QUICK BOOK REVIEWS
You will find on this page all the book reviews, as they were published on the main blog pages. They are gathered together here for easier browsing, as many relate to one another.
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- 23 June 2010 : “Cradle to Cradle” – M. Braungart, W. McDonough.
Rating : ***
Overall, a very interesting book, full of new revolutionizing ideas on how we can produce and consume while reducing pollution, all of this by developing more organic designs within our industries and manufacturing processes.
The comparison and metaphors with natural systems are a cool concept used by the authors and help them to get their inspiration : creating models that give back as much as they take from nature. (waste that becomes nutrients for example) Many ideas given through the books are now widely used, such as the green roofs for instead of storm drains, depolluting soils through the use of plants, smarter creations for products, and better
packagings that won’t live as long as their contents. The book also reminds us that real recycling means giving a real chance for the product to be reused entirely, this isn’t always the case as our current way of “recycling” (or downcycling as they refer to it) wastes a lot of valuable material that will be lost forever.
All this was very good, but I felt a bit disappointed by an approach that was still very much based on economical growth, rather than questioning the ambient atmosphere of over-consumption of goods.
It appears to me that growth will end up depleting all our resources if we do not rethink it. And simply making it “sustainable” is a mirage, we have been thinking about “sustainable growth” since the 70′s and this has led us nowhere. Sustainability appears to be, in my opinion, a slowing process, not a real solution : it helps to momentarily reduce consumption of all sorts of goods. I am hoping to soon read more dedicated books that will point out to real, more complete solutions.
Rethinking what our real needs are could be part of a real sustainable way of living. But the way we currently do it, “Sustainability” has lost all its meaning, it is rather a very attractive term/concept used and abused by everyone to make things seem fashionable. But a first step is better than no steps at all…
To be followed by other ideas 
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- 07 July 2010 : “Petit Traité de la Décroissance Sereine” (“Little Treaty of a Serene Degrowth“) – Serge Latouche.
Rating : ****
One of the most refreshing books I have read on (de)growth. The author, with interesting figures and facts, investigates and denounces the main issues of capitalism : “growth for growth“, at all costs, no matter what, and looks at what these costs will be, for us and our planet, in the long run.
You might think : “Shoot, not yet another book on anti-globalisation”, as many of these books are unoriginal, reiterating, and call for culpability as you read along… well, it is not the case here. This book is well thought of, and full of innovative ways in which we could consider our lives if we wanted to work for real change.
It is time we face the fact : we cannot afford to keep a luxurious lifestyle, we need to live better with less. For example, if everyone on Earth lived the American way (in the use of resources, that is), we would require at least 6x planet Earth to all survive !
The book explores simple solutions and what needs to be done in order to find a harmonious lifestyle : and it begins with the decolonization of our mental imagery. This means we should forget about all we have been taught concerning the way we should live, what we have been fed with since birth, those ideas/concepts are giving us an unrealistic view of what life should be and how it should be lived. Man was never meant to work 8 hours a day, 5 days a week, it is a recent invention. We came to cultivate what we needed to live, and not over-produce and over-consume what we don’t even need. We were meant to have a quality life with our community/loved ones and use our extra time to simply enjoy, meditate and live.
Capitalism is oppression, no matter how you put it, in regard to man, and to nature, as it does not respect one nor the other. Sustainable growth is a meaningless joke, as it means whatever the person employing this term wants to say. (to give you an example, the Nestlé CEO thinks his enterprise created “sustainable growth” because yes, they’ve been able to sell products to grandpas, fathers, and sons, and so on, for many generations ; so, in this light, their growth has been very sustainable…) The book draws our attention on the way we talk and view things.
This book is a real alarm/kick in the butt destined to wake us up to our true reality. I have greatly enjoyed it as the facts and figures have been thoroughly investigated, it’s not some green ecologist’s manifest, debunking blindly the industry ; it is a really pleasant, easy to read journalistic style of writing, which calls for the use of our common sense in understanding what is happening the world over. Author Serge Latouche also wrote a second book entitled “Survivre au Développement” – “Surviving Development” which will be the subject of the next book review.
I highly recommend this book if you read French (it is not yet available in English, to my knowledge, though Latouche has been widely translated) and if you are looking for interesting ways of escaping capitalism without falling into the mainstream booby trap subjects which are often used and abused in anti-globalisation literature and movements.
Very refreshing !
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- 14 July 2010 : “Survivre au Développement” (“Surviving Development“) – Serge Latouche.
Rating : ****
This book is the introduction to the former book reviewed (“Petit Traité de la Décroissance Sereine”). It was initially a report for Unesco by author Serge Latouche. The book goes into a detailed semantic analysis of the term “Développement” – meaning growth / development. Through this work, we are being shown the real meaning and how words are being played with, in order to bring us hopes for a better economy and future.
Written with the same patte than the previous book, delightful, easy to read and strongly documented.
To understand the main topic, you have to place it back in its original context. Interestingly enough, “growth”, “development”, as such are terms which were first used officially by US president Truman. Through the use of these words, Truman compared the US and the rest of the world : categorically, everything which was more or less inferior to the standard US industry and way of life was categorized as under-developped, implicitly showing the American superiority and defining/justifying its supremacy over the world and other countries, in a pseudo-attempt to “help“.
What we tend to refer to as “developed/development” only refers to a definition constrained within certain views and expectations : our capitalist, Western view of the world, where companies get competitive, where people consume and thus, feed the industrial machine, a world where new useless needs are endlessly created. We conceive growth as our very way of life : granting access to a given population to : buying/consuming goods, getting access to artificial needs and obsolescence, creating debts by buying houses or cars or anything else (and therefore keeping people within a system, as they are bound to paying the debts they have created), wasting countless resources as if they were endless…
- All this without taking into account what that given population really wants, we have created a myth, the myth that our lives and countries are better, because we can satisfy our every single envy, and urge others to do the same.
Growth, as such, does not exist, in many cultures, as it is not perceived as something truly necessary for the well-being of the populations. Growth can even be seen as unproductive and is considered as a “white man’s dream”. Some 3rd world farmers refuse the growth which has been set forth by institutions such as the World Bank, when asked why they do not want to make more money, they simply reply that they have all they need. On a direct opposite hand, others are now wanting to live selfishly, for example : “keeping their money to go on pilgrimage, as local water should be cared for by Oxfam or other humanitarian organizations, not them“… which means local solidarity is being put at stake, all for the profit of personal well-being, when more than often, the isolated communities of those individuals are fragile, and people need to rely on one another, for daily survival and many facilities.
Other popular mechanisms of development : as growth is not always seen as a positive ideology, many economists have been trying to give it a friendlier face by sticking fashionable adjectives to its name : sustainable growth, social growth, humanitarian growth and so forth… When we analyze the concepts behind the names, we find that we are again going around in circles, using a parade, with meaningless terms that make growth seem more humane, closer to our reach, feasible… Non-sense. As when we dig behind the facade, all there is is emptiness.
The author concludes by saying, that again, it is up to us to decolonize our minds, by pushing out of them all the futile ideas which have been given to us, which have been used as food for our minds since we were children, creating absurd hopes and dreams. It is now, more than ever, up to us, to break this illusion and work for the better world we are all dreaming of !
I have personally chosen to decolonize my mind, and it is so extraordinary and funny, once you stand back, to take a proper, reflective look, and to think over what is being seen… Once we become aware of the illusions that are created around us as part of our reality, we are able to step back and take a better look, in order to understand what our alternatives are. And then, we can begin to live the real life, and help others get there too. Knowledge is truly a powerful weapon within our hands, if we decide to use it for our own good… Never forget that ! 
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- 26 July 2010 : “No Conso – Manifeste pour la Grève Générale de la Consommation” – (“No Conso – Manifesto for a Consumption General Strike“) – by Paul Ariès. (Fr)
Rating : ***
The book seemed promising, as Mr Ariès is an inspiration for many, and for Serge Latouche amongst others, but I got a bit deceived because it was VERY slow at getting to the core of the topic, and first, I had to sort out the vocabulary used by the author, as he introduced notions that I wasn’t familiar with, such as “consum-actors” (consom-acteurs in French) and a few others. The book analyses the origins of consumerism and gives advices about how to become a user again, instead of just a consumer.
Consumerism is a reaction to the industrial era and appeared in Europe and in the United States around the same time, though the history is a bit different for both continents, they ended up with similar results on each side :
- At first, in Europe, workers created syndicates to help one another, and they also made groupings, “Cooperatives”, where people would team together to live, buy and educate children via communities. These communities grew and got out of control, slowly. (or local authorities felt they were losing control and looked for stronger grips) Rules changed, adapted, laws were made, and the emphasis of many theorizers of these days, was put on the act of consuming itself. It was seen as a solution for the construction of a better world, and as the best way to boost the economy after the wars.
In the United States, it started and developed as means of protesting : buying became the way to act, and say no to the British government, which was oppressing the colonies through numerous taxes that were added to many imported goods. It saw the appearance of boycott : from tea to other British imports, and soon enough, this new reaction was seen as patriotism, as people bought local produce and manufactured items. The United States gained their independence from Britain, but this “buying idea” was not given up.
As this tactic had been quite successful, it was reused over time, again and again, with syndicated industries, as people wanted more solidarity through their needs and what they chose to buy. Labels started to appear, they guaranteed products made under certain conditions ; by syndicated workers for example. Slowly, this way of thinking and buying got its way into women groups, associations and consumer groups became bigger.
An interesting part of the book analyzes so-called “ethical” labels such as Max Havelaar, AB (in France, for biological agriculture), Fairtrade… and looks at the meanings these labels have come to represent. We are being manipulated by the use of words, which give us the impression that we are good, smart consumers because we have the feeling we buy “political” value. Is Max Havelaar really fair trade when the producers have to pay a fee to “buy” the label ? Is a fruit fair trade if the worker is under-paid, in direct comparison to our salaries and social conditions ? Is a product truly biological when it comes from the other side of the Earth and had to be shipped ?
Many questions are raised with the aim of making us think deeper about the way we buy and consume. The best way to be eco, or to be wise, to be bio, or to be fair trade is to deeply think about every single condition linked to a product.
Mr Ariès’ aim is to make us think about what we have become, and what we can now do about it : do we want to become users, once again, or do we want to simply stay, as such, as consumers ?
Through series of examples, we are then given practical ideas about what can be done. When buying new items, we should ask ourselves “do I really need this ?”, “is this essential ?”, “how was this made ?”, “how was this shipped ?” and so forth. When we want to distinguish ourselves from plain consumers, we have to do the math about what we are about to buy and why.
The best way of escaping consumption is through sharing, through communities, through buying local goods and food and through the promotion of better values that consumerism simply took for granted and destroyed.
This book is not a “must read”, but it certainly brings light on plenty of useful facts and ideas. If you are looking to escape consumerism, you will see some mechanisms exposed in plain daylight.
I will try and find a more “practical” read for my next review.
