6 Affluence
Memo
Allocating environmental impacts to consumers is consistent with the perspective that consumers are the ultimate drivers of production, with their purchasing decisions setting in motion a series of trade transactions and production activities, rippling along complex international supply-chain networks 5 . However, allocating impacts to consumers does not necessarily imply a systemic causal understanding of which actor should be held most responsible for these impacts. Responsibility may lie with the consumer or with an external actor, like the state, or in structural relations between actors. Scholars of sustainable consumption have shown that consumers often have little control over environmentally damaging decisions along supply chains 6 , however they often do have control over making a consumption decision in the first place. Whilst in Keynesian-type economics consumer demand drives production, Marxian political econom- ics as well as environmental sociology views the economy as supply dominated.
Remarkably, consumption (and to a lesser extent population) growth have mostly outrun any beneficial effects of changes in technology over the past few decades
Considering that the lifestyles of wealthy citizens are characterised by an abundance of choice, convenience and comfort, we argue that the determinant and driver we have referred to in previous sections as consumption, is more aptly labelled as affluence.
A suitable concept to address the ecological dimension is the widely established avoid-shift-improve framework outlined by Creutzig et al. 43 . Its focus on the end-use service, such as mobility, nutrition or shelter, allows for a multi-dimensional analysis of potential impact reductions beyond sole technological change. This analysis can be directed at human need satisfaction or decent living standards—an alternative perspective put for- ward for curbing environmental crises 44,45 . Crucially, this per- spective allows us to consider different provisioning systems (e.g. states, markets, communities and households) and to differentiate between superfluous consumption, which is consumption that does not contribute to needs satisfaction, and necessary con- sumption which can be related to satisfying human needs
Carbon emissions and material use are globally more unequally distributed when accounted for as footprints. In contrast to territorial allocations, footprints attribute environmental burdens to the final consumer, no matter where the initial environmental pressure has occurred. Here, international trade is responsible for shifting burdens from mostly low-income developing-world producers to high-income developed-world consumers
Growth imperatives are active at multiple levels, making the pursuit of economic growth (net investment, i.e. investment above depre- ciation) a necessity for different actors and leading to social and economic instability in the absence of it 7,52,60 . Following a Marxian perspective as put forward by Pirgmaier and Steinber- ger 61 , growth imperatives can be attributed to capitalism as the currently dominant socio-economic system in affluent countries 7,51,62 , although this is debated by other scholars
The average energy intensity of labour is now twice as high as in 1950. As long as a firm has a competitive advantage, there is a strong incentive to sell as much as possible.
Under normal economic conditions, this capitalist competition is expected to lead to aggregate growth dynamics
If labour productivity continuously rises, then aggregate economic growth becomes necessary to keep employ- ment constant, otherwise technological unemployment results. This creates one of the imperatives for capitalist states to foster aggregate growth, since with worsening economic conditions and high unemployment, tax revenues shrink, e.g. from labour and value-added taxes, while social security expenditures rise
Consumers usually increase their consumption in tune with increasing production 60 . This process can be at least in part explained by substantial advertising efforts by firms
Following this analysis, it is not surprising that the growth paradigm is hegemonic, i.e. the perception that economic growth solves all kinds of societal problems, that it equals progress, power and welfare and that it can be made practically endless through some form of supposedly green or sustainable growth
Taken together, the described dynamics create multiple dependencies of workers, firms and states on a well-functioning capital accumula- tion and thus wield more material, institutional and discursive power (e.g. for political lobbying) to capitalists who are usually the most affluent consumers
An individual’s happiness correlates positively with their own income but negatively with the peer group’s income 71 and that unequal access to positional goods fosters rising consumption 52 . This endless process is a core part of capitalism as it keeps social momentum and consumption high with affluent consumers driving aspirations and hopes of social ascent in low-affluence segments 70,72 . The positional consump- tion behaviour of the super-affluent thus drives consumption norms across the population
Degrowth is defined here as “an equitable downscaling of throughput [that is the energy and resource flows through an economy, strongly coupled to GDP], with a concomitant securing of wellbeing“ 59,p7 , aimed at a subsequent downscaled steady-state economic system that is socially just and in balance with ecological limits