environment, development and radical alternatives

Can Environment and Development Go Together?

Towards a Radical Ecological Democracy

Ashish KothariKalpavriksh

India’s Impressive Growth• One of world’s biggest economies, high growth

rates, amongst world’s richest persons, 800 million mobile phones, better services for middle class

‘Development’• Development = opening up of

opportunities: intellectual, cultural, material, social

vs• ‘Development’ = material

growth (through industrial and financial expansion)– measured in % economic

growth, per capita income, etc

Today’s vision of ‘development’

Violence against nature, communities, and cultures

Clash of civilisations …

From livelihoods as ways of life …

… to livelihoods as jobs, divorced from rest of life:

Violence against ourselves: our identity, our health, our well-being!

Livelihoods vs. Deadlihoods

Outlets:

• shop till you drop (retail therapy!)

• hate the ‘other’ or ‘outsider’

Jobless growth; continuing and new poverty

• Myth of growing employment: ‘jobless growth’ in organised sector:– 26.7 million in 1991– 30 million in 2012

• 20% unemployment among youth • % below poverty line: 38 to 70%

• World’s largest number of malnourished and undernourished women/children

• 60 million people displaced by ‘development’ projects

‘Green revolution’ model

•High cost of inputs, low purchase prices = farmer indebtness•Destruction of soil productivity, dependence on market & govt

Destruction of India’s agriculture

>300,000 suicides (many in heartland of green revolution!)

Destruction of India’s environment

– >5.5 million ha. forest diverted in last 60 years– 70% waterbodies polluted or drained out– 40% mangroves destroyed– Some of the world’s most polluted cities and

coasts– Nearly 10% wildlife threatened with extinction– Extensive chemical poisoning

Smitu Kothari

Cost of environmental damage = 5.7% points GDPWorld Bank (2013)

(impacts taken into account) •urban & indoor air pollution•inadequate water supply, sanitation and hygiene•agricultural damage by soil salinity, water-logging & soil erosion •pasture degradation•deforestation

Growthless growth

Over-consumption by the rich • Richest 1% consume 17x poorest 40% (per

capita)

1% richest own 50% wealth!!!!

Impacts: growing inequities, deprivation

Money

Cartoon by Vikram Nayak

Cartoon by Vikram Nayak

“Biggest grab of tribal lands since Columbus” (Min. of Rural Dev committee report, 2009)

Water…the contested resource• Several hundred million people without safe

drinking water• Globally, 3X more spending on bottled water,

than needed to provide clean drinking water and sanitation to every person on earth

• Indian bottled water market growing 20-40% annually (global: 4.5%): from 2 mill. (1990) to 150 mill. cases (2010)!

• Coca Cola mines groundwater away from villages that were using it (“if you can’t get water, drink Coke”!)

Smitu Kothari

Does the media cover these issues?

TOI / HT/ IE/ ET/ The Hindu coverage: Development: 6%Agriculture: 3%Environment/wildlife: 1.7%Most space to politics, crime, sports (study by The Hoot)

Of top circulation papers, editorial space to rural issues = 2%(study by CSDS)

India the new Coloniser (with China)

>500,000 hectares of pasture/agricultural land taken over by Indian companies in Ethiopia

More in L. America and rest of Africa

Direct/indirect support by government

India (& China, etc) on the path of ‘globalised development’?

Gandhi: ‘if India is to take Britain’s path of

‘development’, it will strip the world bare like locusts’

Are there alternatives?

Structural roots of unsustainability & inequity

Centralisation / concentration of powerCapitalism State-dominated regimes Patriarchy Caste

False or partial solutions: Technofixes, market solutions, green growth, REDD/REDD+, CDM, geoengineering … ‘sustainable development’

Resistance …

… is part of the alternative

Food security: sustainable agriculture

• Reviving traditional diversity, promoting cultivated and wild foods• Creating community grain banks • Empowering women/dalit farmers, securing land rights• Creating consumer-producer links (Zaheerabad org. food restaurant) • Linking to Public Distribution System

Deccan Development Society (AP): integrating conservation, equity, &

livelihoods through sustainable agriculture

An individual revolutionary…Natwar Sarangi

Narishu vill, Cuttack dist, Odisha

GenX: Jubraj Swain

Growing >400 varieties of rice

Seed albums and banks

Water security: do we need big dams and canals?

KachchhWater self-sufficiency in one of India’s lowest rainfall regions

Knowledge transfer to parageohydrologists

Arvari Sansad (Parliament), Rajasthan: water and food security through landscape governance

Natural resources: conservation & livelihoods

Self-rule & decentralised governance: Mendha-Lekha (Maharashtra)

Informed decisions through monitoring, and regular study circles (abhyas gat)

All decisions in gram sabha (village assembly); no activity even by government officials without sabha consent

Conservation of 1800 ha forests, now with full rights under Forest Rights Act

Vivek Gour-Broome

Earnings from sustainable NTPF use (over Rs. 1 crore in 2011-12), and use of govt schemes towards: • Full employment• Biogas for 80% households• Computer training centre

• Training as barefoot engineers

2013: all agricultural land donated to village, collective ownership

www.kalpavriksh.org

Livelihood / job security

Jharcraft (Jharkhand) Employment for >3 lakh families…

reviving crafts, reducing outmigration

Dharani, AP: farmer’s company(facilitated by Timbaktu Collective)

Maati Sangathan, UttarakhandWomen’s empowerment through local resource-based

livelihoods

The Village and the City …

Gram swaraj & rural revitalisation: outmigration is not inevitable

Ralegan Siddhi & Hivare Bazaar (Maharashtra), Kuthambakkam (TN)

Kudumbashree (Kerala)

Towards sustainable cities Bhuj (Kachchh): •reviving watersheds, decentralized water storage and management •solid waste management and sanitation •livelihoods for poor women •dignified housing for poor •Information-based empowerment under 74th Amendment

(Hunnarshala, Sahjeevan, Kutch Mahila Vikas Sangathan, ACT, Setu)

Middle class actions …

Lake revival / conservation, water harvesting, garbage management (Bengaluru, Salem)

Participatory budgeting (Bengaluru/Pune)‘Maptivism’ by Transparent Chennai

Dignified livelihoods for urban poor

Kagaj Kach Patra Kashtakari Panchayat

& Swach (Pune)

Learning / education: traditional and modern, oral and written, local and global, experiential and theoretical … •Adharshila, MP •Jeevanshala, Narmada•SECMOL, Ladakh •Imli-Mahua, Chhattisgarh•Marudam, Tamil Nadu •Adivasi Academy, Guj•Swaraj University, Rajasthan •Beeja Vidyapeeth, Uttarakhand•Bhoomi College, Karnataka

Intergenerational transmission of knowledge

•Surshala•Karigarshala•Sagarshala•Kala Vidyapeeth•Parageohydrologists

Traditional & new skills for livelihoods

Energy, technology…Energy: decentralised, renewable, efficient (Ladakh solar; SELCO Karnataka)

Solar micro-grid powering village Dharnai, Bihar

Energy, technology…

Technological innovations to reduce ecological impact, reach the poor (malkha cotton weaving, AP; Hunnarshala housing, Kachchh; Solar passive architecture, Ladakh)

Alternative Media & CommunicationsFreeing media of govt & corporate control:

•Community radio (>150); FM? •Mobile-based (CGNetSwara, Chhattisgarh)•Movement newsletters, folk theatre•Film/video (Video Volunteers)•Internet (Scroll, Wire, Infochange, India Together …)•‘Social’ networks … virtual communities

Pic: Puroshottam Thakur

The government responds…• New laws:

– Right to Information Act– National Employment Guarantee Act– Scheduled Tribes and Other Forest

Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act 2006

• New programmes: – Organic farming policies /

programmes in 16 states: Sikkim 100% by 2015, Kerala by 2020?

Decentralised governance

Nagaland ‘communitisation’: devolution of govt powers over education, electricity, health to village councils

Result: sharp increase in quality & quantity of services

Eco-swaraj: Radical ecological democracy

(Radical = going to the roots, challenging the conventional)

• achieving human well-being, through: – empowering all citizens & communities to participate in

decision-making– ensuring socio-economic equity & justice – respecting the limits of the earth

Community (at various levels) as basic unit of organisation, not state or private corporation

Towards a sustainable and equitable society … 5 pillars

•Ecological sustainability

•Social well-being & justice

•Direct democracy

•Economic democracy

•Cultural and knowledge diversity

Fundamental values & principles • Diversity and pluralism (of ideas, knowledge, ecologies,

economies, polities, cultures…)• Self-reliance for basics (swavalamban)• Cooperation, collectivity, and ‘commons’ • Rights with responsibilities/duties• Dignity of labour• Respect for subsistence • Qualitative pursuit of happiness• Equity / equality (gender, caste, class, ethnic)• Simplicity, enoughness (aparigraha)• Decision-making access to all• Respect for all life forms • Ecological sustainability

Recipe for transformational alternatives: Ingredient 1. A NEW POLITICS

Swaraj“Our government in Mumbai and Delhi, we are the government in our village”

Cartoon by Vikram Nayak

A NEW POLITICS

Direct democracy (local): decentralised and nested decision-making

Direct democracy (state/national): referendums & deliberative processes

Delegated/representative democracy, with mechanisms of accountability (right to recall, public audit, reporting back…)

Ecoregional planning across states and countries … political boundaries aligned with ecological and cultural ones?

Ingredient 2.

A NEW ECONOMICS OF PERMANENCE*

Earthshastra: Economics as if the earth (including people) mattered

* JC Kumarappa

Whatever happened to self-reliance?

We already

Kudumbashree: “are we so dirty we need a multinational to make soap for us?”

A NEW ECONOMICS

Mindful of ecological / planetary limits, away from growth addiction

Localisation: self-sufficiency/sovereignty in basic needs

Production, consumption (prosumption) locally controlled; & sustainable consumption line?

Demonetisation: Relations of caring/sharing, local exchange systems, restructuring the market (haat)

Ingredient 3. A JUST SOCIETY

When people go hungry & thirsty, it is not food & water but

justice that is in short supply

A JUST SOCIETY

Towards equity amongst classescastes (eradication of)women and men ethnic groupsspecies

Towards universal rights-based approaches, infused with responsibilities

Ingredient 4. WAYS OF

KNOWING

Diverse knowledges, diverse cultures

CULTURE AND KNOWLEDGE

Relinking with rest of nature

Mix of tradition and modernity … both critically examined

Democratic R&D / S&T / knowledge / innovation: in public domain, participatory, transparent

Alternative media and arts

Opportunities for spiritual / ethical growth (without falling into trap of communal religious institutions)

Ingredient 5.

RENEWED RELATIONSHIP WITH/IN NATURE

Mutual learning with other peoples / cultures ….

• Latin American experiments: direct and delegated democracy, worker-led production, community health, land re-appropriation movements

• Europe’s degrowth movement, solidarity economy • Cuba’s urban agriculture, public R&D • Indigenous peoples’ territorial struggles and worldviews

of well-being (buen vivir, sumaq kawsay, ubuntu …) • Many others….

Alternative globalisation• Global flow of ideas, cultures, materials (millennia old)

NOT• Globalisation dominated by:

–unrestricted financial and economic flows–imposition of one model of ‘development’ across the world

Pathways to ecological swaraj….• People’s resistance (Vedanta/POSCO, Orissa; anti-SEZ;

hundreds of others)• Stretching limits of system (RTI, FRA)• Citizens’ networking, joint actions, collective visioning• Personal introspection, spiritual deepening • Empowering political carriers of new visions ….

movements, students, unions, etc

Vikalp Sangams (Alternatives Confluences): practical collaborations, bottom-up visioning

Vikalp Sangams (regional)Timbaktu, Andhra Pradesh, Oct 2014Madurai, Tamil Nadu, Feb 2015Ladakh, July 2015Wardha, Maharashtra, October 2015Kachchh, July 2016

Vikalp Sangams (thematic)

Decentralised renewable energy: March 2016Food sovereignty : Sept 2016 & 2017Youth: early 2017Learning and education: 2017Arts: 2017?

www.alternativesindia.orgwww.vikalpsangam.org

What can we do? •Visit, understand, study community initiatives•Support actions against destructive development•Make our lifestyle sustainable•Make our school/college sustainable•Spread awareness amongst others

•Get creative! (responsible art, media, tech)

•Choose a career/life-choice contributing to a saner future!

• www.kalpavriksh.org

• www.vikalpsangam.org

• chikikothari@gmail.com

For more information….