The (Very) Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie or (The Young and the Damned)
(an essay submitted for a paper at uni)
In this essay I use insights given on society by Herbert Marcuse to analyse the way in which the development of advanced society and economic relations has perpetuated climate change and mitigated the efforts to prevent it. I begin by outlining Marcuse’s notion of false needs, which is drawn on in the rest of the essay. Next I discuss three ways in which advanced industrial society has perpetuated climate change which are; (1) perpetual economic growth; (2) wasteful incentives and; (3) the co-optation of the climate conscious movement and the administration of a substitutive mindset. Finally, I argue that in lieu of this, we adopt an eliminative mindset. Advanced industrial society (conceptualised by Marcuse) has accelerated and perpetuated climate change, even convincing us it has the solutions in substitutes, when the solution is in elimination.
To begin my account, I wish to present Marcuse’s notion of false needs which the rest of this essay will draw on. False needs to Marcuse are those needs and desires that are “superimposed upon the individual by particular social interests…Such needs have a societal content and function which are determined by external powers over which the individual has no control.” In other words, these needs are contingent on society and the structure thereof; in contrast to true needs which entail the ‘vital’ needs of ‘nourishment, clothing and lodging.’ These false needs are administered by a wider system, particularly by advanced industrial society under capitalism. I wish to use this and the notion of false needs to show how it contributes to, and perpetuates climate change.
There are three ways in which the structure of advanced industrial society, economic relations and the manufacturing of false needs have contributed to, and caused climate change. The first is that it has created a mindset of perpetual growth. The second is that this growth is incentivised to be wasteful and environmentally damaging. Finally, and most importantly, the system co-opts climate justice itself by exploiting its popularity to sell substitute false ‘solutions’ to climate change. These phenomena can be seen and explained by Marcuse’s notion of the irrationality of technological rationality in relation to his concept of false needs. Marcuse argues that as technology has become more advanced and efficient, it has created irrational outcomes. I argue that this notion can be extended to explain how climate change is perpetuated by the same mechanism.
The first way in which the unique structure of advanced industrial society’s economic and social relations has contributed to climate change is that the continued evolution of technology and freedom of markets has caused a perpetual competition towards growth and profit. This means firms engineer desire to consume through advertising and marketing that are entirely superfluous, as it becomes the most profitable strategy. In Marcuse’s language, there are endless industries entirely dependent on the manufacturing of false needs. It is low hanging fruit to point out the absurdity of products like the bottle cap tripod or the twirling spaghetti fork but this point runs much deeper; do we really need things like bottled water, single-use coffee cups, new clothes every year or a new car every three? It is easy to see the consequences for the environment: most of the things we consume are designed in boardrooms to appeal to our unconscious, things we do not even need and could therefore do without using or creating in the first place. One simply needs to reflect on the multitude of useless, fleeting, and single-use products they consume on a daily basis to see they could live without these false needs, and improve their individual carbon footprint with even the smallest of changes.
The second way is that the aforementioned perpetual growth model means creation of goods in wasteful and environmentally damaging ways are incentivised. The most environmentally damaging and transient products are often the cheapest. Since the system requires growth at all costs, this is the choice firms go with, or are forced to go with in order to stay competitive in the market. Some even go as far to create products that are designed to cease functioning after an amount of time. Marcuse observes that “advertising, public relations, indoctrination, planned obsolescence are no longer unproductive overhead costs but rather elements of basic production costs.” In other words, the means of production itself creates further jobs and incentives within itself to perpetuate its own system, only accelerating the production of false needs and the destruction of the environment. For example, car companies bring out a new model for a line of cars every one to two years with slight improvements to the last; Apple creates new and slightly improved iPhones every year that are relentlessly consumed; popular textbooks are revising their editions every few years. The incentives are such that firms must constantly release new and improved renditions of their commodities that only serve to continue along the environmentally destructive path that false needs tread. In recent times attitudes towards climate change have been changing; and therefore, are beginning to shift the incentives for companies, but this change itself is subject to the system.
The final way is that, while there have been changes in attitudes towards climate change, that attitude itself is getting subsumed and commodified by society, presenting what I call ‘false solutions.’ As climate awareness rises, so does the desire for environmentally conscious consumption. But, advanced capitalistic society itself adjusts to this change in desire; it becomes profitable to market goods as organic, green, recyclable, eco-friendly or otherwise. But I ask, how many of us verify these labels? Every time we purchase the ‘environmentally friendly’ substitute, how often are we actually making a difference? For example, there is a common belief that buying something ‘biodegradable’ is making a difference. In reality the ambiguous guidelines for labeling such a product, and the fact that in the majority of landfills “throwing [a] biodegradable cup into the trash is basically as bad as throwing a normal plastic cup in the trash” because they do not meet the conditions required for the bio-degradation process. In this it can be seen that the climate conscious movement itself is vulnerable to exploitation by companies to reap greater profits. They are incentivised to relentlessly churn out substitute products for us to consume, instead of eliminating them all together. I call these ‘false solutions’ to climate change.
‘False solutions’ administered by society are substitutes for wasteful products for other slightly less wasteful products. This instils in us a mindset of substitution; I argue we ought to opt out, into a mindset of elimination. What was initially a homegrown movement for environmentally conscious living became another way in which money can be made, by presenting false solutions to this impending and fashionable climate crisis. One of the most egregious examples of false solution given to people is the advent of paper straws. When it became clear that plastic straws were an unnecessary commodity used in millions of instances across the globe, many climate activists campaigned for large companies like Starbucks to get rid of them, and they complied. Only, it was not demanded of them to get rid of straws altogether, it was demanded they substitute them with paper straws, another commodity. In the same way that Marcuse thinks that the welfare state and capitalism present an illusion of true freedom making us complacent in the system, substitution of false needs provides the illusion that people are making a real difference and therefore causing, climate complacency. In response, I argue that we ought to opt out of the substitutive mindset, into an eliminative mindset. This entails shedding the passing desire to buy into the false needs; not using a straw at all; not buying every new iPhone; buying clothes when one needs clothes; buying second-hand; or living minimally. The euphoria of owning new ‘stuff’ or buying into administered false needs passes too quickly.
To conclude, I have argued that advanced industrial society (conceptualised by Marcuse) has accelerated and perpetuated climate change, even convincing us it has the solutions in substitutes, when the solution is in elimination.
Kumagai, Jillian. "25 Completely Absurd Inventions You'll Only Use Once." Mashable Australia. Accessed September 30, 2019. https://mashable.com/2014/10/26/absurd-inventions/.
Marcuse, Herbert. One Dimensional Man: Studies in the Ideology of Advanced Industrial Society. Boston: Beacon Press, 1964.
Szaky, Tom. “The Myth of Biodegradability.” The New York Times. Accessed October 1, 2019. https://boss.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/02/09/the-myth-of-biodegradability/.
Waldman, Michael. "A New Perspective on Planned Obsolescence." The Quarterly Journal of Economics 108, no. 1 (1993): 273-283.
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