S06 Episode 261 | Can fashion and degrowth coexist, and specifically — do high heels exist in a degrowth world?
In episode 261, Kestrel welcomes Marula Tsagkari, a degrowth advocate and PhD candidate at the University of Barcelona in the Department of Economics, to the show. Marula’s work focuses on energy communities, energy self-sufficiency, and energy democracy. "Degrowth is not about austerity, it’s not about living in a primitive way in a cave — nothing like that. And of course degrowth is not COVID-19 lockdown. It’s about happiness, it’s about wellbeing, it’s about living happy with less things. And what real happiness is for each and every one of us — I think I will leave it up to all of you to decide, what real happiness means for you." -Marula For many people, a degrowth world is a utopia – and to some, that means it’s totally unrealistic. Yet to others, it means we can strive to reconstruct a world with many of these ideals at the core of how we exist, and while it may take time, it is possible. This week’s guest is a degrowth advocate and also a lover of fashion. Many may instantly think that the two cannot coexist. Even other degrowth advocates in our guest’s field have in a sense turned their noses up at her, scoffing at the idea of degrowth and fashion coinciding. At one event that she organized, a fellow degrowther said, “there will be no high heels in a degrowth world.” No high heels? Really? For our guest – high heels are totally welcome in a degrowth world. As she reminds us, high heels don’t have to be made in a fast fashion way – they could be a form of art and if someone wants to wear high heels and they feel good in them, they should be able to wear them. As our guest reminds us, there’s a misconception that the fashion industry and fashion art are synonymous – but she definitely doesn’t buy into that. Quotes & links from the conversation: “Degrowth means the abolition of economic growth as the main goal of our society … in other words, it means liberating ourselves from the idea of growth that mistakenly, we have made the religion, the dogma, of our societies.” (8:38) -Marula “We cannot discuss climate change without discussing capitalism, and we cannot discuss degrowth without discussing alternatives to capitalism and social transformation.” (9:08) -Marula “Scale can be different for everyone, but I think for me, what we need to do is move to a lower scale, so start talking more about the local level, about the community level. We don’t need all of us to have access to the same clothes at the same time. We don’t need 25 different fashion seasons. I think that what we need to do is actually to descale, go lower, and start supporting our local store, our local designer, and understand that there’s no way that a local designer can produce of course this amount of clothes at the same time frame that a bigger company was doing. I don’t know, we expect a writer to write 2 books during their own life, but we expect a designer to produce 25 different seasons in one year. So, I think we need to scale down a bit our expectations and start focusing more on our community level, on our local level.” (26:10) -Marula “Rethinking Fashion: A Confession Of A Degrowth Advocate”, article by Marula on Resilience I CAN MAKE SHOES, IG account that teaches you how to make shoes (Kestrel mentions it) “Why Degrowth Is The Only Responsible Way Forward”, article coauthored by Marula on Open Democracy Research & Degrowth (R&D) Organization Explore more of Marula’s work here > Follow Marula on Twitter >