Estimating and implementing “sustainable consumption corridors” in practice: A social practice approach
(2019) Consumption corridors: exploring concepts and implications — Location: Geneva (16.April.2019)
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- Di Giulio and Fuchs (2014) have proposed the concept of “sustainable consumption corridors”, as well as some objections thereto and their responses. This contribution intends to continue this discussion by trying to frame it within a social practice theory approach, with a focus on the practices dealing with the estimations of the lower and upper limits of sustainable consumption. De Giulio and Fuchs base their concept of “sustainable consumption corridors” on the notion of “individual objective needs”, a notion that I will discuss both theoretically and empirically. Issues of power and of legitimacy are at stake to pretend to define with “objectivity” lower and upper limits of consumption. To illustrate empirically the misleading notion of “individual need”, I show the range of energy consumption levels across social groups using different proxies and taking Belgium and different surveys as an example. The following proxies are used and discussed: the yearly electricity consumption per income quartile (SEREC survey, 2004), an estimation of the ecological footprint (Wackernagel and Rees, 1996) per profession (WWF-Belgium, 2006), and a new index of capability deployment (based on Nussbaum, 2000) according to households’ access to affordable warmth (Generation and gender Programme, 2009). The discussion includes some epistemological and ethical aspects of these three proxies, as well as measurement issues. (All estimations presented are from previous quantitative studies I was associated with.) Finally, a few policy instruments (thought of or really tested) to implement such “corridors” are briefly presented to illustrate the pitfalls for estimating and implementing these “sustainable consumption corridors”.
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Bartiaux, F. (2019). Estimating and implementing “sustainable consumption corridors” in practice: A social practice approach. Consumption corridors: exploring concepts and implications, Geneva. https://hdl.handle.net/2078.5/92029