Re: 'Ecological .. free market economy'

On Wed, 16 Jun 1999 08:45:15 +1200 David wrote after presenting my ideas,
now put at the end of this mail :

>now David:
>
>**  I reject any suggestion that I am 'an expert' whose opinions can be
>quoted as any form of 'proof'. (My being able to live {under specified
>conditions} on less than US$900 per year however, _is_ one datum in a
>complete description of how humans can order their lives.) Moreover, I
>suspect that most/all on this list could well be unwilling to have their
>opinions taken as proof, e.g. in a funding request to the European
>Commission. 'Scientific proof' has a specified meaning which doesn't
>include such things as the above.
>
>**  I accept that current economic theories are wrong in the context of
>today's (overdeveloped and over-populated) world, and therefore must be
>changed.

Good.  I make a proposal to change it by correcting an error : consumers
should be able to deduct costs of living with ecological products from
their taxable income.  This will cause a major change in the economy, since
billions of consumers will be able to live in harmony with Nature, all ove
the planet where there is a free market economy.

I further accept that a transition to a sustainable world will be
>aided by economic methods 'harnessing' the power of consumer spending to
>provide 'the market' with signals 'it understands', i.e. using (net) price
>and demand to (i) get consumers to buy in better ways, and then (ii) get
>producers to supply these new 'needs'.

Good, you accept that consumers will create the demand for ecological
products once they can manage their costs of living as income assuring, tax
deductible costs.

>**  I further accept that, after the transition, money and buying power
>will have a place in a sustainable world, and that economic ideas will have
>developed to the extent that they more nearly conform to the real world,

Great

>rather than applying to some cloud-cuckoo-land as mainstream economics does
>now.
>
>**  However:
>(1)  The scale is wrong, by perhaps an order of magnitude. I refer to both
>time-scale and amount of change required.

The scale of my proposal is the free market economy, a global scale.  To
manage the costs of living will change the course of development into
meandering within the lush boundaries of Nature.

Which is the scale of the project on which you are currently working or
which scale do you propose?

So such tinkering with our
>current economic system is far too little and probably too late to be more
>than one small strand in the history we are creating right now.

To call the correction of an error in the current free market economy
tinkering, is understandable because of the image you present with : a
bunch of fish thrashing around in the remains of a cracked and leaking
fish-pond or a drying-up pool in a river-bed during a drought.

I'm not
>saying it shouldn't be done,

Great

just that most people's efforts should be
>directed towards a greater change, sooner,

Which greater change are you now working on that will enable you to SUSTAIN
development, sooner?  Have you knowledge of any proposal that offers
greater change than the management of the costs of living?

than can be achieved by fiddling
>with net prices.

To call the correction of an error in the current free market economy
fiddling with net prices, is understandable because of the image you
present with : a bunch of fish thrashing around in the remains of a cracked
and leaking fish-pond or a drying-up pool in a river-bed during a drought.

>(2)  I doubt that this is the right list to try initiating such discussion,
>since Wim de Bruyn's page above makes it clear that the main goal/criterion
>is development, a subsidiary goal is 'keeping the integrity of human
>Nature', and the backdrop for this is: 'production that is in harmony with
>Nature'.
>  This describes, to me, a light-green, shallow-ecology viewpoint that
>views deep ecology as a means to an end: development. David Orton has said:
>"Shallow ecology, a term also coined by Naess, means that the major
>ecological problems can be resolved within and with the continuation of
>industrial society."

To call the correction of an error in the current free market economy
shallow-ecology is not understandable, since this correction will launch a
human and ethical development which will cause the creation of an
ecological industry.

>(3)  The image that comes to my mind, about such attempts, is of a bunch of
>fish thrashing around in the remains of a cracked and leaking fish-pond or
>a drying-up pool in a river-bed during a drought. Their picture of the
>world is faulty.

The image you leave is that you or ecologists are like these fish ; they do
not have the strenght anymore to consider any proposal ; "The scale is
wrong","tinkering with our current economic system is far too little and
probably too late", "I'm not saying it shouldn't be done, just", "fiddling
with net prices".

It is as if you are rejecting anything that could achieve the goals of
deep-ecology or the goals of ecology, without even thinking about it,
because you lack the energy, it is no use, it is no good, it is too late
and the end is inevitable.  That you still write about sustainable
development strengthens this image.  Thank you for this image.  It explains
many reactions I receive about my proposal.

Eric Storm  added on Wed, 16 Jun 1999 08:34:36 -0700 :

"David's response was a good one; I have little to add.

My ramblings are intended only to stimulate discussion and thinking with
the hopes of clarifying at least my own thinking along the way.  I try not
to hold conclusions in my mind only "current ideas", which I hope will be
continually challenged, refinded and re-defined over time.

Respectfully,

Eric Storm"

With such a mentality a conclusion will never be drawn, a solution will
never be found and no action will ever be undertaken.  Nevertheless, I
forward Introduction to "The Race" with more current ideas about the role
of the Islam in applying the solution I propose.

May be that the mentality, such as presented by David MacClement and Eric
Storm, is the reason the Deep-ecology list is not "the right list to try
initiating such discussion", any discussion, bent on results.

Happily there are others on this list who have a different mentality like
Eric Brooks who wrote on Mon, 14 Jun 1999 04:38:32 GMT

>>One of the most ridiculous things about the Deep Ecology newsgroup is this
>>constant navel examining process that many here are perpetually engaged
>>in, of trying to decide what the 'terms' deep ecology, and sustainability,
>>'mean'.
and
"In the final analysis, I have learned to precisely define, not terms like
deep ecology, sustainability, and permaculture, but instead, simply what
works and what does not."

Does the management of the costs of living of six billion consumers open up
a way of living in harmony with Nature?


>David.
>(David MacClement) mailto:d1v9d@bigfoot.com
>http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Delphi/3142/Pg1-AD11.html#top
>*************************************************************

>At 17:33 15/06/99 +0200, Wim A. de Bruyn <WdeBruyn@mail.dma.be> wrote:
>>Hello subscribers to the Deep Ecology list
>>
>> .. I .., .. a long since subscriber to the DE list, [believe that] your
>recent .. e-mails [in their] precision, .. make you experts to evaluate
>whether .. or to what extent the proposed way of living satisfies
>requirements that enable the consumer to live in harmony with Nature until
>eternity, while enjoying well-being in a pleasant or agreeable way
>
>>[The proposal is that consumers] maintain the integrity of human Nature
>with their income.
>>
>- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
>[Wim de Bruyn's page: ]
>     "Ecological version of the free market economy":
>http://freezone.exmachina.net/ZERO/Ecovers.html
>     has:
>
>_ .. goods and services [and] money .. make up economic development.  Every
>time consumers spend money on their costs of living they determine the
>direction and sense [of] development.
>
>_ .. the current version of the free market economy is: to consume more and
>more forever.  Mankind does not sustain development by pursuing this goal.
>.. Nevertheless, economic theories .. encourage higher consumption to
>maintain growth in development.
>
>_ .. economic growth and environmental management can be brought together
>by harnessing the power of the consumer to choose the goods and services on
>which [they] spend money. [This leads] to the proposition: consumers should
>be able to deduct from taxable income the money they spend on products that
>are ecologically sound.
>
>_ Through this [method] consumers will be motivated to pursue as goal: to
>maintain the integrity of human Nature.  Consumers' .. demand for
>ecological products will favour production that is in harmony with Nature
>and thus in accord with the goal of keeping the integrity of human Nature.
>
>_ .. this proposition [uses] a principle of economic efficiency in the free
>market economy: equilibrium between costs and revenues should be maintained
>by the people who earn the revenues. .. By [this] principle, the efficiency
>of the free market economy in sharing[/distributing] limited resources will
>increase when equilibrium between costs and revenues is kept by the people
>who earn income from the first drive to earn an income: to survive or to
>sustain a way of living; consumers.
>
>- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
>




With sincerity and its feeling,

Wim A. de Bruyn
Founder
ZERO, association of consumers maintaining their integrity with their income
45 rue Alfred Giron
B-1050 Brussels, Belgium
Tel. : **32 (2) 648 56 95
e-mail : WdeBruyn@mail.dma.be
ZERO web site : http://freezone.exmachina.net/ZERO