‘Construir un mundo en el que caben todos los mundos’

We live in a ‘civilizational crisis’, according to my friends in the World Social Forum. But what does it mean? What civilization are they talking about? And what is this crisis? Is this concept of any use in Western Europe? Is it something more than an easy escape out of a problem for which we have no solution? Is it more than a band-aid to the bleeding wound of our lack of alternatives? Is it of any help to the failing dynamics of the left? Is it useful to find innovative ways out of our sleeping existence?
The ‘civilizational crisis’ certainly is not a new concept. But it is being used again in Latin America, in South-Asia and in the alterglobalization movement. I think it can most probably help to see how grassroots movements and academia are inventing new discourses and practices that can be a step in the right direction, out of the impasse.
But in order to participate, we first have to know what the concept means, how it is interpreted and how it can be used.

A systemic crisis
All in all two major interpretations are given to the concept of the ‘civilizational crisis’ today.
The most simple interpretation consists in stating the interdependency, the many links which exist between today’s different crises: the financial crisis, the food crisis, the climate crisis, the security problem, etc. According to this interpretation, all these crises have one common cause which is industrial capitalism based on fossil fuels.
The financial crisis has been analyzed exhaustively in these past two or three years. Not only was the crisis predictable, it was also a direct consequence of the consciously created housing bubble in the US which allowed to pump billions of Dollars into the economy. The US have a huge budget deficit which they finance with a deficit on their balance of payments which, in turn, is funded by other countries, including the poorest. In this way, the US absorb almost all the savings of the world and make the financial economy grow and grow. Neoliberalism has promoted the liberalization of this financial economy and allowed it to take absurd and scandalous proportions.
When the financial markets started to implode, a logical shift of speculative transactions happened towards commodities, mainly food products. In a couple of months, prices of some products like grain, rice and corn rose by up to 50 to 100 %, with dramatic consequences for the poor people in the third world. This food crisis was exacerbated by the success of the agro-fuels which lead to the fact that millions of acres of good farmland are taken out of the food production. Today more and more countries from the South as well as transnational companies grab land in Africa.

 

Poor farmers are driven from their homes, lose their livelihood and have to go and live in the slums of the megacities.
The expansion of the agro-fuels is a consequence of the threatening energy crisis. ‘Peak-oil’ is the phenomenon which takes the oil exploitation over its ‘peak’ and from there to depletion after a period in which it is much harder to pump up. For some, this moment is already behind us, others think it will come very soon.  We have some more time for natural gas, but the peak is expected around 2025. There still is enough coal, though this is more difficult to win. Nuclear energy is not an option, at least if we take into account the massive amounts of nuclear waste it will produce. Renewable energy is possible, but investments are lacking and at any rate our energy consumption has to be reduced.
These three crises are undoubtedly linked to the climate crisis. There are still some skeptical non believers, though they are diminishing and their links with the industry are being disclosed. More and more people think that the estimates of the IPCC are far too conservative and that the planet could become uninhabitable before the end of the century. The population keeps growing, climate change leads to shortages of water as well as to floods, farmland is eroding, biodiversity is diminishing, and if the natural resources which will become available when the poles are melting are also effectively exploited, than there is a risk of ‘tipping points’ which can bring the destruction of our habitat very near in a very short time.

The civilizational crisis means that these crises occur simultaneously and that this is far from being a coincidence. It is a consequence of the many dysfunctions of the global political, economic, ideological and ethical system. The civilizational crisis is an inherent part of the ideology, the logic and the structure of our political economy. Our civilization is threatened, not by any external given, but by the capitalist system itself. In such a context, policy reforms do not help anymore. Only a drastic reconceptualization of our system can bring solutions. Only a radical re-thinking of the system can help. According to this interpretation, we are on the threshold of a renewal of society and of a civilizational transition, at least, if we want to survive. We urgently have to start to prepare the way to another civilization, away from industrial capitalism.
This is the first narrative.
Questioning modernity
The second narrative goes beyond this anti-capitalist interpretation. It emerged in Latin America and was influenced by indigenous movements. It is popular in the countries where experiences with a ‘socialism of the 21st century’ are being practiced, more particularly in Ecuador and Bolivia. It is also hotly debated within the alterglobalization movement.
This second interpretation is also based on the simultaneous and interdependent crises, and these are linked to western, industrial capitalism. But it does not stop there, since this capitalism is also linked to modernity, the knowledge system that emerged from it and the belief in endless progress. For some, it is also linked to colonialism, eurocentrism, patriarchy and racism. It is this interpretation which causes quite some problems for the left in western Europe.

The first reason is that modernity is rejected. It is perceived as being responsible for colonialism and for the subjugation of all other knowledge systems, for individualism and for imposing a universalism based on western values. This modernity is also responsible for separating humankind and nature, for a misdirected rationality and for the belief that men can dominate nature, perceived as being an external given, and rationally harness it.
Many points in this criticism are certainly correct, though they hardly justify to simply and totally reject modernity. Modernity was, after all, a dramatic emancipatory movement in Europe, against absolute monarchs and against religions, against all rules and norms that hindered people to take their destiny into their own hands. Modernity is based on Kant’s ‘sapere audere’, the courage to use one’s reason in order to discover truth and knowledge, the awareness of our common humanity, the rejection of what ‘is’ in order to seek what ‘can be’. The belief in agency and the possibility of social change remain crucial for modernity. What happened in the past months in Northern Africa, in Tunisia and Egypt, was evidence of the awareness of people that they can decide for themselves, that another world is indeed possible and that they can and should shape it themselves.

So, criticism of modernity has to be taken seriously. We do have to examine the relationship between men and nature, the idea of endless progress and growth,  development and diversity. This is not an easy task.
The second reason why this interpretation of the civilizational crisis is rather difficult to accept, is that the solution for the problems caused by capitalism and modernity cannot be found in a system which is, in the same way as capitalism, a child of modernity. In other words, socialism can no longer be an answer to the crisis.  We have to look beyond socialism if we really want to survive on a sustainable planet. Socialism also wants the forces of production to be developed, and this necessarily leads to limitless growth. Socialism is also based on a separation of men and nature and one of its central tenets is precisely the domination of nature and the refusal to accept limits to what is possible. Democracy and human rights are not necessarily bourgeois values and functional to capitalism, as Marx thought. Is the collectivization of the means of production the unavoidable answer to capitalism or can we think of other collective forms of management?

These are only some of the questions which cannot easily be answered, though a more profound analysis of Marxist writings can give us some clues. But it does mean, inevitably, that socialism cannot be promoted in its 20th century collectivist, productivist and undemocratic version anymore. If we want to maintain the concept, its content will have to change. It will not only be anti-capitalist, but will need another philosophical background taking into account the rights of nature as well as the urge for freedom of men and women.

The good life
In Ecuador and Bolivia, two countries which claim to practice a ‘socialism of the 21st century’ a concept of ‘buen vivir’ (the good life) is being developed. Its basic premise is another definition of the economy, away from growth and profit. The economy of the ‘buen vivir’ is an economy of and for life and the reproduction of life. This means there can be no separation between production and reproduction, since both are necessary for life, nor between men and nature, since both are needed for life. Growth and profit cease to be the objectives of economic activity and are substituted by an enlargement of freedoms and rights in order to guarantee life and the preservation of life. The state can support a social and solidary economy, though it is people who will decide on what and how to produce.
This is the basis from which other concepts are being re-signified, such as development, market, plan and ownership. Growth and wealth are no longer central ideas. Cooperation and solidarity are vital to preserve life of men and nature. The philosophy of ‘buen vivir’ then, tries to create a different logic, another State and another economy in which the traditional questions of socialism become largely irrelevant. Capitalism is not totally abolished but is also framed in a totally different logic. The programme is thus radical as well as pragmatic. As is being said repeatedly, ‘buen vivir’ is much more than a transition from capitalism to socialism, it is a systemic rupture which allows for showing the problems caused by our civilization and in which different cosmovisions can co-exist. It is about the decolonization of our thinking, about other meaning systems, about real emancipation.
Is this new Latinamerican perspective really new and proper to Latin America? In fact, I think it is not, because no culture, no ideology ever develops out of nothing and without the influence of others. European modernity has been prepared – and discussed – in Muslim Spain at the beginning of this millennium. It looks as if the new thinking of ‘buen vivir’ in Latin America is very much influenced by feminist economics, by indigenous people and also by the green ideology born in Europe and the United States. It also looks as if indigenous thinking is sometimes close to deep ecology. Who influenced whom? The answer is not that obvious if one knows that the current concept of ‘pachamama’ or ‘mother earth’ comes from … Europe. Originally, pachamama had a very different meaning for Bolivians referring to time, space and authority.

We therefore have to be very careful to not accept new ideologies coming from indigenous people, while rejecting these same ideas when coming from – a minority of - fundamentalist greens in Europe. Where green thinking reconceptualizes solidarity and society, going back to community and voluntary work, it is perfectly compatible with neoliberalism.  There also exists an antiglobalist, ecofascist tendency, often linked to spiritualism, esoterism or paganism, also criticizing the separation of humanity from nature. It is obvious these can be no options for the left or for the majority of greens.
The ‘buen vivir’ ideology is still being developed, and it does not always and totally reject modernity and materialism. The intellectual space in which it is developing is also more open than the one European greens have to work in. But a serious analysis of its convergence with green thinking could be most useful.
A perspective for the left
Seen from a Latin American perspective, with its important history of colonialism and internal colonialism, one can only look with admiration and some envy at these intellectual endeavours and the experiments with this new kind of socialism.

But it seems clear to me that Western Europe cannot just adopt this way of thinking and has its own homework to do. If we agree that this crisis and more particularly the climate crisis cannot be interpreted as just another cycle of capitalism but has to be seen as a systemic crisis that confronts us with the limits of capitalism and socialism – the limits of growth and progress – than we can use some of the basic assumptions of the Latinamerican thinking and more particularly the questioning of modernity and the re-signification of socialism itself.
Questioning modernity can be very useful, though the child cannot be thrown away with the bathwater. The most problematic point is the separation of humankind from nature and the desire to dominate nature. Neither this ‘domination’, nor the ‘harmony with nature’ as preached by the Bolivians, can, in my eyes, be accepted. Men have never lived in harmony with nature. Everywhere, in all continents and in all cultures, men have tried to protect themselves against floods and against earthquakes. Modern science has succeeded in protecting men with vaccines against certain illnesses. We may question the necessity and usefulness of certain technologies – nanotechnologies, gmo’s, etc. – but why would we have to reject a priori all extraction industry, dams or medical innovations? Is the main point not to have a democratic process to decide on what to develop and what not to develop, on the necessary equilibrium between respect for nature, survival and protection against nature?

The other point about modernity is the belief in our common humanity and the equality of all people, men and women, black and white, homosexuals and heterosexuals, religious and non religious. True, the practice does not always follow the discourse, but the discourse allows for people demanding their rights, because these rights are universal. It is precisely because humankind is based on an enormous diversity, that we need to declare all being equal. Western Europe is one of the subcontinents where these individual and collective freedoms are best protected, however much they are threatened today and however much Western Europe has ignored these rights in other continents. Universalism probably can be defined in another way and should never be defined by only one people. Nevertheless, there can be no ‘universalisms’, we are all equal human beings, part of nature, living on one common planet and part of one common humanity. Today, we therefore have to organize a debate on a new ‘universalism’ where all peoples and cultures can have their input. It will be based on different cosmovisions and be the result of their interactions.
Finally, there is the problem of rationality. Scientific research is extremely important, especially in these times of crisis. Surely, instrumental rationality can be dangerous, it can lead to unacceptable practices of discrimination and genocide, but the possibility for free inquiry certainly has to be preserved against all philosophical and/or religious limitations and manipulation.

In other words, a serious research into the pro’s and cons of modernity, into the many proposals that have been made in the past decades – Latour, Descola … - can certainly help to preserve the most important achievements of modernity and to avoid the risks of its rejection. Unfortunately, the past has taught us some bitter lessons – from Inquisition to fascism -  so as never again to indulge in intolerance, nationalism and identity politics. The Modernity Western Europe has developed, however imperfect it is, is the best protection against it.
In order to do this, Western Europeans will also have to decolonize their minds. We have all grown up with a world vision that puts Western Europe in the center of the world and even if many of us never shared the feelings of superiority, we do have to learn and look at the world in a different way, with Western Europe as just one civilization amongst many, as not having the monopoly on knowledge and rationality.
This is maybe the most difficult part of the homework. Latinamericans can do it in opposition to a colonial past, but what should we in Western Europe be opposed to? We certainly have to oppose our own colonial past, our double-tongued discourses, our intolerance, racism and fascism, today’s populism… And we urgently have to reflect on another kind of Modernity and universalism that integrates other peoples and cultures … We have to re-conceptualize socialism and propose alternatives that people can find attractive. This all depends on our willingness, on our possibility to abandon dogmatic thinking, to think beyond socialism and capitalism, on our contacts with other people and other cultures, on our openness and on our capacity to put our ‘achievements’ and knowledge into perspective.

Conclusion
The climate crisis is a very serious challenge which forces us to think beyond our traditional  ideologies. Capitalism and socialism are both unsustainable.
The renewal of socialist thinking began after 1989 but the crisis of 2008 meant a serious relapse into orthodox Marxism for many.

Green ideology is being discussed since about four decades, with a rightwing and leftwing tendency. From the beginning, there have been serious attempts to reconcile the ecological and the socialist thinking, though some of the blocking points concern precisely modernity, progress and growth.  The result is that we still have no alternative, which is very dangerous in the crisis situation of today.

We certainly should abandon growth and profit as the main objectives of our economy, but there is no reason to oppose growth and de-growth, as there is no reason to abandon our mechanic solidarity systems. Class conflict remains as important today as it has always been, while the need for democratic participation cannot be ignored. Green thinking can help to re-define the relationship between humankind and nature, as well as to introduce the use value instead of the exchange value of our products.

These are but some examples. The left has to stop its navel-gazing and urgently has to re-conceptualize itself. It has to integrate some elements of ecological thinking, it has to re-think its relationship to nature, progress and growth. While fundamentally remaining anti-capitalist, it has to re-focus its objectives.
François Houtart has started to develop a new coherent theoretical framework which can be used by the left. It is based on a new relationship between humankind and nature, the material foundation of our survival, based on the use value, democracy and global common goods and finally our diversity. He calls it the ‘Common Good of Humanity’. It is an invitation for all to discuss it and develop it.  

We cannot adopt ‘buen vivir’, we have to do our own work, but we can be inspired by the pragmatic and open way Latinamericans are working. It is a condition if we want a new attractive and democratic leftwing project. It is urgent.


I would like to thank Nafeez Mossadeq Ahmed, Alberto Acosta, Geneviève Azam, Giuseppe Caruso, Walter Baier, Janet Conway, François Houtart, Corinne Kumar, Edgardo Lander, Magdalena and Irene Leon, Anibal Quijano, Jai Sen, Boaventura de Sousa Santos, Immanuel Wallerstein for their inspiring books, lectures and talks.