Rage of a Porritt Spurned

What a pleasure it is to find Jonathan Porritt on rampagingly good form. In a post yesterday he bemoans the passing of the Sustainable Development Commission, of which he was formerly chair, and indeed of any commitment to sustainable development from the Condem government.

This doublespeak is becoming something of a habit with our government. We have numerous examples locally, where our MP tries to portray himself as a defender of the very local services which his government is forcing us to cut. Then we have the odious Pickles portraying the privatisation of public services as something we should feel empowered about.

In case you cannot cope with this level of rage you may enjoy a light-hearted paper called Japan's Phillips Curve Looks Like Japan, whose only reference is a paper called 'All Meat Looks Like South America'. The Phillips Curve is a rather nasty piece of economic theory that says there is an inverse relationship between inflation and unemployment. This can be interpreted as the suggestion that we need unemployment to keep prices under control. The theory is not very well supported empirically, suggesting that its primary motivation is political.

In the paper cited,* you can see a clear relationship between the two variables in the case of Japan, but not what you might expect. As shown in the figure what we ascertain is that the datapoints produce a pretty picture of the country itself. Aw: isn't that sweet!

*Thanks to Tom Lines for sending me this link. Tweet

Inspiration from the Emerald City

This short hiatus in posts can be explained by my recent very enjoyable trip to Freiburg, a Germany city close to the French and Swiss borders and the Black Forest. I was invited to speak to this year's Forum on Enviromental Governance, an event organised by the students of the University MSc in Environmental Governance.

Freiburg styles itself as the 'greenest city in the world' and was voted Germany's greenest city last year. Many of the design features - such as co-housing developments and local food markets - were familiar to me from Stroud. The difference was in terms of scale, and also of the commitment to inclusive ecological communities (such as the famous Solarsiedlung, or 'solar village') and the excellent public transport systems you expect in Germany.


I had assumed that these developments would have grown up with the active support of the local authority, but it seems that even in Germany eco-activists have to lead the way. The famous Vauban development, where eco-homes powered by the sun have replaced a US army base, was privately funded and faced problems with planning permission at every stage.

During my visit I stayed at the Hotel Victoria, which claims to be the world's greenest. It uses no fossil fuels, relying on solar panels, four small wind turbines, and wood pellets from the local forest resource. The level of luxury in the hotel (and the expense) did make me question the concept of 'prosperity without growth'. I am fairly sure that the level of comfort enjoyed in the hotel is not possible for all the world's citizens.

Which brings me to the content of the conference itself. Like many who come to a first consideration of 'the green economy', the students had focused on technical and design aspects. The two first speakers were Ernst Ulrich von Weiszacker, he of Factor-4 and now Factor-5 fame. His claims that energy efficiency could solve the ecological-economic crunch were undermined by Ulrich Hoffman, head of sustainable development at UNCTAD, who quoted Tim Jackson's figure that a 128% increase in efficiency would be necessary to ensure a Western lifestyle to all the world's people, if we assume current population growth trends.


My own contribution was to raise the social, political and cultural questions around a green economy. The students were very interested in the Transition Towns, although they left little space to consider how we are to make changes to our consumption expectations if we are to make a deep green economy a reality. Overall it was a realy inspiring visit. The city itself is a wonderful model, but so is the university and its openness to genuine learning. The 19 MIG students, from 26 countries, will be sustainability leaders and we would benefit greatly in the UK from similar courses.
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The King's Speech

You can tell that there is a major adaptation afoot when the Governer of the central bank of the country where capitalist finance is based starts to make interesting speeches. Do not be put off by the title, Global imbalances: The perspective of the Bank of England is radical stuff - heady, the FT calls it. Like King's speech to the Buttonwood gathering in New York this new statement is steeped in nostalgia for the era before Big Bang, when there was some degree of political control over financial interests, and bankers could not destroy the livelihoods of other citizens.


King expresses concern about the 'large and persistent current account deficits' being run by the UK and US 'while emerging market economies, in particular in Asia and among oil exporters, have been running current account surpluses.' This situation of imbalance in current accounts - the very situation that the Bretton Woods system was designed to avoid - results in instability and, potentially, conflict. The graphic shows how successful the Bretton Woods system was, and the mayhem that was evident before and after.

This paper must surely have been used to inform discussions amongst G20 finance ministers in Paris last weekend. The meeting agreed a resolution but the fundamental disagreement between China and the others over the desirability of total free movement of currencies and the need to address current account imbalances was apparent.

Mervyn King appears to agree with the Chinese. As illustrated in the second graphic from his paper, he associates free currency movement and financial instability:

'financial crises have been a hallmark of the current incarnation of the international monetary and financial system (IMFS),with the reappearance of global financial instability coinciding with the rapid increase in capital mobility.'

His conclusion is that finance ministers need to use a much wider range of tools than just interest rates. They should take back a positive management role in monetary policy, controlling capital flows, and encouraging an increase in saving rather than spending, as well as considering a revision of the 'role and governance of the international financial institutions'.
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Who Bankrupted the Country?

Richard Lawson has an excellent post using Office for National Statistics data to make it quite clear who is responsible for the national debt. As he says, since the Labour Party seem terrified of laying the lie that it was Labour rather than the bankers that made us bust, the Green Party will have to do it for them. Tweet

Tim Jackson to Speak at Green Party Conference

We are delighted to announce that Tim Jackson will be speaking at this year's Green Party conference, in Cardiff on Monday 28th February at the Angel Hotel in Cardiff. Professor Jackson is one of the world leaders in the debate about how we might develop our economy in a way that does not threaten the health of the planet. His TED talk has received glowing reviews.

Tim Jackson's book Prosperity without Growth grew out of a report he undertook on behalf of the Sustainable Development Commission. That was advice to the highest level of government that we had to end economic growth and undertake a radical restructuring of our economy. Perhaps we should not be surprised that the SDC was closed down shortly afterwards.

Professor Jackson will be in debate with Neal Lawson from Compass at 1pm on Monday. They will address the link between sustainability and equality in the context of economic recession and government spending cuts. This is an important debate for the Green Party and we hope that the session will enable us to find ways to make more of our commitment to living within our means while also ensuring equality and high standards of well-being.
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Witness Against the Arms Trade

This year's census is providing an excellent opportunity for those of us committed to peace to make a personal witness against the international arms trade. Despite the power of the rhetoric of the 'free market', every society defines 'goods and services' which cannot be sold freely, whether this is a range of drugs or people's bodies. Arms should be put into a similar category of highly controlled products.

It is unfortunate that the Green Party appears to have changed its position on the census. Back in August 2008, when the decision was made to engage Lockheed Martin, the US arms corporation, to undertake the census Caroline Lucas was quoted as saying that 'the Census depends on the trust of every person in Britain' and that:

'We maintain that the Census would be best conducted by teams of public employees, over which we have full scrutiny and control, not by private contractors with such close links to the US Government.'

Lockheed Martin is responsible for the manufacture of Trident nuclear missiles, which the Green Party opposes, as well as cluster bombs and F-16 fighter jets that are used to kill the innocent in wars in Iraq and Afghanistan - post-colonial engagements to which the party was also vociferously opposed.

In spite of these principled stands the Green Party, my party, has decided to oppose the boycott of the census. I can only assume that this is through fear of appearing irresponsible. I have not been aware of much debate or any democratic decision-making process within the party. My own personal decision, as a Quaker, is not to contribute to the profits of one of the merchants of death: I urge you to join me.
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Insupporterble Ethics

At the risk of giving Michael Porter greater publicity by posting a blog about him, I have decided to dedicate today's offering to his concept of 'shared value'. If you can spare your eardrums you can hear him discussing this with Peter Day on the latter's World of Business programme (20th January).

On one level this is extremely irritating. The very same Michael Porter, star of the Harvard Business School, scourge of fatty production systems, climate criminal extraordinary, has metamorphosed into a fluffy bunny, worried about fair shares. It is impossible not to be galled by this - and particularly by the fact that he makes arguments diametrically opposed to those he made a mere year or two ago with an equivalent amount of grating self-confidence. Here is Porter post-epiphany, writing in the Harvard Business Review:

'A big part of the problem lies with companies themselves, which remain trapped in an outdated, narrow approach to value creation. Focused on optimizing short-term financial performance, they overlook the greatest unmet needs in the market as well as broader influences on their long-term success. Why else would companies ignore the well-being of their customers, the depletion of natural resources vital to their businesses, the viability of suppliers, and the economic distress of the communities in which they produce and sell?'

But wasn't it this very sort of competition for value creation that Porter's theories of innovation and business strategy generated? How can he move on, without missing a beat, to become Robert Owen's blood brother? And how can we square this with Porter's arguments made in 1995,* where he suggested that there is no trade-off between economy and environment and that innovation can reduce the need for regulation:

'Our focus here is not on the social benefits of environmental regulation, but on the
private costs. Our argument is that whatever the level of social benefits, these costs are far higher than they need to be. The policy focus should, then, be on relaxing the tradeoff between competitiveness and the environment rather than accepting it as a given.'

Fundamentally, of course, Porter and his ilk have not changed their own strategies, which were always about control. Recognising that - in the midst of ecological and financial crisis - the game is up with this incarnation of capitalism, they are seeking to be in control of the next phase. Whether capitalism is adapting in essence or merely in rhetoric remains to be seen - and lies beyond the control of those not part of the Harvard Business elite.

*Porter, M. E., and Claas van der Linde. "Toward a New Conception of the Environment-Competitiveness Relationship." Journal of Economic Perspectives 9, no. 4 (fall 1995).
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