google Scholar. My translation.

34. Latouche, Survivre au développement, 97. My translation.

35. Latouche, Survivre au développement, 96. My translation.

36. Interview between Serge Latouche and Hubert Védrine. Le Monde, May 26, 2005. My translation.

37. For a detailed analysis of the relationship between Marxism, contemporary Communism, and other antiliberal or degrowth movements: Martelli Roger, “Croissance et Décroissance: du côté du communisme politique” in Pour une Politique de la Décroissance, 21–28, Villeurbanne, Golias, 2007.

38. Dominique Voynet was a former minister for national and regional development and environment for the Green Party who served in Lionel Jospin's socialist government from 1997 to 2001. She was the first minister ever from the Green Party to serve in a government and took part in the negotiations in Kyoto.

39. This formula refers to a national concertation between actors from different backgrounds (agriculture, transports, energy, political parties, and environmentally conscious associations together with government members) over environmental issues. “Grenelle” is a short way of signifying that crucial questions are at stake, as was the case in May 1968 when Prime Minister Georges Pompidou summoned political, economic, and unionist spokespeople to the Ministry of Labour in order to ratify agreements (Les accords de Grenelle) that would bring back social peace after the massive strikes and demonstrations.