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Coping with Devils and Climate Change with the Help of Asceticism? Exploring the Role of Asceticism as Trigger of Collective Climate Action
Abstract
For much of European Christian history, asceticism has been associated with the capacity to transform individuals as well as societies. As an organised collaborative exercise in monasteries, asceticism enabled monks not only to live a life preparing for eternal life but also to generate ground-breaking technical and social innovations. Drawing on identity theories and recent developments in the social movement literature, we examine how asceticism has been the impetus for various individual and societal transformations and explore whether asceticism can still unfold such transformative power. In particular, we discuss whether and how ongoing movements for Voluntary Simplicity (VS) and further reflections on that, as found, for example, in the work of the sociologist Ulrich Beck, might assist humans in coping with climate change. Our article contributes to recent environmental ethics research by exploring the role of asceticism in potentially triggering collective climate action and its contribution to helping individuals to live meaningful lives in the face of climate change.
... Consumption reduction and life simplification are a means to focus on intrinsic and non-materialistic sources of satisfaction, such as interpersonal relationships, social interactions, and activities (Black & Cherrier, 2010;Cherrier & Murray, 2007;Elgin, 1981;Iyer & Muncy, 2009;Zavestoski, 2002). The underlying motivations to pursue voluntary simplicity are also present in asceticism where detachment is believed to free the individual from the distractions of the material world and facilitate spiritual growth (Bort & Kieser, 2023). Voluntary simplicity allows adherents to attain a greater sense of authenticity, one of the main motivational bases of the self, which in most cases cannot be achieved through consumption alone (Marden & Belk, 2018;Zavestoski, 2002). ...
Belk’s ( Journal of Consumer Research, 15(2), 139–168, 1988, Journal of Consumer Research, 40(1), 477–500, 2013) seminal work on possessions and the extended self explains how possessions form and symbolize an individual’s extended self. According to the framework, material possessions play a significant role for the extended self. In recent decades, individuals in consumer societies of the Global North have started to question their consumption patterns and their impact on the natural environment in light of the climate crisis. These individuals engage in anti-consumption practices which aim at reducing environmental impact through reducing and rejecting consumption including the acquisition of material possessions. This paper assesses if Belk’s ( Journal of Consumer Research, 15(2), 139–168, 1988, Journal of Consumer Research, 40(1), 477–500 2013) framework is still applicable in the case of sustainability-concerned anti-consumers and which modifications need to be made to account for a change in consumption patterns. We propose that the self-expressive aspect of the extended self framework remains salient, as the intentional non-consumption by anti-consumers helps them distance themselves from possible undesired selves. Through a de-extension of the self, consumers rely on experiences, people and places which are central to the self rather than on material possessions. The material objects that remain parts of the extended self and that have a symbolic meaning represent their owner’s ethical and pro-environmental values and are often created through upcycling, refurbishing or acquired in second-hand or sharing markets. Since consumers increasingly consider the effects their acquisitions and actions have on the state of the Earth, they re-extend their selves to include experiences and the natural environment as a psychological possession.
This article critically reflects on the research portfolio by the ecological economist Clive Spash who has helped pinpoint specific and systemic blindspots in a political-economic system that prioritises myopic development trajectories divorced from ecological reality. Drawing on his published work and collaborations it seeks to make sense of the slow, or absent, progress in averting global warming and ecological destruction. Three strands of key concern and influence are identified and discussed with reference to their orientation and explicit expression regarding Ontology, Epistemology and Axiology. Some complementary points about indeterminacy and holism are presented to further strengthen the arguments for a transition towards a social-ecological economic system that puts values and principles back into focus. While Clive Spash's work has made a strong case within the economic community and appealing to ecology professionals, the value-myopia or value-vacuum has to be tackled across all disciplines, politics and society for a meaningful and urgently required transformation in decision making. Hence, the article finishes with some suggestions for the (higher) education system, and highlights the importance of simplicity and sufficiency, as well as strong sustainability-driven citizen and community action as necessary catalysts of change in this social-ecological transformation.
This book considers the global response on governance after the pandemic while sociologically addressing the effects of COVID-19 on life and work experience. It presents the effects of COVID-19 on global and local labour markets, the development of digitisation and technology, of work health, and on the
environment with respect to global warming and climate change. Linking COVID-19 to the progress of globalisation, the book considers the spread of the pandemic and its management as a response to neoliberalism. The book analyses national and international governance models for tackling future outcomes of emerging global issues such as technology, green industry and
environment that may inform future management of global crises. As such, it will be of interest to scholars in the field of Global Studies, Governance, International Relations, Political Science, Complexity Studies, Environment Studies, Sociology,
Disaster Management and Occupational Health.
Voluntary simplicity (VS) is the contemporary version of an ancient notion where inner growth is prioritized over riches and material accumulation. The VS lifestyle is often discussed as a more sustainable lifestyle, which has been a primary factor for attracting interest from a range of research disciplines. However, definitional inconsistencies plague VS. This has resulted in incompatible research methodologies in identifying the different categories of participants that can be associated with this lifestyle. This article addresses the main definitional issues of VS and provides a set of ‘VS criteria’ that can be useful for future empirical work and for discussing the different levels of simplicity. VS has also been criticized for lacking political teeth and the inability to influence structure change. The extent that VS can be considered a social movement is also discussed and suggestions for further research on this topic are provided.
Encouraging pro‐environmental behaviour (PEB) is an environmental and societal concern. Encouraging PEB focussing on how consumers see themselves (their identity) has blossomed. However, a theoretical assessment of this research is missing. Three main identity theories seem to best explain the research, specifically, and two‐fold, identity, and social identity theory (SIT), collectively known as the unified identity theory (UIT), and place identity theory (PIT). As these theories overlap more than differ in their understanding of identity, we argue that combining these theories is needed to avoid redundancies in identity theorizing, provide a universal approach to identity in terms of the processes and outcomes, and explain the PEB research most succinctly. Therefore, we understand identity similarly between the theories and offer a universal identity theory approach based on the theoretical definitions and assumptions. Finally, we demonstrate how the theory can be used to explain the research. Next, research was identified by conducting a systematic review using the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta‐Analyses guidelines, where 62 studies were relevant. Multiple identities relevant for a given PEB are assumed and evidenced: 99. Identities are assumed to be either individually‐, group‐, and/or place‐focused, drawing on the specific subsets of the universal theory: identity theory, social identity theory, and place identity theory, respectively. Identities are assumed to relate to behaviour, where identity increased PEB with medium effect sizes. Finally, to move the field forward, we provide a theoretical framework of how to test identities in relation to other psychological variables relevant for PEB research.
Considering the worsening climate crisis, we argue that our present conditions require a particular approach to the past in order to disrupt current intellectual trajectories. We enrol Walter Benjamin's concept of history, via the writings of Svetlana Alexievich and Margaret Atwood, with the aim of bringing a criticality to the present to make us reconsider the ways we think about and act in our present world. Based on Alexievich and Atwood's work, we develop research conceptualizations of forgotten and alternative histories to open up a space to consider a future climate-changed world beyond the dominant tropes of inevitable dystopian apocalypse and clever technological adaptation. We offer the concept of 'hope without optimism' in encouraging management and organization studies scholars to develop a discipline fit for the Anthropocene.
The post-2008 financial crisis era has seen an upsurge in popular cultural narratives that implicitly challenge principles of economic productivity, consumption and growth by lamenting a so-called ‘world of too much,’ advocating ethics of minimalism, and renouncing everyday busyness. Narratives range from lifestyle advice on simplicity and de-cluttering private homes, to quests for the reduction of individual labor, communication, social contacts and distraction. This article questions these narratives in terms of eco-politics. Using Kate Soper’s concept of ‘alternative hedonism,’ the article analyzes a selection of five self-help books and one blog that promote lifestyle minimalism in order to interrogate their potential in stimulating de-growth eco-politics through popular culture. Drawing on post-ecological theory, it argues that narratives of lifestyle minimalism are paradoxical in that they resist yet at the same time promote capitalist cultures of growth. To overcome this limitation, it is crucial to understand and transform the narrative premises of lifestyle minimalism in ways that contextualize problems of ‘excess,’ ‘clutter’ and ‘a world of too much’ as intrinsic to the current system of capital accumulation. The article concludes by reflecting on the potential of an eco-movement that joins the alternative culture of minimalist hedonism with the eco-political agenda of de-growth.
This study aims to compare the demographics and behavioural characteristics of consumers who adopt voluntary simplicity as a daily lifestyle process, focusing on one developed country and one developing country. Data were accordingly collected from 589 US and Turkish consumers who define themselves as voluntary simplifiers. Although other studies found that voluntary simplifiers have same demographic characteristics, our results indicate that Turkish and US simplifiers do not vary statistically in terms of demographic variables such as income class, marital status, number of children and gender but do vary statistically in terms of education, age and working hours. They also vary in terms of the deliberate shortening of working hours. The results reveal that several behavioural and demographic characteristics of consumers who adopt the same lifestyle philosophy may vary based on their culture and the conditions of their country. Findings in the discussion section are aligned with previous studies in the literature and with socioeconomic and demographic indicators of the two countries.
The functioning of the biosphere and the Earth as a whole is being radically disrupted due to human activities, evident in climate change, toxic pollution and mass species extinction. Financialization and exponential growth in production, consumption and population now threaten our planet’s life-support systems. These profound changes have led Earth System scientists to argue we have now entered a new geological epoch – the Anthropocene. In this introductory article to the Special Issue, we first set out the origins of the Anthropocene and some of the key debates around this concept within the physical and social sciences. We then explore five key organizing narratives that inform current economic, technological, political and cultural understandings of the Anthropocene and link these to the contributions in this Special Issue. We argue that the Anthropocene is the crucial issue for organizational scholars to engage with in order to not only understand on-going anthropogenic problems but also help create alternative forms of organizing based on realistic Earth–human relations.
Large-scale environmental crises are genuinely collective phenomena: they usually result from collective, rather than personal, behavior and how they are cognitively represented and appraised is determined by collectively shared interpretations (e.g., differing across ideological groups) and based on concern for collectives (e.g., humankind, future generations) rather than for individuals. Nevertheless, pro-environmental action has been primarily investigated as a personal decision-making process. We complement this research with a social identity perspective on pro-environmental action. Social identity is the human capacity to define the self in terms of “We” instead of “I”, enabling people to think and act as collectives, which should be crucial given personal insufficiency to appraise and effectively respond to environmental crises. We propose a Social Identity Model of Pro-Environmental Action (SIMPEA) of how social identity processes affect both appraisal of and behavioral responses to large-scale environmental crises. We review related and pertinent research providing initial evidence for the role of four social identity processes hypothesized in SIMPEA. Specifically, we propose that ingroup identification, ingroup norms and goals, and collective efficacy determine environmental appraisals as well as both private and public sphere environmental action. These processes are driven by personal and collective emotions and motivations that arise from environmental appraisal and operate on both a deliberate and automatic processing level. Finally, we discuss SIMPEA’s implications for the research agenda in environmental and social psychology and for interventions fostering pro-environmental action.
Although there has been considerable theoretical support outlining a positive relationship between religiosity and voluntary simplicity, there is limited empirical evidence validating this relationship. This study examines the relationships among religious orientations (Allport and Ross in J Pers Soc Psychol 5(4):432–443, 1967) and voluntary simplicity in a sample of Australian consumers. The results demonstrate that intrinsic religiosity is positively related to voluntary simplicity; however, there is no relationship between extrinsic religiosity and voluntary simplicity. Furthermore, this research investigates the processes through which intrinsic religiosity affects voluntary simplicity. The relationship between intrinsic religiosity and voluntary simplicity is sequentially mediated by communal/personal well-being and environmental well-being. The findings not only identify a prosocial role of intrinsic religiosity in motivating voluntary simplicity, but also indicate that secular pursuits that enhance communal/personal well-being and environmental well-being may also motivate voluntary simplicity.
Low consumption lifestyles have the potential to impact positively on the
environment and mental health. Past research indicates that individuals who engage in a
low consumption lifestyle known as voluntary simplicity have higher levels of life satisfaction.
This investigation aimed to test the role of psychological needs as proposed by
Ryan and Deci’s (Am Psychol 55(1):68–78, 2000. doi:10.1037/0003-066X.55.1.68) selfdetermination
theory, in the relationship between voluntary simplicity and life satisfaction
in a sample of 571 adults who may or may not identify as voluntary simplifiers. Self-report
data was analysed using structural equation modeling to test a hypothesised path from
simplifying behaviours to life satisfaction via gratification of the three proposed psychological
needs. Consistent with previous research, simplifying behaviours were associated
with increased life satisfaction. The proposed pathway: simplicity—psychological need
gratification—life satisfaction was supported in the empirical test of the structural equation
model suggesting psychological need satisfaction plays a mediating role in the increased
life satisfaction of voluntary simplifiers.
This article examines the learning occurring within the voluntary simplicity social movement, focusing specifically on the learning and development of identity via “moral agency” in those individuals who embrace and practice voluntary simplicity. Four key findings are discussed. First, simplifiers craft new identities in a consumption-driven world that reject society's normative subjectivities and re-create more ethical ones. Second, simplifiers develop and reinforce their moral identities through participating in particular practices of the self and self-regulation. Third, simplifiers struggle with trying to balance an ethic of nonjudgment with the very real feelings of being morally superior. Finally, simplifiers face the difficulty of managing collective group identity because of their decentralized and stratified participant base and highly individualistic moral codes. Because collective identity is so closely linked to social movement success, it holds implications for the politics of social movements and their effectiveness in bringing about social change.
Planning Review initiates with this article on voluntary simplicity a series prepared by Stanford Research Institute's research staff. The articles will address emerging trends in economics, technology, and society that need to be considered by practicing planners. The new series will be coordinated by Riggs Monfort, Director of Program Development for SRI's Business Intelligence Program, and a Contributing Editor for Planning Review.
Determinants of collective behavior, as suggested by the social identity or self-categorization approach and social movement research, were examined in 2 field studies. Study 1 was conducted in the context of the older people's movement in Germany and Study 2 in the context of the gay movement in the United States. Both studies yielded similar results pointing to 2 independent pathways to willingness to participate in collective action; one is based on cost-benefit calculations (including normative considerations), and the other is based on collective identification as an activist. Study 2 included an experimental manipulation and provided evidence for the causal role of collective identification as an activist. Directions for future research on the proposed dual-pathway model are suggested. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
This article examines and extends the notion of voluntary simplifiers (VS). VS are individuals who have freely chosen a frugal, anticonsumer lifestyle that features low resource use and environmental impact. The article will begin by reviewing empirical work with VS and their mainstream counterparts, non-voluntary simplifiers (NVS). It will go on to identify and locate within this literature an intermediate group: beginner voluntary simplifiers (BVS). BVS may support some aspects of sustainability (such as buying fair-trade coffee or recycling domestic waste) without either embracing a complete lifestyle change like VS, or completely dismissing ethical or environ-mental features of products and services they consume, like NVS. Insight into the complex decision-making processes of BVS is crucial for the understanding of the concept of voluntary simplification and is therefore important for the advancement of sustainable consumption. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
The practice of voluntary simplicity is inextricably linked to consumer behavior and has attracted the attention of researchers in a number of disciplines, including psychology and marketing. Yet the daily practice of voluntary simplicity in the United States remains largely unexamined. The research presented here is the first to look at voluntary simplicity with the use of a nationwide sample of American consumers. A more refined application of Maslow's theory of human motivation to the understanding of this social phenomenon is proposed. The practices considered most important to this lifestyle are identified, as are key impediments to its consistent practice. Factor analysis is used to identify the underlying dimensions of U.S. voluntary simplicity: ecological and social responsibility; community; and maintaining a spiritual life. Findings indicate that people of moderate income are more likely to practice voluntary simplicity than was previously believed. This research also compares highly committed simplifiers to those who are less committed, finding that more committed practitioners are more likely to be consistent in practices requiring ongoing effort, such as composting. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
The management of carbon emissions holds some prospect for challenging sustainable development as the organising principle of socio-environmental regulation. This paper explores the rise of a distinctive low-carbon polity as an ideological state project, and examines its potential ramifications for the regulation of economy–environment relations at the urban and regional scale. Carbon control would seem to introduce a new set of values into state regulation and this might open up possibilities for challenging mainstream modes of urban and regional development in a manner not possible under sustainable development. But low-carbon restructuring also portends intensified uneven development, new forms of state control and a socially uneven reworking of state–society relations. In order to explore these issues we start by setting out a framework for conceptualising environmental regulation based around the idea of eco-state restructuring. This idea is introduced to capture the conflicts, power struggles and strategic selectivities involved as governments seek to reconcile environmental protection with multiple other pressures and demands. Overall the paper seeks to make a distinctive contribution to theoretical work on state environmental regulation and the emerging spatial dimensions of climate policy.
Industrial ecology has mainly been concerned with improving the efficiency of production systems. But addressing consumption is also vital in reducing the impact of society on its environment. The concept of sustainable consumption is a response to this. But the debates about sustainable consumption can only really be understood in the context of much wider and deeper debates about consumption and about consumer behavior itself. This article explores some of these wider debates. In particular, it draws attention to a fundamental disagreement that runs through the literature on consumption and haunts the debate on sustainable consumption: the question of whether, or to what extent, consumption can be taken as “good for us.” Some approaches assume that increasing consumption is more or less synonymous with improved well-being: the more we consume the better off we are. Others argue, just as vehemently, that the scale of consumption in modern society is both environmentally and psychologically damaging, and that we could reduce consumption significantly without threatening the quality of our lives. This second viewpoint suggests that a kind of “double dividend” is inherent in sustainable consumption: the ability to live better by consuming less and reduce our impact on the environment in the process. In the final analysis, this article argues, such “win-win” solutions may exist but will require a concerted societal effort to realize.
Situated in a period that witnessed the genesis of institutions fundamental to this day, this path-breaking study offers a comprehensive look at how ancient Christian women initiated ascetic ways of living, and how these practices were then institutionalized. Using the organization of female asceticism in Asia Minor and Egypt as a lever, the author demonstrates that - in direct contrast to later conceptions - asceticism began primarly as an urban movement. Crucially, it also originated with men and women living together, varying the model of the family. The book then traces how, in the course of the fourth century, these early organizational forms underwent a transformation. Concurrent with the doctrinal struggles to redefine the Trinity, and with the formation of a new Christian élite, men such as Basil of Caesarea changed the institutional configuration of ascetic life in common: they emphasized the segregation of the sexes, and the supremacy of the rural over urban models. At the same time, ascetics became clerics, who increasingly used female saints as symbols for the role of the new ecclesiastical elite. Earlier, more varied models of ascetic life were either silenced or condemned as heretical; and those who had been in fact their reformers became known as the founding fathers of monasticism.
The concept of asceticism shows the unity of efforts through which an individual desires to progress in his moral, religious, and spiritual life. The original meaning of the term refers to any exercise, physical, intellectual, or moral, practiced with method and rigor, in hopes of self‐improvement and progress. Notwithstanding the great flexibility that characterizes the application of asceticism, the concept always alludes to a search for perfection based on the submission of the body to the spirit, recalling the symbolic distinction between exterior and interior life.
Identity can improve our understanding of personal climate action, particularly when climate action becomes an expression of a person’s self. However, it is unclear which kind of self or identity is most relevant. Building on a comprehensive series of eight meta-analyses (using data from 188 published articles, N = 414,282 participants) this research systematically compares how strongly climate-friendly intentions and behaviors are associated with place identity, personal connectedness to nature, environmental self-identity (i.e., personal self-definition as a pro-environmentally acting person), and social identity (i.e., identification with social groups). Results suggest robust, medium-sized to strong links of both pro-environmental intentions and behaviors to people’s nature connectedness (r = 0.44/0.52), environmental self-identity (r = 0.62/0.56), and identification with groups considered to support climate-friendly behavior (r = 0.48/0.51), but markedly weaker effects for identification with groups which are unrelated to environmental topics (r = 0.30/0.15) and for place identity (r = 0.18/0.32). Implications for policy interventions and psychological theory are discussed.
Thoreau's Religion presents a ground-breaking interpretation of Henry David Thoreau's most famous book, Walden. Rather than treating Walden Woods as a lonely wilderness, Balthrop-Lewis demonstrates that Thoreau's ascetic life was a form of religious practice dedicated to cultivating a just, multispecies community. The book makes an important contribution to scholarship in religious studies, political theory, English, environmental studies, and critical theory by offering the first sustained reading of Thoreau's religiously motivated politics. In Balthrop-Lewis's vision, practices of renunciation like Thoreau's can contribute to the reformation of social and political life. In this, the book transforms Thoreau's image, making him a vital source for a world beset by inequality and climate change. Balthrop-Lewis argues for an environmental politics in which ecological flourishing is impossible without economic and social justice.
Cambridge Core - Philosophy Texts - Kant: Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is the leading international body for assessing the science related to climate change. It provides regular assessments of the scientific basis of climate change, its impacts and future risks, and options for adaptation and mitigation. This IPCC Special Report is a comprehensive assessment of our understanding of global warming of 1.5°C, future climate change, potential impacts and associated risks, emission pathways, and system transitions consistent with 1.5°C global warming, and strengthening the global response to climate change in the context of sustainable development and efforts to eradicate poverty. It serves policymakers, decision makers, stakeholders and all interested parties with unbiased, up-to-date, policy-relevant information. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.
This article reviews the German sociologist Ulrich Beck’s final contribution, The Metamorphosis of the World (2016). The drivers of the process of metamorphosis are appraised and the approach adopted by Beck is considered within the broader context of his oeuvre. Continuities with previous work are illuminated and novel developments identified. In order to provide a critical but sympathetic assessment of the theory of metamorphosis, Beck’s epistemological position and his sociological modus operandi are considered. It is argued that, despite elisions, the theory of metamorphosis breaks new ground in social theory and offers valuable opportunities for future empirical investigation and conceptual debate.
The article critically assesses Ulrich Beck’s body of work and its importance for contemporary sociology. It demonstrates that Beck’s elaboration of his original theory of the ‘risk society’ into a theory of the ‘world risk society’, ‘cosmopolitanism’ and ‘metamorphosis’ involved several key theoretical innovations. Firstly, Beck adjusted his notion of risk to include the threat of international terrorism in his diagnosis of the (world) risk society. Secondly, he introduced a distinction between (normative) ‘cosmopolitanism’ and (real existing) ‘cosmopolitization’ in order to capture the specificity of contemporary social change. Thirdly and most recently, Beck outlined a theory of ‘the metamorphosis of the world’ which marks an important shift of emphasis from ‘the negative side effects of goods’ to ‘the positive side effects of bads’. In conclusion, the article identifies a number of theoretical ambiguities and unresolved questions in Beck’s theory.
In this paper, we trace the compounding and escalation of frames to try and encompass the reality of climate change. These frames capture significant aspects, revealing new contours and extreme organizational challenges. However, what if climate change is unframeable? We locate three ontological dimensions of climate change – its unboundedness, incalculability and unthinkability – that make this case. This means that climate change is not a problem that organizations can encompass, divide or draw lines around – some ‘thing’ that can be recuperated into existing institutional, infrastructural and interpersonal frameworks. Instead, it is calling forth forms of organization without any precedent. We argue that the philosophy of speculative realism, specifically the work of Quentin Meillassoux, reveals climate change as a new World for which we do not have categories. We deploy Meillassoux’s concepts which are non-human and rational to think through what climate change is ontologically. Meillassoux’s work is characterized as the reintroduction of the old philosophical idea of the absolute, and we use it as a possible way to overcome the equivocal status of climate change without succumbing to despondency and passivity. Rather than a negative, overwhelming threat, climate change gives us what we call a bleak optimism: the realization that climate change has already happened, and that human civilization must learn how to die in a way that is a creative and just foreclosure of the Earth’s organizational forms.
Asceticism is the practice of self-discipline, self-denial, or self-restraint used in order to reach a particular goal. Its origins are found in the activities of Greek athletes and warriors and its practice is found in almost every religion in the world. It was most prominently found in Early and Medieval Christianity and is closely connected to monks. Max Weber developed the sociological study of asceticism and introduced a new type of asceticism – the ‘inner-worldly’ asceticism of the early Protestants.
Buying Time and Getting By provides a detailed account of the voluntary simplicity movement, which took off in the United States in the late 1980s and early 1990s. The concept of voluntary simplicity encompasses both self-change aimed at bringing personal practice into alignment with ecological values and cultural change that rejects consumerist values and careerism. While simple livers struggle with self-change, they work toward the broader goals of a sustainable global environment, sustainable communities, increased equality in access to resources, and economies aimed at human quality of life rather than profit. Author Mary Grigsby looks inside the movement at the daily lives of participants and includes their own accounts of their efforts. She also uses reflexive empirical analysis to explore race, class, and gender in relation to the movement. The influence of the dominant culture and institutionalized power in shaping the movement are balanced with the importance of participants' dynamic identity work.
The unusually high regard with which Saint Francis of Assisi is held has served to insulate him from any real criticism of the kind of sanctity that he embodied: a sanctity based, first and foremost, on his deliberate pursuit of poverty. This book offers a critique of Francis's "holy poverty" by considering its ironic relationship to the ordinary poverty of the poor. While Francis's emphasis on voluntary poverty as the first step toward spiritual regeneration may have opened the door to salvation for wealthy Christians like himself, it effectively precluded the idea that the poor could use their own involuntary poverty as a path to heaven. In marked contrast to Francis's poverty, theirs was more likely to be seen by contemporaries as a symptom of moral turpitude. Moreover, Francis's experiment in poverty had a potentially negative effect on the level of almsgiving directed toward the involuntary poor. Not only did the Franciscan abhorrence of money prevent the friars from assuming any significant role in alleviating urban poverty but their own mendicant lifestyle also put them in direct competition with the other kind of beggars for the charitable donations of the urban elite. Though this work focuses on the idea of "holy poverty" as it appears in the earliest hagiographical accounts of the saint as well as Francis's own writings, its implications for the relationship between poverty as a spiritual discipline and poverty as a socioeconomic affliction extend to Christianity as a whole.
The metamorphosis of the world is about the hidden emancipatory side effect of global risk. This article argues that the talk about bads produces ‘common goods’. As such, the argument goes beyond what has been at the heart of the world risk society theory so far: it is not about the negative side effects of goods but the positive side effects of bads. They are producing normative horizons of common goods. This is what the author defines as ‘emancipatory catastrophism’. Emancipatory catastrophism can be seen and analysed by using three conceptual lenses: first, the anticipation of global catastrophe violates sacred (unwritten) norms of human existence and civilization; second, thereby it causes an anthropological shock, and, third, a social catharsis.
Over the past half-century, Lynn White Jr.'s ‘The Historical Roots of Our Ecologic Crisis’ has stimulated examination of the relationship between religion, particularly Christianity, and attitudes toward nature in the U.S. and elsewhere. The article contrasts critiques of the Lynn White thesis as expressed in White's scholarly work (Medieval Technology and Religion, Medieval Technology and Social Change) with the far broader response to ‘Roots’ by not only medieval historians but also scholars in the fields of environmental philosophy and ethics, Religion and Ecology, and modern history. The bifurcated response to White reveals how the White thesis became a flashpoint for discussion of environmental issues outside and beyond medieval studies, a discussion that until recently took place largely independently of continuing work in medieval environmental history itself. Only within the last decade or so have the main lines of criticism of the White thesis by medieval historians begun to be integrated into a more unified consensus, leaving as White's legacy the fundamental point that religion is an important, if not the only, factor in how human societies relate to the natural world.
In this article the author explores the process by which asceticism lost its central place in (Protestant) Christian tradition in early modernity by comparing the ascetic teaching of fifteenth-century Carthusian writer Nikolaus Kempf with the views of Martin Luther and Immanuel Kant. The article identifies a number of philosophical and theological changes that took place that made it impossible for modern thinkers to understand asceticism in its traditional sense, and instead led to interpretations of asceticism as "works righteousness" and superstition. These changes included a new emphasis on the freedom of the individual, which corresponded to a mistrust of moral authority, a new understanding of morality that de-emphasized moral education, and a new understanding of knowledge that disconnected knowledge and virtue.
1. First published in Science Magazine, March 19, 1967, but quoted here from the more accessible D. and E. Spring, Ecology and Religion in History (New York, 1974), pp. 15-31.
2. In ed. I. M. Barbour, Western Man and Environmental Ethics (Reading, Mass., 1973), pp. 55-63.
3. In American Historical Review, 52 (1947), 421-435.
4. See, for example, the responses by E. Doyle, "Ecology and the Canticle of Brother Sun," New Blackfriars 55 (1974), 392-402; and F. Schaeffer, Pollution and the Death of Man (London, 1972).
5. The present author in fact discusses the issues and incidents here more fully in his dissertation, "Tradition and Innovation in St. Francis of Assisi's Interpretation of Nature," Cornell University, 1983; and in the book, St. Francis of Assisi and Nature, currently in publication by Oxford University Press.
6. Celano, Vita Prima 58; Fioretti 16.
7. Celano, Vita Prima 59.
8. Celano, Vita Secunda 166.
9. Opinions selected from White's articles "The Historical Roots...," and "Continuing the Conversation," loc. cit.
10. From "The Historical Roots," loc. cit., p. 29.
11. See J. Moorman, A History of the Franciscan Order from its Origins to the Year 1517 (Oxford, 1968), pp. 246-7; St. Francis of Assisi: Writings and Early Biographies: English Omnibus of the Sources for the Life of St. Francis, ed. M. A. Habig (Chicago, 1973), pp. 209-11.
12. See e.g. Bonaventure, Legenda Major, VIII, 6 ff.
13. As in the postulations of White, "The Historical Roots...," loc. cit.
14. Consider the confusion of M. Bishop, in his St. Francis of Assisi (Boston, 1974), p. 187, where he is unable to understand why Francis was not a vegetarian. He fails to see the link with evangelical prescriptions and the wish to avoid the Cathar heresy here.
15. L. Cunningham, Brother Francis: An Anthology of Writings by and about Saint Francis of Assisi (New York, 1972), pp. x-xi; xvii.
16. For important recent analysis of the Cistercian attitudes here, see T. Glacken, Traces on the Rhodian Shore: Nature and Culture in Western Thought from Ancient Times to the end of the Eighteenth Century (Berkeley, 1967), pp. 308 ff; R. Dubos, "Franciscan Conservation vs. Benedictine Stewardship," in Spring, op. cit., pp. 113-136; for older works, see H. Workman, The Evolution of the Monastic Ideal (London, 1913), pp. 236 ff.; G. Coulton, Five Centuries of Religion (Cambridge, 1927), vol. 2, pp. 16 ff.; and of course, M. de Joubainville, Études sur l'état interieur des abbayes Cisterciennes, et principalement de Clairvaux, au xiie et xiiie siècle (Paris, 1858).
17. For critical discussion see E. Armstrong, Saint Francis: Nature Mystic (Berkeley, 1973), pp. 56-57; M. Bihl, "De praedicatione a S. Francesco avibus facta," AFH 20 (1927), 202-6; L. Cellucci, "Varie redazioni della predica di San Francisco agli uccelli," Archivum Romanicum 24 (1940), 301-08.
18. See the Fioretti, ch. 16, for these details.
19. Pace Armstrong (op. cit., p. 58), who thinks, "The writer, Bible in hand, has extended Celano's account." The reason for the lack of influence may well have been that the decree of 1266 banning all other legenda than Bonaventure's was very effective. See the Omnibus, pp. 209-11.
20. M. Bihl, "De praedicatione a S. Francisco avibus facta," AFH 20 (1927), pp. 202-06.
21. On the influence of this concept in the medieval world, see T. Gregory, Anima Mundi: la filosofia di Guglielmo di Conches e la scuola di Chartres (Florence, 1955). Much work remains to be done in this area. Its rarefied philosophical nature and tradition make it highly improbable that any belief in the world soul influenced Francis.
22. L. Cunningham discusses this Victorian view in his Saint Francis of Assisi (Boston, 1976), pp. 54; 109 ff. See H. Adams, Mont-Saint-Michel and Chartres (New York, rep. 1961), pp. 25, 336. With White, the eastern influence on Francis is seen to derive from Catharism (see "Historical Roots," loc. cit., p. 29). This opinion is supported by Sir Steven Runciman, The Medieval Manichee: A Study of Christian Dualist Heresy (Cambridge, 1960), pp. 174, 179, 186. But one may very successfully defend Francis here. See K...
Dramatic climate changes are predicted if present-day social practices in affluent societies are not changed, but the challenge is that scarce knowledge exists about how to motivate people for social practice changes in everyday life. Preconditions for neccesary lifestyle changes seem to be in place: subjective well-being (Subjective well-being comprises in this paper; (1) “hedonic well-being”, characterized by materialistic oriented values, such as; material possessions, -pleasure, -comfort and positive emotions, and (2) “eudaimonic well-being”, such as; meaning in life, feelings of vitality, personal flourishing, and social relations.) in Sweden, for example, has stagnated for the well-off middle and upper classes since the 1980s. In some of the most affluent welfare societies in the world, well-off persons have trouble finding meaning in life, eudaimonic well-being (EWB), although levels of hedonic well-being have grown continuously. Apparently economic prosperity is not a key factor providing meaning and personal flourishing. Based on social constructivist theory, this paper reveals leisure time as a important sources providing EWB in terms of shaping frames for existential meaning, personal flourishing and social interaction. However, the topic is complex; social norms and intrinsic contra extrinsic oriented values are discussed in relation to what people see as the good life and a sustainable everyday living (In terms of lowering present personal CO2 emission levels with 60–90 % in affluent Scandinavian societies, e.g. by working shorter work hours and practice a less consumption based everyday life. See further definitions under Sect. 3.), as time affluence, leisure time, at the expense of material affluence, provides a smaller personal carbon foot print. Finally it is discussed if sustainable living is a means for increased EWB or if it is correlated the other way around, due to the finding that frames facilitating EWB is an important precondition for transition and learning processes in direction towards a more sustainable everyday living.
Among the many traditions of research on "identity," two somewhat different yet strongly related strands of identity theory have developed. The first, reflected in the work of Stryker and colleagues, focuses on the linkages of social structures with identities. The second, reflected in the work of Burke and colleagues, focuses on the internal process of self-verification. In the present paper we review each of these strands and then discuss ways in which the two relate to and complement one another. Each provides a context for the other: the relation of social structures to identities influences the process of self-verification, while the process of self-verification creates and sustains social structures. The paper concludes with examples of potentially useful applications of identity theory to other arenas of social psychology, and with a discussion of challenges that identity theory must meet to provide a clear understanding of the relation between self and society.
Climate change is not 'a problem' waiting for 'a solution'. It is an environmental, cultural and political phenomenon which is re-shaping the way we think about ourselves, our societies and humanity's place on Earth. Drawing upon twenty-five years of professional work as an international climate change scientist and public commentator, Mike Hulme provides a unique insider's account of the emergence of this phenomenon and the diverse ways in which it is understood. He uses different standpoints from science, economics, faith, psychology, communication, sociology, politics and development to explain why we disagree about climate change. In this way he shows that climate change, far from being simply an 'issue' or a 'threat', can act as a catalyst to revise our perception of our place in the world. Why We Disagree About Climate Change is an important contribution to the ongoing debate over climate change and its likely impact on our lives.
Our dependence on energy from fossil fuels is causing potentially disastrous global warming and posing fundamental questions about the commensurability of consumer capitalism and a sustainable society. UK and Scottish governments have taken a lead in climate change legislation intended to avoid worst-case scenarios through low carbon transition. There are, however, considerable uncertainties about whether individualized, market-driven, materialistic societies can manage such radical transformations. Policies to cut household emissions focus on behaviour change through social marketing and incremental modifications to consumption. This technocratic model produces very little societal change, and seems likely to be self-defeating. The framing of the problem as one of behavioural adjustments to individual self-interest obscures alternative understandings of society as a collective accomplishment. Through simultaneous ‘knowing and not knowing’ about unsustainable consumerism, a behavioural model allows governing to proceed, while marginalizing awkward questions about the contradictions between economic growth and low carbon transitions.
Modern societies—Western and non-Western alike—are confronted with qualitatively new problems, which create the “cosmopolitan imperative”: cooperate or fail! This cosmopolitan imperative arises because of global risks: nuclear risks, ecological risks, technological risks, economic risks created by radicalized modernity and insufficiently regulated financial markets, and so on. These new global risks have at least two consequences: First, they mix the “native” with the “foreign” and create an everyday global awareness, and second therefore, the concept of imagined communities, so beautifully outlined by Benedict Anderson, has to be redefined. However, the result of global interconnectedness is not a “pure” normative cosmopolitanism of a world without borders. Instead, these risks produce a new “impure” cosmopolitization—the global other is in our midst. What emerges is the universal possibility of “risk communities” that spring up, establish themselves, and become aware of their cosmopolitan composition—“imagined cosmopolitan communities” that might come into existence in the awareness that dangers or risks can no longer be socially delimited in space or time.
Medieval monasteries are analysed on the basis of Weber's concept of the process of rationalization, since they represent an important episode in this process. They were the first deliberately designed organization in the Occident. These rationally designed work organizations and the puritan work ethic created by the monks led to the accumulation of immense wealth which was incompatible with the ideal of an ascetic life conducted in poverty. Thus, medieval monasteries, leaving no room for self-determination, provide the first example of the 'iron cage' of bureaucracies.
The notion of asceticism plays a large and important role in Max Weber’s writings; however, it has remained relatively unexamined. Weber did not offer a definition of asceticism, but he did provide a contrast between the ‘polar concepts’ of the ascetic and the mystic. In this paper I discuss this contrast and place it within the historical context of the early and medieval monks. Then, I examine Weber’s discussions of the four major monastic reform movements. I conclude with a discussion concerning Weber’s political preferences for the strict, rational conduct of the ascetic, and especially his own personal inclinations towards asceticism.
It is difficult for political leaders to take action on climate change at the scale and speed necessary. Neither governments, businesses nor individuals acting alone will be able to secure more decisive action by political leaders. Only the third sector can do this, and a far greater mobilisation will be needed to create the social foundations for action. The four key characteristics of a successful mobilisation by the third sector are outlined: national leadership by a diverse coalition of groups; action at community level; a mass movement 'living differently and demanding more and mobilisation across borders.
Emotions can be a source of information and an impetus for social action, but the desire to avoid unpleasant emotions and the need for emotion management can also prevent social movement participation. Ethnographic and interview data from a rural Norwegian community describes how people avoided thinking about climate change in part because doing so raised fears of ontological security, emotions of helplessness and guilt, and was a threat to individual and collective senses of identity. In contrast to existing studies that focus on the public's lack of information or concern about global warming as the basis for the lack of public response, my work describes the way in which holding information at a distance was an active strategy performed by individuals as part of emotion management. Following Evitar Zerubavel, I describe this process of collective avoiding as the social organization of denial. Emotions played a key role in denial, providing much of the reason why people preferred to avoid information. Emotion management was also a central aspect of the process of denial, which in this community was carried out through the use of a cultural stock of social narratives that were invoked to achieve “perspectival selectivity” and “selective interpretation.”