ISEE/DEGROWTH 2020 SYMPOSIUM RECORDINGS
Video recordings are available for the global on-line symposium of the International Degrowth Network and the International Society for Ecological Economics on the theme of “Economy and Livelihoods after Covid-19” held September 1st-5th, 2020. Each day has one video (about 4-5 hours in length) containing all sessions for that day.
Day 1: Tuesday 1st September
Session 1: On the possible alliance between degrowth and ecological economics: Would an alliance between ecological economics and degrowth help both communities achieve their shared goals for a better future, post COVID-19? If yes, how do we strengthen it?
Introduction: Rationale of the roundtable by Joshua Farley and Federico Demaria
Speakers: Ecological economics: Bina Agarwal (Confirmed), Julia Steinberger (Confirmed) and Emanuele Campiglio (TBC). Degrowth (Confirmed): Ekaterina Chertkovskaya, Ksenija Hanacek, Matthias Schmelzer.
Session 2: Gender, livelihood and the impact of Covid: This session is organized by the Feminisms and Degrowth Alliance (FaDA). It contains intersectional feminist reflections on Covid-19 and the politics of social reproduction, the Care Income, and the politics of care and commons in a context of ecological crisis. After a brief introduction to FaDA by Corinna Dengler, who hosts this session alongside Katy Wiese, we are looking forward to mini-inputs (7-10 minutes) by:
- Anna Saave on the pandemic as an opening for a care-full radical transformation;
- Susan Paulson on Covid-19, care & masculinities;
- Selma James and Nina López from the Global Women’s Strike on the Care Income; and
- Manuela Zechner on the politics of care and commons in a context of ecological crisis.
Following these inputs, there will be time to discuss the question how care can be organized in a degrowth society that strives for both intersectional gender and environmental justice first amongst the panelists and later on with the audience.
Session 3: Post COVID-19 challenges and options for green recovery in sub Saharan Africa: Rashid Hassan, 2020 Boulding Prize Winner
Day 2: Wednesday September 2nd
Sessions 4 and 5: Indigenous and Black communities and the impact of Covid: This session will be drawn from members of indigenous and black communities. Themes will include: consideration of the impact of Covid, environmental injustices and the new authoritarianism on black and indigenous communities; perspectives on creating and strengthening social and economic alternatives.
Session 4 Confirmed speakers:
- Ailton Krenak (Brazil)
- Felipe Milanez (Brazil)
- Yanet Carhuajulca (Perú)
Translators: Roldan Muradia (Venezuela/USA) and Peter may (USA)
Moderator: Tamara Goddard ( Saulteaux [pronounced Soto] First Nation, western Canada)
Session 5 Confirmed speakers:
- Manuel May (Mexico)
- Annie Moon (Navajo Nation, USA)
- Kevin Williams (Black American, USA)
- Josefina Skerk (Sami/Swedish)
Moderator: Tamara Goddard (Saulteaux First Nation, western Canada)
Day 3: Thursday September 3rd
Session 6: Class, livelihoods and alternative production: This session will consider the impact of Covid and an ecological economy after Covid through class and livelihood. It will draw on movements by labour to shift to alternative systems of production. How can production be redirected in more democratic ways to meet human needs? It will draw on the experience of the Lucas Plan, applying the lessons to the present context, and of the occupied factory in Milan, RiMaflow
Confirmed speakers:
- Hilary Wainwright (editor of Red Pepper)
- Phil Asquith (Lucas Workers Combine)
- Mick Cooney (Lucas Workers Combine)
- Luca Federici (RiMaflow)
- Mario Pansera (Autonomous University of Barcelona)
Moderator: Maeve Cohen (Rethinking Economics, UK
Session 7: Reflections: Making change happen: This session will reflect on the week’s colloquium discussions. The panel will be drawn from authors of recent books on degrowth and ecological economics. Themes might include: strategies and policies; incumbent interests and power; political mobilisation; responding to the new authoritarianism; social movements.
Confirmed speakers:
- Vincent Liegey (France/Hungary)
- Susan Paulson (USA)
- Neera Singh
- Bathsheba Demuth (USA)
- Rajeswari Raina (India)
Moderators: Mark Burton (UK) and Valeria Andreoni (Italy/UK)
Session 7a: A special intervention: Stuart Scott (USA), introduced by Clóvis Cvalcanti (Brazil)
Criminal Indictment of the Meme of Money & Growth Economics for the Destruction of Humanity & Nature
Day 4: Friday September 4th
Interventions from the Arts
Session 8: Decentralising Political Economies: Decentralizing Political Economies is an open-source research platform launching in September 2020. Set up as a long-term collaboration between The City Lab at Liverpool John Moores University, the Whitworth Art Gallery and The Association of Arte Útil, it explores the idea of usership in art through the implementation of real-world 1:1 scale projects in which artworks are themselves open-ended and functioning projects in the real world.
This session will introduce notions of ‘usership’ and the ‘constituent-led’ in art and art institutions. In discussion with artist Owen Griffiths, whose recent projects include a community growing garden, the session will consider alternative modes of ownership and rethinking livelihood in the context of civic space and urban landscapes.
Speakers:
- Poppy Bowers (The Whitworth, The University of Manchester)
- John Byrne (Liverpool John Moores University, School of Art and Design/City Lab)
- Owen Griffiths (Owen Griffiths Studio)
- Alessandra Saviotti (Liverpool John Moores University/ Asociación de Arte Util)
Session 9: Art and Degrowth. Reflecting on DegrowthFest, a community art exploration: From 14-16th August, art installations and happenings emerged throughout the Old North End neighbourhood of Burlington, Vermont. Through these art pieces, community members explored what crises reveal, and what we want to bring forward toward desirable futures and leave behind along the way. Many contributions also engaged with degrowth as a concept and movement. They are all available in a virtual gallery, for which we are seeking more contributions.
In this session, some of DegrowthFest’s organizers will reflect on the event and open space to discuss community art projects as a way to learn together about degrowth and other important ideas for transformation.
Participants, all from DegrowBTV, Vermont, USA:
- Meg Egler
- Sam Bliss
- Kristian Brevik
- Lindsay Barbieri (to be confirmed)
Session 10: Altamira 2042: Gabriela Carneiro da Cunha will introduce an on-line showing of Altamira 2042. She will lead a discussion following the showing. Gabriela Carneiro da Cunha is an actress, director and researcher. For the past 5 years, she has developed the ”Riverbank Project”, about rivers, buiúnas and fireflies, an art research dedicated to listening and amplifying the testimony of Brazilian rivers that are living an experience of catastrophe. This project was conceived as a response to the Anthropocene, defined here as “the moment when men cease to fear catastrophe to become the catastrophe themselves”.
Altamira 2042 is a performative installation created from the testimony of the Xingu River about the Belo Monte dam. A polyphony of beings, languages, sounds and noises take over the space to open up the audience’s attention to voices that so many try to silence.
Led Speakers and Flash drives become techno-shamanic devices carrying and amplifying both human and non-human voices, heard on the Xingu banks: riverside people, the Araweté indigenous people, the Juruna indigenous people, the city’s attorney, Altamira’s journalists, ambientalists, rappers, artists, city sounds, and also the Forest, the animals, the rain and the Xingu River itself. The performance contains nudity.