Consumption Corridors

Living a Good Life within Sustainable Limits

Doris Fuchs, Marlyne Sahakian, Tobias Gumbert, Antonietta Di Giulio, Michael Maniates, Sylvia Lorek, Antonia Graf

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781000389463
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Economics
• Subtopic: Environmental Economics
• Index: Economics

Consumption Corridors: Living a Good Life within Sustainable Limits explores how to enhance peoples' chances to live a good life in a world of ecological and social limits.

Rejecting familiar recitations of problems of ecological decline and planetary boundaries, this compact book instead offers a spirited explication of what everyone desires: a good life. Fundamental concepts of the good life are explained and explored, as are forces that threaten the good life for all. The remedy, says the book's seven international authors, lies with the concept of consumption corridors, enabled by mechanisms of citizen engagement and deliberative democracy.

Across five concise chapters, readers are invited into conversation about how wellbeing can be enriched by social change that joins "needs satisfaction" with consumerist restraint, social justice, and environmental sustainability. In this endeavour, lower limits of consumption that ensure minimal needs satisfaction for all are important, and enjoy ample precedent. But upper limits to consumption, argue the authors, are equally essential, and attainable, especially in those domains where limits enhance rather than undermine essential freedoms.

This book will be of great interest to students and scholars in the social sciences and humanities, and environmental and sustainability studies, as well as to community activists and the general public.

The Open Access version of this book, available at http://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/e/9780367748746, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license.

1 Living well within limits

All humans want to live a good life. They want to live a life they value. But what does such a life look like? If you were to ask people on the street to define a good life, their answers would surely vary – by geography, age, gender, education, class, race, and access to social media, to name just a few intersecting factors. One person might respond that a good life is about having a roof over their head, running water at home, or having access to good education. Someone else might say that the good life is about enjoyment, from simple pleasures like taking regular walks in the park, to spending time with friends and family, or even traveling the world. For some, a good life might be about having a rewarding career and tallying up personal achievements. For others, commitment to community may be the defining factor.

Does that mean that differences prevail around how people achieve a good life? Actually, no. While honoring our differences as individuals, we should not lose sight of what unites us as humans. When we look beyond the surface, removing all the varied stylings and decorum, the essence of what we experience as a good life is surprisingly similar, even among individuals living seemingly different lives. At the deepest level, all human beings share certain needs that must be satisfied as a prerequisite for leading a good life. We all need access to the material necessities for life, for example, as well as a sense of belonging to some form of community and being recognized as valuable. How we satisfy these needs differs according to the places we live and the opportunities we have, but strong similarities exist when it comes to the needs themselves. And the most essential condition for living a good life, when all is said and done, is the ability to satisfy these needs.

Can you imagine a world in which all individuals living now and in the future are able to satisfy these needs and live a good life? Is such a world possible? This book invites you on a journey around a compelling vision of how a good life for all could become a reality, and how we might work together for that world.

Why do we need such a vision? If some people are able to live a life of plenty, flirting with endless possibilities of consumer goods, a vast majority barely survive, let alone live a life they value. Even people who are materially wealthy may not actually be leading a satisfying life; chasing fleeting moments of happiness may not bring about real satisfaction, and can even lead to burnout, depression, or other illnesses. A certain amount of material consumption – associated with food and water, shelter and clothes, health services, and mobility infrastructure, for example – is necessary for any human being to meet their needs. But there is also ample evidence to suggest that some consumption practices, patterns, and levels actually reduce the ability to live a good life. The lure of endless consumption opportunities, compounded by social norms and structural forces, can lead to status competition, stressful choices, time pressures, and endless debt, to name but a few ailments.

Figure 1.1 After a point, further wealth does not increase wellbeing.

Additionally, the consumption practices and patterns of some people increasingly hamper the ability of others in this world to live a good life today, reflecting or reinforcing historical patterns of ecological and social exploitation. If certain clothing items or food products have a surprisingly low price tag, it probably means that the true costs of people’s work are not being recognized. Too often, a consumer “deal” or “bargain” conceals under-paid workers and unfair work conditions. A low-cost product can also hide environmental costs, such as rainforest loss or greenhouse gas emissions. Moreover, the consumption patterns and levels of the most affluent leave a huge ecological and climate debt to future generations. How are those who follow us supposed to be able to live good lives in this world, once we are done with it?

Thus, some kinds of consumption – too much, not enough, unequally enjoyed, environmentally or socially destructive, or divorced from wellbeing and security – are inimical to a vision of the good life for all. This is deeply ironic, since “consumption” is typically cast as essential to living well. And yet, what hinders many living in affluence from accessing a good life is the constant pursuit of a “better life.” The alleged benefits of such consumerist pursuits are continuously trumpeted by advertisements in which the good life is not in the here and now, but rather achievable later, through the purchase of a new product or service. There is no question that a broad share of the global population very much needs improvements in their quality of life. For many others, however, the constant (admonition to) search for an elusive, “better” life leads to being trapped in an ever-escalating spiral of “the more, the bigger, the better,” which by definition never can be good enough. Far too often, quantity takes precedence over quality.

In times of crisis, such as the pandemic that swept across the world in 2020 and 2021, we may stop and reconsider the false promises of consumerism. Such moments also show that societies can come together to determine new joint objectives, and new priorities for resource allocation and action. In this vein, it should also be conceivable for us all to agree on a vision of the good life and to work together toward the goal of enabling everybody to live it. This is the major strength of focusing on the good life, and specifically on a good life from a needs-based perspective. It allows for reflection about what we really need rather than what we wish for or desire. It also allows for a critical distinction between needs and how we go about satisfying them, and how we as a society might support the chances for needs satisfaction of others. Even more importantly, a needs-based approach to a good life illuminates the conditions that must be provided if individuals are to live a good life. And this, in turn, shines a light on needed policy and institutional reform, the (re-)organization of responsibility, and the promotion of a just society.

People have always wanted to live a good life, across the world and throughout the centuries. Societies and governments strive to support and protect the members of their populations toward that aim. Today, however, the context for these efforts has changed. We are witnessing an unprecedented global increase in urban consumers, many of whom aspire to high consumption lifestyles. At the same time, growing inequity and worrisome risks from overusing and destroying ecological resources imply that some people will never experience the lifestyles to which they aspire. The planet simply cannot provide the ecological resources necessary for everyone to live high consumption lifestyles. Indeed, current environmental changes are already winnowing chances for a good life. The global human society cannot endure the degree of inequity and exploitation necessarily involved either. Not only will this lead to much frustration and anxiety but these developments may also erode cooperation and empathy, further worsening the situation.

In an increasingly inequitable and ecologically full world, living well within limits thus becomes the core challenge of our time. Facing this challenge means enabling every individual living now and in the future to live a life they value, while driving the institutional changes necessary to organize ourselves with respect to these limits. All of this is possible. Humankind, after all, has made impressive technological advances over the decades: improved energy efficiency, the harvesting of renewable energy resources, and the marvels of modern medicine, to name a few. But these advances have only gotten us part way to the good life. We need social change next to technological change. We must nurture new institutional processes and practices for living well within limits.

This book introduces consumption corridors as a means for achieving living well within limits. Consumption corridors describe a space between minimum consumption standards that provide every individual with the ability to live a good life, and maximum consumption standards that keep individuals from consuming in quantities or ways that hurt others’ chances to do the same. Such corridors combine the pursuits of a good life and of justice within planetary boundaries. At the same time, they offer a foundation for needed systemic change by engaging citizens in the design and implementation of policy, grounded in robust mechanisms of procedural justice. While a lower limit is a starting point for discussions around justice, the need for an upper limit is an essential next step for reasons of environmental and social sustainability, and may make for challenging discussions. But starting these discussions is critical.

Limits is a concept not well liked in liberal societies, where unlimited freedom is often extolled to be of utmost importance. And yet, we live and thrive in a world of limits. We intuitively know that limits, of the right type at the right time, are good for us. Individually, we set limits on how much we eat or drink, or put on a credit card. Our bodily and financial health would suffer if we did not. Collectively, we embrace limits on individual freedom, via formal law or societal norms, to protect individuals from each other or to allow the pursuit of communal interests where they conflict with individual ones. That is the very basis for laws, norms, and other forms of social regulation. Limits are a tool for wellbeing when they are not exploited by coercive regimes. Under the right conditions, limits are not a threat to freedom. They are its foundation.

The concept of consumption corridors thus offers a vision of how to pursue the goal of living well within limits. It offers a compelling vehicle to sustainability. This book is an invitation to explore the most pressing challenges facing humanity today, and to uncover how consumption corridors can help achieve the goal of sustainable wellbeing for all.

2 Our vision
The good life

Often, environmental and social analysts focus on threats, dangers, and damage. They highlight negatives, in terms of limited or non-renewable resources, or the impacts of excessive emissions or effluents. But what if one took the opposite approach and focused on the positives that we want to strive for? We – the authors – believe that every human being, that is you and us and everybody close and far away, wants to be able to live a good life, a life that is worth living. Given that the Earth’s resources are limited and distributed highly unevenly, the core objective has to be how everybody can live well within limits.

Striving for this goal of living well within limits requires something different from the typical focus on threats and dangers. It requires a deep and profound orientation toward the good life. It requires us to ponder what the good life is, what conditions must be fulfilled for individuals to live it, and what it takes to create these conditions. Indeed, orienting our view toward the good life and away from threats, dangers, and damage is helpful and necessary for a number of reasons.

One is that the positivity of the vision of the good life facilitates action. Think about it. How much easier is it for us to be persistent and, if necessary, creative in pursuit of something we really want to do, compared to when we are coerced? How much more persuasive is an offer when it embraces something we care about? Motivational speakers and writers will always tell you to identify your (positive) goals first, and then go about making plans for how to achieve them. Health specialists, too, have witnessed a shift from the question “what is illness and how can it be removed?” to the question “what is health and how can it be promoted and nurtured?”

The positivity of this good-life lens relates to our search for freedom. One reason why striving for something we like or desire is powerful is that we derive additional strength from it being rooted in our freedom. We derive satisfaction from pursuing something we choose. Indeed, the ability to design and control one’s own life has been identified by many thinkers as one of the crucial needs we share as humans.

At the same time, the vision of a good life for all integrates our individual pursuit of this goal with an immediate concern for others. In other words, we can enjoy and exercise freedoms only to the extent that doing so does not impinge on others. Achieving this vision underlines both the crucial role of freedom but also the necessity of limits for this freedom to exist. Thereby, pursuing the vision of a good life for all has the potential of bridging current political divides, as it is a vision that all people can adhere to.

Beyond a concern for freedom and its limits, the pursuit of the vision of a good life for all is rooted in human inclination for empathy and desire for justice. Making the good life a goal not only individually but also at the level of societies means pursuing a vision of a world where all people, whether they are born in the Northern or the Southern hemisphere, or live on the right or the left side of the tracks, can lead a life they value. Thereby, the vision underscores the idea that the very purpose of societies is to allow its members to flourish, and it posits that all institutions of a society should serve that purpose. Making a good life a societal goal entails working at all scales, from the individual to the global, and explicitly raising these two questions: what kind of a world do people want to inhabit, and what kind of a world should be passed on to future generations? Confronting questions of what a good life consists of, how it can be achieved, and how it can be guaranteed for everybody entails exploring what really matters to humans, individually and collectively. These questions thus can launch new societal debate, helping us recognize similarities rather than differences and serve cohesion over polarization. Most fundamentally, a focus on the vision of a good life allows us, individually and collectively, to devise ways to escape the trap of “the more, the bigger, the better,” and to examine how our personal understanding of the good life interacts with that of others.

Importantly, talking about a good life is not the same as talking about life being good in terms of morals, ethical rules of conduct, norms, or societal obligations. In the following pages, “the good life” refers to ideas such as quality of life, human wellbeing, and human flourishing. Nevertheless, the notions of a good life and ethical questions about rules, norms, and obligations are not completely at odds. The freedom of one individual to live a life he or she values relates to the freedom of other individuals to do the same, and brings to the fore issues of responsibility and justice. This was always the case, of course. But today, this relationship is all the more pronounced, living as we are in a world in which biophysical and social limits can no longer be denied. We can no longer ignore the fact that the pursuit of the good life can impact the chances of others to live a good life.

Pursuing the good life is about beginning with the goal of human flourishing. It does not mean that we should ignore environmental threats and dangers, or social injustice. But starting with the good life means that we set our focus straight on what is important to us, and then work our way backwards to account for limited environmental and social resources. We develop the vision of how everybody can enjoy a good life first, and then ask ourselves how that vision can become reality.

But what is a good life?

Clearly, people have different perceptions of the good life. For one person, it might be about time with the family. For another a good life could mean traveling to interesting places. And for a third it might be about a rewarding job. But what is absolutely essential for people to lead a life they value?

Scholars and thinkers across the world have pondered the good life since antiquity. They have sought to explain what the good life is and how it can be achieved. They have asked whether the focus of attention should be on individuals or the broader society. They have debated such questions in relation to virtues and morals, and rights and responsibilities. No wonder they came up with myriad answers. To some, this good life means achieving peace of mind and not being ruled by passions and desire. To others it is about living in compliance with the word of god, and observing religious duties and rules. For others it is living in harmony with nature. And for others still it is about living in accordance with human nature, focused on human capabilities and virtues.

It is impossible to present and discuss here the full range of thoughts and arguments about the characteristics of a good life. But it might be worthwhile to show the different approaches one can take and how different potential answers complement each other (for an introduction into some of these systematic differences, see Box 2.1: The good life in...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of figuers
• List of boxes
• Acknowledgments
• 1 Living well within limits
• 2 Our vision: the good life
• 3 Consumption corridors as a vehicle to pursue the good life
• 4 What’s stopping us?
• 5 Visionary change: corridors as a pathway to the good life
• Annex 1: Needs
• Annex 2: Indicators of quality of life
• Annex 3: Estimates of upper and lower sustainable limits in floor space
• References
• Index