Non-Violent Economy Consultation

Workshop

 

Organised by

Jai Jagat Campaign with support of CCD, Madurai

 

Venue:

Centre for Experiencing Socio Cultural Interaction (CESCI)

Kadavur, Madurai, Tamilnadu

 

Schedule:

4^th and 5^th December, 2021

 

                                                                                                                         Report Prepared by     

 Karthik G, PGS Organic Council

With inputs from Utkarsh G, CCD

 

Overview:

The current economic system is a violent system as it instils conflict between the people and the planet. It has brought violence into education, governance, media; and the development model is based on top-down policies that are used to oppress dissent and pre-empt citizen dialogue. The Covid-19 pandemic has further exposed and extenuated the unsustainability of the present development model by covering scenes of the first wave of the pandemic migrants where millions of workers walked hundreds of kilometres to reach the safety of their homes.

School going youth are gathering across Europe and North America on Fridays for the Future strikes claiming that the older generation who are the decision makers, are unable to address critical issues that continue to perpetuate untold violence on the earth. A paradigm shift towards nonviolent economy, which is bottom up and driven by Gandhian ideology of focusing on weakest and poorest, is vital for survival of human civilisation.

While the nonviolent economy is a path of transition and not an end result, therefore it requires an openness to trial and error and self-correction, and various movements such as the sarvodaya movement have historically exemplified such a pathway in India, and at the same time has influenced various like-minded movements across the world. Throughout the southern part of India, there are diversity of experiments such as: natural farming, organic agriculture, traditional seed collection, traditional medicine, village industries, eco-architecture, water conservation, heritage arts and crafts, non-timber forest products, local eco-tourism, bartering of products, and so forth. 

These have been seen as micro, social enterprises mostly without a macro-narrative.  This is due to the predominant mainstream economy with its aggressive narratives that suggests micro-initiatives to be able to scale up, to meet larger market demands, to maintain quality control, and to guarantee efficiency and so forth. These are legitimate arguments from the perspective of the mainstream economy but it requires reframing when dealing with the  small-scale and collective producer organizations.

Micro actions and macro narratives is putting two things together: firstly, the narratives of producer organizations and their support structures on how they control the value chain in a way that keeps some of the benefits generated in the communities or with the producer groups; and secondly, how nonviolence is embedded in a manner that people take responsibilities in the production and consumption, to ensure it is safe, healthy and sustainable.  It is in micro-actions and macro-narratives that youth and others will feel renewed confidence in addressing the climate crisis. These demonstrate how individual and collective responsibilities can create climate-friendly, and inclusive growth, what may be called a nonviolent development model.

 

Frame of the Workshop:

 

1.       Develop a trajectory from local to global to show influence from the grassroots. Similarly global narrative of nonviolent development model to be woven into the local actions.

2.       Replace vertical with horizontal linkages by bringing together groups to interact, evaluate, provide peer learning in building each other’s capacities so as to provide mutually-supportive economic relationships.

3.       Provide holistic approaches for a just transition in response to climate change, as compared to a restrictive framework based exclusively on carbon emissions and global warming.

4.       Emphasize a local production and responsible consumption where benefits stay with the community or producer groups.

5.       Link economy with eco-cultural heritage so there is sustainability and a sense of a permanent economy.  

Objectives of the Workshop:

The community enterprises have valiantly perpetuated the nonviolent economy movement for last three to four decades with limited institutional structure and resources. However, the sustenance of nonviolent economy and community enterprise models depend on: (i) passing on the torch and engaging the current generation of youth, namely the third generation in the social sector; (ii) attracting professional expertise; and (iii) creating a spirit of working together.

The workshop is a step in this direction with the participants reflecting on:

-          Looking back: Path travelled, struggles and issues along with key learnings

-          Looking forward: Together create a process to continue building on positive learnings

Then each of the participant was asked to present their micro economy. There was attention paid to how each of them were carrying out nonviolence.