From the Imperial Mode of Living towards an Ecologically Sustainable Future

Prof. Dr. Ulrich Brand (University of Vienna) & Ivonne Yanez (Accion Ecologica, Ecuador)

The concept “imperial mode of living” analyses the multiple phenomena of crisis that are shaping our current moment as a systemic crisis of capitalist development. It tries to explain how and why capitalism ceaselessly exploits the biophysical world and yet remains resilient in face of its manifest failures. It basically points, first, at the socially and ecologically destructive and, at the same time, attractive and increasingly globalized patterns of production and consumption. They are imperial in the sense that they assume an – in principle – unlimited appropriation of global resources and labour capacities, mainly by the global North but increasingly also by parts of the global South (particularly the so-called ‘emerging economies’). Secondly, the “imperial mode of living” depends on an external sphere from where resources are extracted and to which its socio-environmental costs can be shifted (“externalization”), resulting in the “internalization” of those burdens in other regions like Latin America. The concept can also help us to rethink resistance and alternatives.

In this evening’s lecture, Ulrich Brand will give an introduction to the concept “imperial mode of living” and its implications for current debates surrounding climate change and the ecological crisis. Then, Ivonne Yanez will exp

and on this introduction from a global South perspective by outlining practices of resistance against the “imperial mode of living” through environmental activism in Latin America. This will lead to the question of how an alternative, i.e. an ecologically sustainable future, could look like.