I was browsing a Friends of the Earth report yesterday on the train, entitled Overconsumption: our use of the earth’s natural resources (pdf). This passage in the introduction is a rather neat summary of our philosophy at Make Wealth History.
In order to create a more sustainable and equitable world, regions with high levels of per-capita resource use, such as Europe, will need to sharply decrease their resource use in absolute terms. This reduction in resource use in richer regions will give poorer regions the chance to increase their resource use as they overcome poverty and increase their quality of life.
It’s not the first time I’ve come across other people saying the same thing – that we need to reduce our resource use in overconsuming countries so that everyone can have enough. Here are a few more quotes:
“In many ways Transition is designed as a detox for the affluent West. We talk about contraction and convergence, and we need to get the West down 80% so that the developing world can meet us at 20%… There is an equitable footprint that we can all live on. We need to come down to that point, and allow the developing world to come up to that point, so that we all reach a level.”
Rob Hopkins, Transition Towns
“I’ve often said that far more sensible than a ‘make poverty history’ campaign would be a ‘make wealth history’ campaign. It is, after all, the wealthy people who do all the damage. The less money you earn, the fewer resources you use up.”
Tom Hodgkinson, The Ecologist
The environmental and economic crises are not separate but interconnected events. It is the high levels of debt-fuelled consumption in developed countries that have landed us with dangerously high concentrations of CO2 and put pressure on ecosystem resources… While there is a clear case for poor countries to improve their living standards, increasing consumption further in developed countries is not sustainable or justifiable. In fact, developed countries need to do the exact opposite.
New Economics Foundation, The Great Transition
The Earthbound Report 
keep going