Musings on "Made in Bangladesh"

One of my shirts

When I learned that the death toll of the Bangladeshi garment factory collapse topped 1000 - I started writing.  A few months ago this would have put me into a steep tailspin. I'm still saddened, though instead of throwing my hands up, casting blame, and tilting at the windmills of "race-to-the-bottom" capitalism, I found myself thinking of the systemic causes and possible solutions in the context of our global economy and sprawling supply chains and possible actions to take to incite change.

A short digression...

Back in March I wrote about my personal responsibility for a long list of global environmental catastrophes and miscarriages of justice.  It was a dark time for my faith in humanity, and, if I am completely honest, listing things out made it easier for me to mentally disengage from them - on top of that, my intent was to instill a sense of responsibility for these challenges with anyone that might read the post - depending upon the readers' socio-economic background, responsibility should (a loaded word) be shared, correct? 

Before I published that post, I ran it by some friends that share my sustainability ideals.  They suggested that instead of focusing on a laundry list of problems and the guilt associated with them, it might be more useful to think about how I contribute to solutions.  Makes complete sense.

...back to the topic at hand.

With that in mind, relative to the Bangladesh building collapse, what might I do to make an impact?  Here are a few ideas that came to mind with questions and comments about potential impact(s):

1. Buy garments made in another country
• Reward those with better labor regulations, though there were regulations and policies in place in Bangladesh that were enforced poorly
• Does this then unfairly punish the laborers that have improved their lives despite their dangerous working conditions?
2. Buy garments made by brands with the highest level of supply-chain scrutiny working in Bangladesh
• With the complicated supply chains of today, does this mean anything?
• Where does one find this information?  Looking at my closet of recent clothing purchases, I know I did not look.
• Note: the photo above is from a shirt I bought recently - with no thought to where it was made.  At the time of this writing, I could find nothing about the brand's responsible business practices in Bangladesh.  I've sent them a message and asked about this - we'll see where this goes.
3. Buy garments from the brands that said they would be compensating victims' families
• What impact will this make in the long term?
• Is this slacktivism at its finest, taking an action that easy and ultimately not very effective?
4. Buy garments from local / regional sources
• I never thought of this until I visited the Watch City Festival (a Steampunk affair) and found a purveyor of clothing in my region - yes, clothing is still made in New England.
• Of course, because a garment is stitched within my region, does not imply that its constituent parts were sourced here as well.  Thread, buttons, cloth, zippers, etc. all come from somewhere.  In fact, one-off garments could have a larger per unit environmental and social impact.  
5. Buy no new garments at all
• There are a wealth of thrift stores and other ways to find gently used items to cover oneself and extend the useful life of an item.
• In the world of (assumed) requisite economic growth, where would this cause pain? 
6. Make them myself
• This would be a useful skill to have, and, in the world of neoclassical economics, is my maximum value in society manifested in making clothing?  Maybe.

I am sure important actions, ideas, and insights are missing.  What would you add?

I am indebted to friends Kevin Hagen, former REI Sustainability Leader and now on his own helping organizations start and continue their sustainability journeys, Asheen Phansey, Babson MBA, Bio-engineering undergrad with biomimicry expertise currently changing the world at D'Assault Systemes, Caleb Bushner, self-proclaimed philosopher of sandwiches, BGI MBA, and Associate Director at Digitas, and Paul Diegel BGI MBA and Executive Director, Friends of the Utah Avalanche Center for providing invaluable insights into these topics.  I am grateful for their help as I continue to challenge my mental models and unconscious assumptions about sustainability and my battle against a priori pessimism.  Follow them on twitter at @asheen  |  @kevinhagen  |  @calebbushner .

Rediscovering Optimism

Image by Samantha Celera

It's come in fits and starts - my optimism peeks through the dark veil of pessimism that slowly crept up and took over my sustainable thinking over the past few years.  It dawned on me as I re-read my last post that pessimism was winning - handily - creating an overwhelming sense of hopelessness at the state of the world when it comes to environmental sustainability and social justice.  The plane on which I functioned had tilted steeply to the negative...and...I concluded...once it's tilted that way...it can be tough to bring it back.

Tough...and I am.

I paused and reflected a bit on the people and organizations I know of that are doing great things, whether building a company with a social mission or believing in their artistic pursuits and making it happen.  Taking the time to think about these positive actions re-framed my internal debate at our collective trajectory  - calling my pessimism into question - again.

Dwelling, mulling, stewing, on the negatives just sucks the energy out of anything and everything

Lesson learned - for now.  So, that means that whatever you see here going forward will be focused on solutions.

Waking up to Responsibility

Image from Moonty used under Creative Commons

The germ of this post sprouted sometime in 2012, I'm not sure when and I'm not sure what it was, it's not important.  With my previous post on spirituality and sustainability, teasing out the theme of "connectedness" along with a few recent articles shared by friends I respect with themes that relate to these ideas it was time to reconnect with the idea and see where it goes.

So, here we go.

I've known it for a long time.  It's one of those things that we know and bury beneath our existing identity and worldview because it raises big questions about who we are as individuals, what we believe in, and our role in our local and global communities.

What is it that I know?

I'm responsible for Fukushima
I'm responsible for the Deepwater Horizon oil spill
I'm responsible for reality television
I'm responsible for type 2 diabetes in children
I'm responsible for pink slime
I'm responsible for lead paint
I'm responsible for the plastic in the oceans
I'm responsible for the production of carcinogens

The list could go on, and I'm not sure that's helpful.  We could argue about the term "responsible" being replaces with complicit, culpable, or some other less in-your-face word.  Again - not helpful.  The point is that this list of social problems (some might categorize them as "environmental" and/or "social" as well but I'm not sure that the distinction is relevant) are all symptoms of my activities as a consumer of, and investor in, products and/or services that contribute to them.  Ultimately, if we see the news about any of these issues, do we not have a shared responsibility to do something about it?  Otherwise, I must come to the uncomfortable conclusion that I am, indeed, personally responsible.

"What's the point?" you might ask - rightfully.  How do my actions in my ______________ [insert city, town, company, family, community, etc.] affect things happening at these scales or other countries or even other parts of my own community?  The question is, how do they not?  We're all connected in the same socioeconomic system that at its core seeks to extract and amass wealth.  We do this by extracting raw materials from the biosphere, investing energy in the process of manipulating it (this involves many, many steps) to increase its value in the marketplace and then slowly extracting that value in the form of financial capital as it flows through the distribution chain to the end-user.  The challenge is that the value extracted is not proportional to the net effects of the damage caused by its production.  In other words, the people living near the oil wells in Nigeria and adversely affected by the pollution associated with the oil's extraction receive a small portion (if any) of the overall value of that resource.  Where does then rest of it go?

We take some of it when we buy the item and use it. The rest goes to various organizations along with way, businesses that may or may not have a desire to use what they've earned (extracted) in restorative activities.

So...what's the solution?

It's time to take a step back from the day-to-day and ask serious questions about what our role is in this world and what we're willing to do in the short and long term to right the wrongs listed above.  It's daunting, absolutely daunting, sobering, and massive.  Most of the time when I think about these issues I fall into despair - feeling completely helpless in their depth and scope.  But...I am sure there are others out there, others watching the news or reading the paper and feeling the pang of sadness and/or responsibility and then burying that feeling below the myriad activities that keep us busy.  After all, we all have our own lives, families, and communities to look after.

Here is one of the articles that I referred to that might make us think a bit differently about our impact, responsibility, espoused values, and actions.

Want to save the planet? Shrink your habitat — not just your apartment

Is Spiritual Connection Necessary to Save the Planet?

From CC nasrulekrom

One of the great mysteries I continue to wrestle with is the contribution of individual spirituality and spiritual institutions to creating an environmentally sustainable and just world economy.

Pretty minor topic, right?

This has come up for me at a very personal level as I seek out my own spiritual connections.  I define spirituality/religion as - wherever there are deeply felt connections between people that share a concept and/or belief.  This desire sneaked up on me over the past few years as I sensed I had  become distant, disconnected, and pessimistic about the state of the world and my ability to contribute in a positive way.  I painted the whole of "developed world" humanity (myself included) as base organisms seeking enrichment through material wealth with nary a care about the social and environmental injustices these actions inflicted upon the rest of the world.  Let's just say that this world view was not working.

With that as background, I'd steeled myself to emotional and empathetic connections, yet found myself moved to tears in situations involving spiritual gatherings (as I defined them) and wondering what I was missing in my intellectual Cave of Agnosticism. The last time I felt connected to something was when I attended BGI a few years ago, only now do I appreciate what that connection meant to me.

Considering that many definitions of sustainability involve the concept of systems thinking and earthly interconnections - I wondered "how does my individual spirituality connect with sustainability"?  Or, more directly, how can it NOT?

I started reading on the topic again looking for answers (that's dangerous!) to my questions. I picked up "Spirituality and Sustainability" by John Carroll a few months ago.  I immediately connected with the writers ideas - what we pursue as "environmental sustainability" is woefully inadequate - more of a quarter-measure to make us feel better about maintaining a growth-centered economic model that tolerates social injustice even though we know something is wrong but we can't collectively deal with the massive shift needed in our thinking. The author posits that there is something missing in our conversations about what a sustainable business needs to be, and the something is spirituality.

Imagine the Pope coming out and saying that members of his Faith are damaging the Lord's Creation with their actions and that they are bound to take action to make amends.  What would happen? Anything?  Would individuals of this faith take action?

The next question becomes - if we experience a desire to build a sustainable and just world through our individual spiritual pursuits, why is it that these desires are "checked at the door" of most businesses (that are comprised of individuals)?  Is the business world operating in a sphere that we have collectively agreed is in its own space devoid of our shared morality and values with the overarching goal of increasing monetary wealth?  If so, how might it be shifted to encompass the values we profess in our personal spirituality reflected at a societal level?

Do B Corporations, hybrid non-profits, L3Cs, and social enterprises hold the key?  Do they go far enough?

Finding Inspiration for Creative Expression

It happened in the most innocuous way.  I read somewhere - I cannot remember where and I'm not going to pretend I do by looking it up now - that "successful people" take time every day, usually in the morning, to pause and reflect on what they are thankful for.  It seemed like worthwhile advice, pausing to be with my thoughts about things I take for granted.  Since I was struggling with my vision of a sustainable future (maybe "struggle" is the wrong world - I gave up on it) it seemed like a good activity to help change a pessimistic outlook.  I'd been somewhat of a regular journal writer since the mid-90's, though what started out as a way to record significant events in my life had morphed into a repository for (mostly) rants of a recurring theme (see pattern comment above) - I had this. So inspired, I started jotting thoughts in my journal every morning...easy enough.

That lasted a day...

A few months later, I happened upon a tweet about why keeping a notebook near your bed was important - I liked it and ended up in a short interaction with @geoffliving and @ErinMFeldman (thanks to both of you!) on the benefits of writing...by hand, the old fashioned way.  [Need a reason to maintain cursive writing skills? In the not too distant future it might be sought after since it's slowly dying as a form of writing] Since then (re-inspired), I write daily - maybe not first thing in the morning and maybe it's not well-crafted, but it's happening.

Most importantly, I have spent that last three days caring for my young son.  It's been an enlightening, rewarding, and - dare I say - inspiring time.  I'm not sure what happened, what he said or did that altered my view quite so suddenly - but it happened.  Do I need to know?  Maybe that's what it was - renewing my appreciation for simple enjoyment, letting my lack of understanding sit there - alone - dispensing with the need for an explanation and just "doing".  I kept writing...

"So...what' the big deal about writing?", you may ask.

It's not about the writing.  The big deal is that I'm listening to The Maker trapped inside of me again for the first time in a few years.  I've squelched it in the name of "practicality", with defeatist pleas of  "I don't have time", or "I'd rather sit here and watch a movie", or "what I'll create won't make a damn bit of difference", or "how can I contemplate this while [insert global catastrophe] or [family health problem] is happening?"  Yes, the Internal Critic was kicking my ass.  IF, we are living in what I perceive to be a world of consuming and taking v. generating and making AND I participate in the former over the latter far too much AND bemoan that state of affairs...

...how am I helping move from taking to making if I do not try making?