Venice 2012, the Degrowth as an opportunity

by Francesca Morra

In Venice, from September 19th to 23rd will be held the third international conference on the degrowth, ecological sustainability and social equity. The conference will develop three priority areas of common goods, jobs and democracy that have already been widely expressed in the preparatory phase of the conference, through spreading on the site and social networks.

We asked a representative of the association Degrowth in Campania, Rosaria Di Girolamo, to tell us more about this event.

The theme of the decrease is very large, explained in a few words?
It is true that the theme of the degrowth is large, but it can be easily synthesized with the eight “R“s of Serge Latouche. These represent specific actions: re-evaluate (first of all sobriety) and reconceptualizing; restructuring, concept which follows to relocate and redistribute. The last three "R"s are reuse, recycle and reduce: waste, energy and resources. These same themes were also tackled by the conference in October 2011 in Genoa.

What is the role of citizens in degrowth?
To take awareness of the size of the economic crisis, on energy and waste of human resources and food. This ending can also be part of the individual waste through the exercise of good practices in daily life, finally giving justice to the other concept so propagated by the media and contained in the philosophy of degrowth: sobriety.

The program "towards Venice" is already in place? What media you used primarily?
Yes it is, since the last fall you can activate an account on the official website to share ideas and post contributions as photos, videos and articles. They will be published after the screening of the organizers. This allows the democratic participation of individuals and of several Italian and foreign committees, who have the opportunity to learn through other posts Degrowth and good practices in order to apply them in their territory. There are several different political campaigns that deal with the theme: KM/0, Slow Food, NO-TAV and the same movement Cinque Stelle, each one with its own address and style. But a-politically speaking, the Degrowth is a trust agreement established within a community as a voluntary choice in applying best practices.

Finally, why a snail as a symbol of the Conference?
Concerning the use of the image of the snail you may think that metaphorically is the symbol of slowness and a slow way of life. But not only, in mathematics it represents a curve that starts from any point, but known, expanding in a contained manner.

Waiting to see the fruits of the conference, we hope that the positive trend advocated by the organizers, triggering a virtuous spiral in the coming months, in order to involve as many people as possible to follow the snail.