In a recent blog post Professor Jem Bendell, author of the Deep Adaptation paper wrote a challenge to views expressed by John Foster of Lancaster University/ Green House UK Think Tank ( the latter’s strapline is “It aims to lead the development of green thinking in the UK.” I’m beginning to automatically view with caution any organisation that seeks to centralise knowledge and meaning-making in this way.)
Its an excellent and thoughtful post which I am sure will spark much debate. However in the age of Limits to Growth, its does beg the question who is responsible for imposing those limits? How do we keep within Planetary Boundaries and ensure a solid social floor a la Doughnut Economics? I agree authoritarianism is not the answer, but the current sustainability crises is also a crises of liberalism- unfettered freedom without constraints. Inevitably you have to go back to Aristotle’s ideas of the polity which cannot exist as a mere alliance of self-interested individuals (taken up more recently by Macintyre and Ophuls). What makes a polity cohere is what Aristotle called a rule of life-that is, a shared ethos. So while an external political authority is undesirable, a moral/ ethical authority agreed upon by participants at an appropriate scale and set as a guiding direction for political authority, is surely desirable. The problem is consensus (and at what scale do you need consensus) and the time it takes to bring it about….this is deep adaptation not climate change mitigation.
James T Jones 