Customer Reviews

Capitalism as if the World Matters

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Activist Jonathon Porritt offers the startling proposal that capitalism may provide the best solution to poverty and global environmental degradation, though his solution requires reshaping capitalism. Porritt is aware that conventional environmental activists, greens and political academics favor socialism more than capitalism. However, he takes them to task for ignoring the power and potential of such capitalist mechanisms as markets and property rights and for their naïveté in expecting voters or political leaders to embrace their dismal vision of environmental responsibility as asceticism. We find his book more suggestive than programmatic. It meanders like a river and is sometimes directionless. The author makes his passions apparent, including anti-Americanism and scathing criticism of certain forms of Christianity. Though Porritt does not offer a detailed description of his vision or the practical steps needed to realize it, he does suggest a path toward a utopian ideal; for that hope, he deserves appropriate attention.

Jonathan Porritt's CAPITALISM AS IF THE WORLD MATTERS provides college-level readers with a fine survey of how capitalism at its foundations may be a part of the environmental problem as a whole. Many time commercial activities themselves lend to eroding environments: it's up to both business and government to work hand in hand to build a form of capitalism and free market solutions which lend towards sustainability rather than away from it - and to consider the chapters in CAPITALISM AS IF THE WORLD MATTERS, which offers commentary and guideposts for building different capital resources.

The spirit is there along with a sound message and an abundance of info. But the author's flesh is much too willing. This book is about ten times longer than the message and the material justify. Go to a bookstore, browse it selectively for half an hour for free, and you'll have the best of it. What is sustainable about books that are too long? KISS = Keep It Short and Simple!!

The author goes to great lengths to demonstrate that, when natural capital is included in the calculation, capitalism can be made docile. Capitalists are disinclined to follow this more ethical course without guns pressed to their temples, however. Corporations are mandated by Supreme Court decisions to put return on investment before any other consideration, meaning they are prohibited from acting ethically if profits might be compromised. This sociopathic perspective means corporations must "externalize" whatever costs they can, environmental costs being the easiest. "Free market democracy" (as used by neocons) means we must eat the soot and drink the effluent of industry.