A POSTCAPITALIST PARADIGM: THE COMMON GOOD OF ...

exhaust the natural wealth of the earth and their production processing
emits greenhouse gases. It is just not possible to spend some 1,000 billion
dollars a year without creating serious destruction for ecosystems.
The warming of the planet continues, the level of the sea rises. Our ecological
footprint is so great that, according to a body that is specialized
in the matter, by about the middle of August 2010 the planet had exhausted
its capacity to renew itself naturally. As we have access to only
one planet, this means that the model is unsustainable. Furthermore,
according to the report by Dr. Nicholas Stern to the British Government,
it was stated, already in 2006, that if the current tendency continues
there would be between 150 and 200 million climate refugees by the
middle of the present century (Nicholas Stern, 2006). More recent statistics
give even higher figures.
All this is unfolding within a landscape in which wealth is concentrating,
including among the economic and political decision-makers. Twenty per
cent of the world population, according to the UNDP, consumes 80 per
cent of the planet’s economic resources. It is true that there are many
millions of people who, over recent decades, have attained a certain level
of consumption but they represent a minority among the more than 7 billion
human beings. The 20 per cent of the richer ones have a purchasing
power that is very useful for the replication of capital and provides an outlet
for financial derivatives. The rest of humanity is considered, as Susan
George has said, ‘superfluous billions’ (S. George, 1999). In fact, they do
not contribute to the production of surplus value and have hardly any purchasing
power. As the World Bank has recognized, the distance between
the rich and the poor continues to increase (World Bank Report, 2006) 5 .
As a result of these upheavals, the development model is globally in crisis.
Some talk of a crisis of civilization, which can be seen in uncontrolled urbanization,
the crisis of the State, the increase in violence to resolve con-
5 In 2010, the 500 largest fortunes in France saw their assets grow by 25 per cent,
from 194 billion euros to 241 billions, while the crisis was severely hitting other sectors
of the population (Manila Bulletin, 8 July 2011)
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