HASAs the effects of climate change become more and more evident, calls to consume differently are now encountering strong resistance. The National Rally (RN) thus garners hundreds of thousands of votes by castigating ecology “punitive”its moralizing, sectarian, liberticidal character…
How can we explain the intensity of this resistance despite awareness of the risks? Our hypothesis is that, in reality, reducing our emissions of polluting gases and waste by consuming “less but better” is today a luxury inaccessible to many. No wonder calls for sobriety breed frustration and anger.
Sobriety, a luxury? It is obviously easier to buy a sustainable household appliance or piece of clothing, organic vegetables or an electric car when you have the financial means. But the quality of public services turns out to be decisive in reality for “democratize” sobriety and, in this regard, elected officials, and particularly mayors, have real room for maneuver, each in their own territory.
Create new collective spaces
We naturally think of the development of public transport and cycle paths, certainly costly but essential to limit the use of private cars. Elected officials can also provide the public with attractive places, parks where they can have a good time without consuming, and vegetable gardens which provide access to vegetables without pesticides. Facilitating access to culture in the broad sense is part of the same movement because outings play the role of alternatives to shopping trips and the consumption of objects. Other, more new avenues can also be explored.
Could we not envisage the creation in each municipality, in each neighborhood, of new collective spaces, like media and game libraries, where everyone could find and borrow free of charge the equipment necessary to repair, sew and maintain their objects? of everyday life, from the toaster to the blouse, including the computer or the washing machine?
As part of these “tool libraries” built on the model of “repair cafés” and third-party places which are currently multiplying, citizens could also be advised and trained to waste less. They would reduce their polluting emissions, gain autonomy, while saving money, which is a major issue in times of inflation. In today’s context of resource depletion, such spaces are a public service.
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