Coronavirus Exposes the Contradiction at the Heart of Capitalism. It’s Time For It To Go.
By Louis Devine
Writing positively about Melbourne’s lockdown feels self-indulgent. Enjoying lockdown is only possible for the economically secure; which shamefully is a dwindling proportion of society. Still, something strange happened to me under lockdown: my mental health actually improved. Although material comfort certainly enabled this change, it didn’t cause it. In fact, materialism seemed to play no part at all – the less I consumed, the happier I became.
Consumption fuels capitalism. But we know overconsumption is pushing our planet to the brink. Finite resources cannot sustain infinite growth. Perhaps the relative simplicity of life under lockdown offers us a new way forward? Winding back conspicuous consumption might help solve two of late capitalism’s most pressing problems: environmental degradation and deteriorating mental health.
Consumerism is as much a cultural phenomenon today as it is an economic necessity. To keep the economy growing, workers must not only have the means (i.e. wages) to endlessly consume, but also the desire. Consumerism therefore operates on a psychological level. Youtuber John Green unintentionally described the consumerist impulse perfect: “there’s this huge difference between the person I actually am and the person I wish to be, and I continue to believe that somehow making a purchase will help me bridge this divide”.
We all experience these feelings to some degree. Marxists have a name for it: commodity fetishism. Under capitalism, highly specialised and monotonous tasks cause workers to become alienated from their labour. Alienated workers no longer see themselves in what they create. For example, menial daily office tasks are barely recognisable in a company’s final product. Work becomes meaningless.
This loss of meaning results in what philosopher Terry Eagleton describes as a reversal between the subject and object. Society values commodities (objects) more than the labour (subjects) which produces them. Value resides within consumerist products themselves, rather than deriving from human input. Commodities are thus fetishised. Alienation and fetishization directly feeds consumerism. Purchasing is an attempt to reacquire the meaning stripped from our lives and placed within objects.
Everyone experiences commodity fetishism differently. Personally, purchasing hundreds of dollars’ worth of unread books is an attempt to acquire an identity (being well-read) through consumption rather than hard work (actually reading). But happiness derived from consumption is fleeting; soon enough we find ourselves back in the store, justifying another purchase. Spending cannot plug the chasm of meaning opened up by capitalism – in fact, it perpetuates it.
According to Marx, the moral goal of society is allowing humans to expend their creative energies for their own sake. Work, rather than a means to afford consumption, should be something we inherently enjoy. Currently, the reverse is true: eighty-five percent of American workers hate their job. No wonder people spend their troubles away. There’s a reason bars call it “happy hour”.
We are unhappy, and the numbers show it. Society’s mental health continues to deteriorate. One in five Australians report feeling frequently either anxious or depressed, an increase from just five years ago. Writer and philosopher Mark Fisher described the growing mental health crisis as a “traumatic void” underlying capitalist societies. But when staring into the void, be careful the void doesn’t stare back. As if to prove his point in the most tragic of ways, Fisher took his own life in 2017.
We might be broken, but the system is not. Misery induced consumption keeps the economic engine running. But this cycle of conspicuous consumption cannot continue indefinitely. Eventually, something must give way. The choice is ours: will it be the economic system or the environment?
A contradiction lies at the heart of capitalism. Economic prosperity depends upon growth. Without the expectation of future growth, private firms and banks will not lend. Without growth, capital ceases to flow, and capitalism enters a periodic crisis phase. Mainstream progressive politics attempts to temper capitalism by smoothening out recessions through public spending. Note however, that this is just another form of consumption. Consumption-led growth borrows from the future by depending on an eventual return on investment. But time is running out. Finite resources cannot sustain infinite growth. Producing consumer goods generates carbon emissions. Not to mention the emissions involved in transporting them around the planet. Capitalism’s ‘creative destruction’ can’t save us either. So far, any innovation that reduces emissions has been offset by ever increasing consumption. ‘Green growth’ - economic growth decoupled from carbon emissions – is fictious.
But why would we want to preserve this system anyway? What use is something that not only makes us unhappy, but destroys the environmental fabric of society? Afterall, markets serve society, not the other way around (although many seem to have forgotten this). Fortunately, coronavirus has shown us another way. We know now more than ever that it is human connectivity that makes us happy, not the ability to go out and spend.
By recognising that pursuing our creative projects (such as writing this article) is what truly makes us happy, we can begin to consume less. Of course, individual changes are not enough. We need to change structures. Introducing universal “right to repair” legislation can help create a culture of repairing our existing broken goods, rather than instantly replacing them. A four-day work week would go a long way in giving us more time to pursue our hobbies. Research also suggests it makes people happier at work. Happiness acts as a bulwark against overconsumption.
We need to go deeper still. The incentives at the heart of our economic system must be rewired. Afterall, there’s no use in decreasing consumption if it causes a recession. Don’t listen to the cynics who tell you that changing capitalism means Soviet-style communism and crushing poverty. Alternatives do exist.
One such alternative is “doughnut economics”, a concept invented and popularised by Kate Raworth. Imagine a standard doughnut if you will. Its empty core represents human suffering due to economic underdevelopment: poverty, disease, food scarcity, violence, etc. We want to be safely ‘inside’ the doughnut, whereby everyone is fed, housed, employed, educated, and has enough resources to pursue their passions in life. Going beyond the doughnut means overshooting the biocapacity of the planet and triggering climate change, ozone layer depletion, ocean acidification, and so on. Endless economic growth has already caused us to push beyond Earth’s natural boundaries. Instead of measuring progress via growth, it should be measured by human wellbeing. New Zealand has already begun this transition, using the Happiness Index rather than GDP. Amsterdam is embracing the doughnut model to guide its post-COVID recovery.
Making this switch is not only necessary, it’s driven by irrefutable logic: what is the point of an economic system that leaves humanity miserable on a decaying planet? There is none. So, let’s get rid of it.
