The Positional Contract
The positional contract relates the infinity of human forms of expression to the physical limits of the planet. By applying the principle of equality to the ecological footprint, it links ecological awareness and social fulfilment.
The physical resources needed to maintain a rate of return deemed satisfactory by a global market have reached their limits. The extraction of fossil fuels has led to climate change; the percentage of fresh water necessary for all forms of life has declined worldwide; farmland has lost its fertility; and biodiversity has decreased. For the countries of the South, all this has meant poverty and the disappearance of all prospects. Expensive training courses designed to meet market needs have to contend with investors looking only for cheap labour, leading to mass emigration. In addition to the extinction of natural resources, there are the problems of conflicts of interest, power struggles and political instability. The number of countries with an effective democratic regime is decreasing.
Today and in the future, the dramatic consequences of climate change (storms, drying up of freshwater reserves, migrations, etc.) are affecting countries and their different populations in very unequal ways, and responsibility for this situation is difficult to define, given that it is the logic of capital profitability that drives decisions.
Today, the consumption of resources and carbon emissions are very unevenly distributed around the world, depending on the country and the population. The differences between people are even greater. We are faced with the problem that the limits of our resources have already been reached, while whole sections of the population have not yet had the opportunity or the choice of benefiting from these resources.
How can we empower individuals to take action at a global level?
Freedom, while not limited to consumption, cannot be dissociated from it, as we see in the heated debates about meat-free days and the like. We live in a global consumer society, which cannot be changed as quickly as climate change makes it necessary.
We are therefore proposing a new contract of freedom between all human beings, which also includes future generations.
Conceptually, we refer to the eccentric positionality of the philosopher Helmuth Plessner. Plessner's theory shows us that human being’s nature is her and his artificiality. It is only by producing culture, by shaping it, that a human being achieves a balance that is not given to him or her by nature. Humans not only live, they have to lead a life. Eccentric positionality is present in all human beings, whatever the cultural, historical or political context in which they live. Making choices, imagining and playing a role are all manifestations of eccentricity; human beings need to project themselves in order to exist. Freedom is the possibility / modality of living out one's eccentric positionality.
Plessner's theory helps to explain, among other things, why capitalism is more alive than ever, even though it is responsible for so many calamities. In capitalism, the need for creation and novelty is satisfied by consumption - all over the world.
How can we ensure that eccentricity is exercised in ways other than through energy-intensive and destructive consumption? Today, the expression of freedom is too often understood as the right to unlimited consumption of resources.
In Rousseau's Social Contract, the expression of freedom reaches a limit when it hinders that of others. We need to apply this same principle to our ecological footprint. It is interesting to note, for example, that the German Federal Constitutional Court made a similar argument in 2021 in its criticism of the Merkel government's climate laws, introducing the term "intertemporaler Freiheitsbegriff" (intertemporal concept of freedom) because the expression of freedom for future generations is effectively threatened.
How can we reconcile the eccentricity of Europe and the United States, which consume a lot of resources, with the eccentricity of Africa, which uses very little? How can we restore control over the exercise of eccentric positionality to countries that are kept in poverty?
The Positional Contract
The Positional Contract is based on the principle that all human beings are equal and on the observation that the earth's resources are limited. As a result, every individual on the planet is entitled to the same quota of resource use, and every individual must be made aware (in their training) of their eccentric capacities. The Positional Contract is a contract between all human beings.
The Positional Contract is implemented in two stages and along two axes:
First axis:
1) The development of an instrument that combines the use of vital resources and the environmental footprint in a single index. Each person now receives an individual account with the same number of points. Purchases and consumption will result in a deduction of points according to the index. The points must last a lifetime, so only part of them can be used each year.
2) Setting up an exchange platform where you can buy and sell points from / to other people. Trading points is a way of taking into account the consumption of very different resources in different parts of the world and by different people. Taking action to conserve resources suddenly makes very good economic sense. Those who consume little get paid, those who consume a lot must pay.
Governments and businesses are already participating in the global trade in CO2 certificates. The time has come to enable everyone to see their individual local actions in the context of their global impact and to create an instrument for responsible action. Technically, this instrument can be developed using blockchain technology (using renewable energy). This is an instrument of transition, which goes hand in hand with a second axis: the introduction of service learning-oriented training.
The "positional contract" consists, in the African context in particular, of making training programs no longer dependent on the employment market (which sustains poverty) but on a freely chosen future. Leaving behind the mentality of a destiny suffered (slavery) to enter resolutely into that of a desired destiny (freedom) requires a "positional contract" by positioning the desired African human being as the model to be achieved for a flourishing future for each and everyone. Service-learning meets this expectation in the sense that this pedagogy leads the learner to learn from the concrete social needs of his or her environment. People are no longer trained (in our universities/schools) to "operate with a view to and according to the principle of capital" to maintain and sustain the capitalist system, but rather with a view to and according to the principle of valuing the index of social and environmental responsibility.
The next stage is a collective film, based on different continents and featuring experts and civil society players.
The groupe of initiators:
Sylvie Boisseau, artist, lives and works in Berlin, Germany, more here
Épiphane Kinhoun, philosopher, anthropologist, academic, former footballer and currently vice-rector of the Catholic University of Central Africa, lives and works in Yaoundé, Cameroon. Publications: here, on migration: here
Srinivas Mangipudi, artist / researcher, visual thinker, Goa, India, plus: here
Frank Westermeyer, artist and teacher, works in Geneva, Switzerland, more: here
What binds our interdisciplinary team is an interest in the thinking of Helmuth Plessner.
June 2023
© illustrations: Srinivas Mangipudi