The Men Who Made Us Spend

Here are a couple of studies related to this theme:

Kilbourne, W., & Pickett, G. (2008). How materialism affects environmental beliefs, concern, and environmentally responsible behavior. Journal of Business Research, 61, 885-893.

Corral-Verdugo, V., Mereles-Acosta, J., Tapi-Follem, C., & Fraijo-Sing, B. (2011). Happiness as Correlate of Sustainable Behavior: A Study of Pro-Ecological, Frugal, Equitable and Altruistic Actions That Promote Subjective Wellbeing.  Human Ecology Review, 18, 95-104. 

Hope you can find them! 

Moses Ikiugu's Occupation in the Service of Gaia (2008) might be worth a read here. It sets out an occupation based approach to becoming greener, reducing consumption, through the monitoring of daily actions. There are economists such as Max-Neef whose human scale values developmental framework is used in a number of his papers to argue that basically most human needs are not tied to money but the qualities of existence such as 'having a place in which to be'. He presented this at WFOT in 2010, and the values his framework decpits chime in well with quality of life measures and Wilcock's doing, being, becoming and belonging = self health mantra. Finally Ivan Illich would be an earlier writer in a similar vein, whose Tools for Conviviality is one of a number of books which advocates a low key approach to living together rather than in the pursuit of 'growth'. Recently I've been reading James Fenimore Cooper's novels which are set in the pioneer period of America's emergence as an independent nation. These are very much books of their time but a significant theme is his alarm at the destructiveness of the pioneer society in response to the sheer scale of the natural environment, contrasted with the Native American culture of harmony with nature as interpreted by his white heroic character, Hawkeye. Cooper was writing from his personal experience of this time. However, it's clear from his writing that the environmental destruction arises from every little thing people do, want, in the here and now iwthout thought to the future. Moses book might offer a tool kit for exploring how occupation can be analysed in terms that reveal how sustainable our present individual actions are.

I have been trying to publish a paper focussing on this very topic, namely illustrating that we can promote occupation-based transcendence as a counter to consumerism and individualism, and in the process improve meaningful living and address wider societal issues (see abstract of the paper below):

Abstract

Several decades ago, Viktor Frankl suggested that the disease of meaninglessness afflicts modern society. Occupational therapists/scientists can help people resolve the problem of meaninglessness by assisting them to engage in occupations that are meaningful. Meaningful occupations tend to be those that enhance a sense of coherence, control, and transcendence among other things. In this paper, I propose that when people are encouraged to seek self-transcendence in the context of occupational performance, it is plausible that they would and often tend to engage in occupations that benefit the planet and posterity, thus contributing to solution of wider societal issues. 

However, I have not yet found a journal whose reviewers think that this is a work of interest. I still think though, that as occupational therapists, we need to do more work illsutrating how self-transcendence through occupational perofrmance is more fulfilling and in essence good for society and our planet than materialsim and extreme selfish individualism. I could be totally out of line in my thinking though. Moses

Good day all,

I came across this Index and thought that it is so appropriate for what we are discussing.

http://www.goodcountry.org/

The "Good Country" Index was created by Simon Arnholt to evaluate countries not on the basis of their economic influence, or the extent to which they cater to their politicians or citizens, but rather on the basis of the extent to which they contribute to the well-being of the world and the planet as a whole. This seems to be a beginning step in the direction of creating a new measure of development as suggested by Max-Neef (2010). We can even go further than Arnhiolt and develop a method of evaluating ourselves as individuals not only on the basis to which we act occupationallly to enhance our own economic well-being, or the well-being of family members and freinds, but rather on the extent to which we contribute to the well-being of our countries and the entire world and the planet through our daily occupational pursuits. Perhaps this could be the next project for the WFOT after developing the educational principles pertaining to Sustainability in OT curricula. What do folks think? Moses 

These are great resources! Thanks Mary. Moses