1   Towards Convergence

Sean Connelly, Mike Gismondi, Sean Markey, and Mark Roseland

The roots of the modern environmental movement in the Western world can be traced to the publication of Rachel Carson’s book Silent Spring in 1962. The book was a very public wake-up call of our human impact on the environment. Supported by meticulous research, Carson clearly outlined the devastating environmental costs of America’s postwar economic progress. A decade later, in The Limits to Growth, Donella Meadows and colleagues measured the thresholds of the earth’s ecosystem and horizons of resource exhaustion. Our Common Future (1987), the report of the United Nations’ Brundtland Commission, warned of increasing environmental degradation, as well as the challenges of underdevelopment and the growing gap between the world’s rich and poor. The report asked current generations to reduce consumption and conserve ecosystems for future generations—to practice what the report termed sustainable development. As government and business embraced the term in the 1990s, however, many in the environmental movement began to reject it. They feared that its original meaning had been co-opted by corporate messages equating sustainable development with more rapid economic growth allegedly intended to alleviate poverty, increase productivity and consumption standards, and diversify economies (Block 1912 Collective 2007; Rees 1990). As Tim O’Riordan put it (2007, 325), “Sustainable development has become a universal phrase. It means everything, and is in danger of meaning nothing.”

In this discussion of the transition to sustainability, we return to centre stage the complex of ecological limits, social inequalities, and moral obligations encompassed by the term sustainable development when it was first introduced by the Brundtland Commission. Neither economies nor ecosystems have stood still since Brundtland. If anything, the politics of sustainability has entered a new stage. Today, some 60 percent of the planet’s ecosystems are at risk (Millennium Ecosystem Assessment 2005). Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are rising year after year. The demand for oil has far surpassed the supply of conventionally produced oil, so governments and corporations are turning to unconventional sources that are much more costly to extract, both financially and environmentally (Davidson and Gismondi 2011). With the rapid decline in the price of oil in 2014 and 2015, the future of investments in these unconventional supplies is being questioned. Investments in unconventional oil run the risk of being stranded assets, with commentators such as the Governor of the Bank of England, President of the World Bank and the U.S. President referring to the vast majority of these and older reserves like coal being un-burnable (Rusbridger, 2015). The certainty of a steady future supply of energy is in doubt (Aleklett et al. 2010; IEA 2008, 2010). Furthermore, leading scientists now argue that we have breached critical planetary boundaries. Global patterns of climate change, resource exhaustion, species extinctions, and environmental pollution confirm that we have surpassed ecological and thermodynamic limits. Only a massive reduction in carbon usage and emissions over the next fifty years can correct our error (Barnosky et al. 2012).

In addition to these disturbing trends, social inequality remains high, both globally and locally. In the past, unsustainable practices and ways of being were justified through their development benefits. In simple terms, burning fossil fuels in the present could be traded-off for rising incomes, with the expectation that rising incomes would result in more sustainable practices in the future. Evidence of increasing inequality and worsening environmental conditions suggests such an argument is not tenable. Today, the effects of unsustainability are often unanticipated and unpredictable, and continuing along the path we are on will endanger the livelihoods of millions well into the future (Rockstrom et al. 2009). Poor and marginal populations are the most vulnerable (AtKisson 2011; Srinivasan et al. 2008; Urry 2011). As changes in the ecosystem accelerate, we must accelerate our response. Radical change is needed.

How can we respond quickly and effectively to this sustainability challenge? Information is not enough, that much we know. We cannot just put information in front of decision-makers and wait for them to make the right decisions. Nor can we expect information—even the best information—to change public behaviour or to cause firms and states to steer economies wisely and equitably towards sustainability. Nothing short of a seismic shift in consumption, technologies, values, and political organization will suffice (Shove 2010; Shove and Spurling, 2013).

In this book, the contributors argue that the social economy is strategic to this great change. Research has shown that the social economy has the potential to be catalytic—as having the potential to lead a transition to a more humanized economy, one that is attentive to local and global sustainability (Bouchard 2013; Buchs et al., 2011; Connelly 2010; Gertler 2006; Gibson-Graham, Cameron, and Healy, 2013; Gismondi & Cannon, 2012; Restakis 2010, 2011; Wittman, Beckie, and Hergesheimer 2012). Our perspective is also based on some foundational principles of social economics: the interdependence of parts within the whole, a dependence on robust democratic institutions, and innovation that is locally defined and controlled to meet sustainably a community’s or a region’s basic needs for energy, food, shelter, and work.

The transition to a more sustainable economy has barely begun. The power and politics involved in maintaining the status quo are daunting. Yet change is underway. The intentional adoption and merging of the alternative structures, principles, and practices of sustainability and social economics may facilitate a just transition to sustainability.

Most readers are probably familiar with the social economy. If you volunteer in your community, you are part of it. So, too, if you are a member of a credit union or a non-profit society. You encounter the social economy if you participate in a community centre or support a women’s shelter, live in a housing co-operative, or shop at a social enterprise.

But let’s be more specific. The social economy can be understood as a “third system” of the economy, in addition to the public and private systems. In this third system, citizens take action to satisfy their own and others’ needs by working together in some way (Pearce 2003). The social economy includes non-profit organizations whose actions enhance communities socially, economically, and environmentally, often with a focus on disadvantaged community members (Neamtan 2009). The social economy, according to some writers, encompasses the work of any democratically controlled organization whose mission is both social and economic in nature (Amin, Cameron, and Hudson 2002; Lionais and Johnstone 2009; McMurtry 2009a; Neamtan 2009). Some define social economy organizations as those groups whose members and supporters are fired by the principle of reciprocity. Such groups pursue economic, social, and environmental goals through the social control of capital, including the use of market mechanisms, to pursue explicit social and environmental objectives (Lewis 2006; Restakis 2006; see also Fairbairn 2009; Neamtan and Anderson 2010; and Pearce 2003).

How big is the social economy? Researchers estimate that it generates $79.1 billion (7.8%) of Canada’s annual gross domestic product and employs over two million people (Amyot, Downing, and Tremblay 2010, 14–15). And it is growing rapidly. (See chapter 2 for figures on British Columbia and Alberta.) The size, scope, and impact of the social economy, however, differ from region to region. In Québec, the social economy is large and well known and is recognized as a distinct form of economic activity with its own social and cultural values. The Chantier de l’économie sociale acts as the social economy’s umbrella organization in that province, unifying an array of non-profit groups, mutual associations, co-operatives, and community economic development initiatives. The organization has thus been able to secure legitimacy and support from the Province, universities, and public policy research centres (Bouchard 2013).

Elsewhere in Canada, the social economy is not as well recognized by either the public or government, despite a long history of community action in response to social and economic restructuring. All the same, its work and impact are significant. Numerous non-profit societies, co-operatives, mutual associations, and foundations pursue economic activities on behalf of vulnerable individuals and groups: farmers, rural resource communities, the urban poor, and other disadvantaged populations.

Two recent English Canadian books explore Canada’s social economy in depth, analyzing how it is organized and what it does (McMurtry 2009b; Quarter, Mook, Armstrong 2009). Surprisingly, ecological sustainability is rather marginal to both of these studies: in the words of John Pearce (2003, 43), “It should be axiomatic that an enterprise which has a social purpose will have a clear positive environmental policy, for to be environmentally irresponsible is to be socially irresponsible.” Graham Smith (2005, 125) speaks of “the mutual, common or general interest that is fundamental to the ethos of the social economy”: surely, environmental sustainability is in the common interest of us all.

The engagement of social economy actors with environmental sustainability has been uneven, but it is growing (Smith 2005). We propose that a serious effort to bring about a convergence of the social economy with critical sustainability theory and practice can create a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts. This book is about social economy organizations that grapple with sustainability in its fullest sense: their structures, like their enterprises, target a triple bottom line of mutual economic, environmental, and social sustainability. Although the examples explored in this volume are all located in western Canada, we recognize that they are part of something bigger. As Nancy Neamtan, the past president of the Chantier de l’économie sociale, reminds us, “the social economy has grown into a global movement. It does not only respond to the repercussions of repetitive crises. It proposes an alternative: a pluralist and inclusive economy within a framework of sustainable development” (Neamtan 2009, 1).

It is essential, however, that environmental sustainability be integrated into the politics and practice of the social economy. The reverse is also true. Some environmental researchers and activists ask which social and economic practices and values align well with sustainability. They recognize a need to “social economize” sustainability in order to increase the impact of sound practices (Connelly, Markey, and Roseland 2011). The effort to connect the two fields, in terms of both research and practice, has just begun. Little attention has been paid, for example, to what such a convergence could do for social sustainability. In this book, we attempt to begin filling that gap. We investigate how innovations from both movements might be united, thereby accelerating the transition to sustainability.

We explore this potential as it relates to a number of the basic needs associated with life and livelihood. The case examples herein cover such topics as local food, transportation, housing, social inclusion, job creation, heritage conservation, tourism, land, finance, and advocacy. Each chapter begins with “green social economy” innovations in western Canada, followed by a discussion of patterns emerging in other parts of Canada or internationally. For decades, practitioners in the areas of environmental sustainability and social economics have known and respected each other. Occasionally, they have even worked on projects together. But something new is afoot. Something is driving innovative connections of thought and practice. This book aims to expand and strengthen those connections.

The concept of “sustainable development,” while broadly recognized, is interpreted in different and often competing ways (Mebratu 1998). Early discussions of sustainable development concentrated on conservation of non-human nature and management of the environment. Today, sustainable development encompasses issues of employment, equality, and the economy (Edwards 2005). The concept itself has been subject to much criticism because its ambiguity leaves it open to widely different interpretations (Dale 2001; Keiner 2004; Robinson 2004; Sneddon, Howarth, and Norgaard 2006). Indeed, many argue that the concept is used to perpetuate overconsumption and the destruction of ecosystems driven by the process of capital accumulation (Johnston, Gismondi, and Goodman 2006). In addition, much discussion of sustainable development occurs at a level of abstraction that means little to the general public (Bridger and Luloff 1999).

It is at the local level where SE and SCD convergence is most apparent. It is the context specific interventions in particular places that provide opportunities to connect problems and solutions across communities. SCD and SE address realities at the local level, where people generally experience economic and social marginalization and environmental degradation most acutely (Bridger and Luloff 1999, 380). In the last two decades, climate change and energy issues have taken an especially large toll on Canada’s poor, including the working poor. Energy costs have spiked and energy supplies have grown uncertain. The portion of household income spent on cooling and heating, light, water, and waste removal has risen, resulting in “fuel poverty”—the inability to stay adequately warm or cool at a reasonable cost—for large numbers of citizens. At the same time, transportation costs have escalated, with a concomitant growth in the portion of the household budget spent on personal transport and on groceries and household goods.

Faced with the mounting impacts of these trends, individuals, communities, and municipalities are collaborating with social economy organizations. Social economy models of organization offer strong platforms for generating knowledge and innovation relevant to sustainability. Indeed, the theory and practice of both SCD and social economy offer us an entirely new ethos: they provide us with novel and valuable ways of thinking and organizing. Table 1.3 compares strong approaches to SCD with strong approaches to social economy.

The contributors to this volume are committed to research that advances the work of social economy and sustainability practitioners. We are enthusiastic about the potential of a convergence of these two fields, but our enthusiasm should not be misread as naïveté. We are well aware of the challenges of socio-economic transition and of the economic imperatives of capitalist accumulation that pressure firms (even well-meaning co-operatives, credit unions, and social enterprises) to reduce costs and generate surpluses in ways that often result in social exploitation and environmental decline (Meiksins Wood 2002). Although we are attentive to these pressures and tensions, we avoid what J. K. Gibson-Graham calls “capitalocentrism”—seeing capitalism as an all-pervading presence—since it leaves “little emotional space for alternatives” and can stifle one’s imagination for political change (2006, xxii).

Many writers have struggled recently with the tension between the building of alternatives and the pressure of capitalism on those organizations that attempt to do so (Alperovitz 2011; Bajo and Roelants 2011; Curl 2012; Lewis and Conaty 2012; Lutz 2002; Murray 2010; Smith and Seyfang 2013). Each of the pockets of resistance to that pressure which are highlighted in this book arises out of a desire by people in particular places to do things fairly and sustainably. These organizations, and the individuals who participate in them, take risks and extend the boundaries of what is possible. They frame problems and solutions in new ways. They offer hopeful narratives of alternative futures. They build networks, institutional supports, and movements, sometimes with the help of the state (especially at the municipal and regional levels). They explicitly incorporate concerns about social and ecological sustainability in their endeavours. More and more, they federate and seek to enter multistakeholder coalitions to regulate or alter structures of provision and market pressures. Their existence provides a promising counternarrative to the dominance of capitalist logic. They open up new spaces for others to creatively reframe how we relate to each other and to the environment in ways that reflect strong sustainability and strong social economy approaches.

The many social economy organizations introduced in this book are consistent with sustainability in terms of not only what they do but how they do it. They provide robust, tested models of alternative ownership and control—models that animate the values of democracy, participation, and co-operation. They promote values grounded in commitment to a moral economy, an economy based on goodness, fairness, and justice—values that motivate people to co-operate in changing and building their own communities (Cannan 2000; Lewis and Conaty 2012). Social economy organizations develop relationships based on reciprocal, democratic, and co-operative principles. They live out their commitment to global justice, which they believe is essential to a just transition to sustainability. Their plurality and diversity help us to imagine not only how to “take back the economy” (Cameron and Wright, 2014; Gibson-Graham, Cameron, and Healy 2013) but also how to organize regionally and globally to transform it democratically.

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