Reorganizing Production to Serve Life, Not Profit
Jason Hickel on ecology, capitalism, and socialist strategy in the twenty-first century
On 15 May 2025, economic anthropologist, degrowth theorist, and author of popular works such as Less is More Jason Hickel delivered a provocative lectio magistralis as part of the Third Annual GRIP Lecture at the University of Bergen, sponsored by the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation’s Brussels Office. In his presentation on “The Struggle for Development in the Twenty-First Century”, Hickel dismantled the idea that the development of the Global South can take place within the logic of extractive capitalism and economic imperialism. Instead, he argued that only through movements for economic sovereignty and an eco-socialist transition is it possible to escape the traps of neo-colonial exploitation.
After the conference, he spoke with Don Kalb, Maria Dyveke Styve, and Federico Tomasone about concrete political strategies in the struggle for climate and redistributive justice, reflecting on the contradictions of liberalism, the ecological and social crises of global capitalism, and the possibilities for a democratic socialist future. In the discussion, Hickel shared his evolving perspective on Marxist theory, critiqued the limits of horizontalist politics, and underscored the urgency of building new political vehicles capable of responding to the planetary emergency.
DK: Yesterday, you argued that it’s essential to rethink the Russian Revolution and China’s history — not only for international politics, but also for working-class politics and global freedom. It struck me that your narrative has evolved into a more explicit anti-liberal reading of recent history. That wasn’t so clear in The Divide, but it was evident in your lecture. Have you shifted toward a more Marxist interpretation?
Yes, I think that’s fair. Two things are happening. First, my analysis has sharpened over time. Second, when I wrote The Divide, I was addressing an audience largely unfamiliar — and often uncomfortable — with Marxist or socialist language. I wanted to communicate effectively with people working in international development, many of whom are wary of what they think are ideological labels.
That strategic decision had a cost: The Divide largely bypasses the question of socialism, even though many of the countries I discuss were socialist or engaged in Communist revolutions. That absence weakens the analysis. You can’t fully understand the history of global inequality without addressing the attempts of socialist revolutions and the Non-Aligned Movement to break from capitalist imperialism and implement alternative development models, followed by the violent Western backlash that took the form of the Cold War.
Since then, I’ve increasingly used concepts like the capitalist law of value, which I now see as central to explaining our ecological and social crises. We live in a world of immense productive potential, and yet we face deprivation and ecological breakdown. Why? Because under capitalism, production only happens when and where it’s profitable. Social and ecological needs are secondary to the returns to capital.
DK: That’s precisely what struck me. I compared your work with that of David Graeber. You both start from anthropology and expand into politics, but the crucial difference, I think, is that you grasp the law of value — whereas Graeber, as an anarchist, tends to evade it. Would you agree that contemporary conditions compel us to reclaim key Marxist concepts and communicate them to a younger public?
Absolutely. As scholars, we should use the best tools available to explain material reality — and Marxist concepts remain analytically powerful. We’re in a moment where those tools can be reintroduced and popularized in new ways.
Liberalism claims to champion universal rights, equality, and environmentalism, but it also clings to a model of production dominated by capital and profit maximization. Every time those two commitments clash, liberal leaders choose capital.
David Graeber was a brilliant and wildly creative thinker, and I learned a lot from him — both as a friend and a scholar. But you’re right, he approached political economy differently. In his later work, especially The Dawn of Everything, he began to acknowledge the limitations of anarchist organizing models like horizontalism. He saw the need for functional hierarchies — structures that can actually get things done without betraying egalitarian principles.
DK: That connects to another question. In 2011, the populist left failed to anticipate what I would call a global counter-revolution. What we’re seeing today isn’t just a resurgence of fascism — it’s a broader anti-liberal and anti-neoliberal insurgency. Some forces are anti-woke, others anti-globalist, and they don’t always share a coherent ideology, but some of the undertow is anti-liberal and potentially anti-capitalist, too. How does your work engage with this complex reaction?
It’s paradoxical. In one sense, this seems like the worst moment to talk about socialism. But in another, it’s precisely the right moment — because liberalism is visibly collapsing, and the rise of far-right populism is a symptom of that failure.
Liberalism claims to champion universal rights, equality, and environmentalism, but it also clings to a model of production dominated by capital and profit maximization. Every time those two commitments clash, liberal leaders choose capital — and everyone sees the hypocrisy. That’s why liberalism is losing legitimacy. The danger is that, in the absence of a compelling left alternative, disaffected workers gravitate toward right-wing narratives — xenophobic conspiracy theories, scapegoating immigrants, and so on. Fascists don’t offer real solutions, but they’re filling a void left by liberal and even social democratic parties, which have abandoned any structural critique of capitalism.
We need a democratic socialist alternative that addresses the root contradictions of capitalism, including its ecological irrationality. But building that alternative will require real political vehicles — not just protest movements, but mass-based parties with deep roots in the working class.
DK: Let’s return to the idea of the law of value. You touched on it earlier, but can you explain why it’s so essential to understanding the crises we face today?
The law of value explains why we experience shortages of socially and ecologically essential goods, even in an age of unprecedented productive capacity. Under capitalism, production is guided not by human or ecological needs, but by profitability. If something isn’t profitable, it doesn’t get made — no matter how necessary it is.
Take the green transition. We have the knowledge, the labour, and the resources to rapidly build renewable energy infrastructure, retrofit buildings, and expand public transit. But these aren’t profitable investments, so capital doesn’t fund them. Meanwhile, we continue producing luxury goods, fossil fuels, and weapons — things that actively harm people and the planet — because they are profitable. This contradiction is at the core of our ecological breakdown.
It’s funny, when people talk about shortages, they often refer to the socialist world, ignoring the sanctions and blockades those economies faced, even while their social outcomes were better than capitalist ones. Today, capitalism itself produces chronic shortages — of affordable housing, healthcare, education, and green technologies. This is a direct result of the law of value. We must overcome it if we are to survive.
FT: That brings me to Europe. The European Union tried to push a green capitalist agenda in recent years, but now we’re seeing a major shift towards militarization. What’s striking is that this agenda is being led by self-described liberals. Starmer in the UK, for instance, is at the forefront. The same is true in the European Parliament. How do you interpret this development?
It’s deeply disturbing. For years, European leaders told us there was no money to invest in decarbonization, public services, or social protections — because we had to uphold deficit and debt-to-GDP ratios to ensure price stability. But suddenly, when it comes to militarization, those rules are tossed aside. They’re ready to spend trillions on weapons and defence.
Democracy was never a gift from the ruling class — it was fought for by working people. Even then, we only got a shallow version of it.
This reveals something critical: the deficit rules were never about economics. They were political tools used to block investment in social and ecological goals while maintaining an artificial scarcity of public goods. Now that military spending is politically expedient and profitable, the limits disappear. It’s a betrayal of the working class and future generations.
Moreover, their analysis is flawed. They seem to think that militarization will bring sovereignty and security to Europe, but true sovereignty would require a complete rethink of Europe’s geopolitical role. It would mean distancing from the United States and pursuing integration and peaceful cooperation with the rest of the Eurasian continent — including China — and the Global South. Instead, European elites remain trapped in the logic of US hegemony. Western Europe has been treated as a forward base for US military strategy for decades. Germany, for example, is filled with American bases. The US wants Europe to antagonize the East – but this is in the US interest, not in Europe’s. We must reject this. Europe’s true interests lie in peace and cooperation with its neighbours.
FT: That’s a perfect segue to my second question: the historical burden of European imperialism. Europe’s ruling classes have inflicted enormous harm over the past few centuries. How do we move beyond that legacy? Is there a real contradiction between the interests of the European working class and those of capital when it comes to foreign policy?
It’s an important question. First of all, yes — policies like the current wave of militarization are clearly aligned with the interests of European capital. That’s why they’re happening. But they run directly counter to the needs of ordinary people and to the stability of the planet. This reveals a deeper truth: there is a fundamental conflict between the interests of working people and those of capital. It forces us to confront the myth of European democracy. We are told that Europe is a beacon of democratic values, but in reality, the interests of capital dominate our institutions.
Democracy was never a gift from the ruling class — it was fought for by working people. Even then, we only got a shallow version of it. The original democratic demands — decommodification of essential goods, workplace democracy, control over finance — were abandoned. Instead, we get elections every few years between parties that all serve capital, in a media environment dominated by billionaires. If we want real democracy, we need to extend it to the economy. That means overcoming the capitalist law of value and redirecting production toward social and ecological needs. That means democratizing the creation of money.
DK: Let’s pick up that thread — money. One of the more original aspects of your work is the focus on the production of money itself. Could you explain how monetary sovereignty fits into your broader critique of capitalism?
Under capitalism, the state holds the legal monopoly over currency issuance, but in practice, it franchises that power out to commercial banks. Banks create the big majority of money in the economy through the process of issuing loans. But they only issue loans when they expect them to be redeemable and therefore profitable — when they serve the accumulation of capital. This means that the power to create money, and thereby mobilize labour and resources, is subordinated to capitalist profitability. It’s a direct expression of the capitalist law of value. Productive capacities are only activated if they yield returns to capital. That’s how banks steer the economy: not toward what we need, but toward what is profitable.
Inflation isn’t a technical obstacle — it’s a political one. The real reason austerity rules exist is to preserve space for capital to accumulate unchallenged.
To change that, we need two things. First, a credit guidance framework — a set of rules that direct bank lending away from destructive sectors like fossil fuels and luxury emissions, and toward socially necessary investments. Second, we need to expand the role of public finance. The state must directly create money to fund essential goods and services — renewable energy, housing, public transit — even if these aren’t directly profitable to private capital.
There’s a myth that we can only produce what is profitable. But in reality, as long as we have the labour and resources, we can produce anything we collectively decide to. The only barrier is political. Once we democratize money creation, we can liberate production from the profit imperative and organize it according to human and ecological needs.
DK: That’s compelling. Many of my left-wing friends in Europe argue that the euro is the main obstacle. They advocate for returning to national currencies to regain sovereignty. I take a different position: we should democratize the euro itself. These are small, interdependent states. Returning to national currencies risks division and renewed dependence on external powers like the US, who will play us off against each other. What do you think?
I’m very sympathetic to that argument. I understand the appeal of monetary sovereignty through national currencies — it offers more direct control over production and spending. But it also fragments the struggle. If every Eurozone country must independently wage its own class battle for economic transformation, progress will be at best uneven and vulnerable. A more strategic route is to reform the rules of the European Central Bank. That could be done quickly, at the institutional level. We could enable member states to expand public investment immediately by suspending austerity constraints.
Critics will say this risks inflation, and yes, if you simply inject public finance without adjusting the rest of the economy, you may drive up demand for limited labour and resources. But eco-socialist degrowth offers a solution: scale down harmful and unnecessary production — SUVs, cruise ships, private jets — and reallocate labour and resources toward socially beneficial activities. This stabilizes prices while transforming the structure of the economy.
Inflation isn’t a technical obstacle — it’s a political one. The real reason austerity rules exist is to preserve space for capital to accumulate unchallenged. If we shift productive resources toward public goods, we threaten the dominance of capital in the system. That’s what elites are trying to prevent when they invoke debt ratios and deficit limits.
DK: There was a strange moment recently. Trump said, in reference to inflation, something like: “Instead of 18 Barbie dolls, your kids will have two.” His argument was that economic sovereignty is more important than material abundance. I found it thrilling — in a way, he’s articulating a kind of anti-consumerist message. Isn’t that part of the danger of fascism today? It sounds anti-neoliberal, but it’s not anti-capitalist.
That’s exactly right, and I found that moment interesting, too. Some people even claimed Trump was embracing degrowth, which is completely false. Degrowth is a fundamentally anti-capitalist idea. It means scaling down ecologically destructive and unnecessary production while scaling up public goods, ecological regeneration, and social equity. Trump is doing none of that.
But there’s something we can learn from this moment. He managed to sell the idea of material sacrifice — “fewer Barbie dolls” — in the name of sovereignty and national pride. That tells us something important: people are willing to accept limits to consumption if they’re framed within a broader, meaningful vision. Too often, we on the Left assume that people won’t accept any kind of material constraint. But that’s not true. What matters is the narrative. If we offer people a coherent vision of freedom, dignity, economic democracy, and a habitable planet, we can make the case for transformation. The challenge is crafting that narrative in a way that’s emotionally and morally compelling.
We need a double-front strategy. In the Global South: national liberation movements that dismantle neocolonial dependency. In the Global North: movements that demand democratic control over production and finance.
Of course, for degrowth to be just, we must ensure that basic needs are met. That’s where a public job guarantee comes in. It would allow us to redirect labour from harmful sectors to beneficial ones, with dignified wages and workplace democracy. That’s the difference between an eco-socialist transition and authoritarian austerity.
MDS: That makes me think about how to build a truly democratic socialist alternative. Especially in the Global North, how do we convince the working class that this future — based on global solidarity, limits, and justice — is like you said, better than what they have now?
It’s a critical question. We must help people understand that consumer abundance in the North is built on unequal exchange — on exploitation of the Global South’s labour and resources. The fast fashion, the cheap electronics, the frequent produce replacement — all of it depends on a global system of appropriation. But more importantly, we must show that the working class in the North doesn’t actually win under this system. What they’ve gained in cheap consumer goods, they’ve lost in political agency, autonomy, and collective freedom. Their demands for decommodification, workplace democracy, and control over production have been abandoned.
Capital has used cheap imports to pacify working-class dissent, while consolidating its own power. So the real prize for workers isn’t another iPhone — it’s democracy, dignity, and a liveable future. We need to reignite that vision, grounded in shared interests with the Global South. The key is to frame eco-socialist transformation not as a loss, but as a liberation — from exploitation, precarity, and ecological collapse. And that’s where solidarity becomes real: not charity, not development aid, but shared struggle for a better world.
MDS: Exactly. That’s the tension I see. Western elites are clearly the main culprits of imperialism and ecological destruction. But in countries like Norway, working-class people also materially benefit from unequal exchange — our welfare state is funded by oil rents, cheap imports, and global extractivism. How do we build anti-imperialist solidarity under those conditions? How do we support revolutionary change in the South while mobilizing the North?
It’s an essential and complex challenge. First, we have to recognize that the landscape has changed since the 1960s. Back then, many leaders in the Global South came to power through mass-based anti-colonial movements. They had mandates for socialist transformation. But over time, those movements were repressed, co-opted, or overthrown — often with Western backing — and replaced by comprador elites who benefit from the current imperial arrangement. These elites are not interested in liberation. They’re aligned with global capital, even if their own populations suffer. That’s why today’s emancipatory movements in the South must confront not only Western imperialism but also their own domestic ruling classes.
This is where national liberation comes in. It’s not a matter of aid or development; it’s about political sovereignty and collective power. Western progressives must support these movements — not through charity, but through solidarity. That means breaking with the logic of the development-industrial complex and backing grassroots revolutions that seek to reclaim control over resources, production, and governance. You’re right: workers in the North do benefit in some material ways. But they are also deeply disempowered. They’ve cheap consumer goods but not democratic control of production. Capital has used unequal exchange to buy off demands for autonomy and dignity. So the working class doesn’t really win. They’re offered illusions of prosperity, while their fundamental rights and freedoms erode.
We need a double-front strategy. In the Global South: national liberation movements that dismantle neocolonial dependency. In the Global North: movements that demand democratic control over production and finance. Together, that’s the path to ending capitalism. It’s not optional — it’s an existential necessity.
DK: That makes sense, but it raises a real problem of political timing. If national liberation in the South cuts off value flows to the core, that would trigger inflation, shortages, and political backlash. Will working-class movements in the North be ready to respond fast enough — with public investment, social protections, and a new vision? Or will the far right get there first?
That’s the critical danger. If we don’t prepare, we could see a very grim outcome. Imagine a scenario where the Global South begins to successfully delink — whether through China’s Belt and Road Initiative, regional trade blocs, or other means. That cuts off flows of cheap labour, resources, and profits to the imperial core. Suddenly, consumption in the North contracts. If the Left hasn’t built a coherent post-capitalist plan, capital will act to preserve its dominance. And what does that look like? Fascism. Crushing labour at home, cheapening domestic wages, repressing dissent. That’s the path I think Trump is preparing for — not because he has a clear plan, but because the logic of empire’s decline demands it.
The protest culture of the past decade has hit a wall. Massive climate demonstrations brought millions into the streets. For a moment, it felt like the political class would have to respond. But they didn’t.
That’s why we must present a real alternative path. The good news is, we have the data. Research shows that we can maintain or even improve living standards in the North with much lower levels of energy and resource use. But that requires decommodifying key services — housing, transit, health, education — to shield people from inflation and secure well-being outside of market dependencies. This is the Left’s task: to make sure the collapse of imperial consumption doesn’t become a gateway to authoritarianism, but a springboard to democracy and liberation.
DK: That brings us to a key issue: political organization. I think we all agree that protest alone is no longer sufficient. We saw enormous mobilizations over the past decade — Fridays for Future, Extinction Rebellion — but they didn’t result in real change. What comes next?
Exactly. The protest culture of the past decade, while incredibly energizing, has hit a wall. Massive climate demonstrations brought millions into the streets. For a moment, it felt like the political class would have to respond. But they didn’t. Nothing substantial changed.
We’re now in a moment of reckoning. People feel disillusioned because they realize these actions weren’t enough. The energy dissipates, and the system remains intact. That’s why I believe we need to return to something that many have been reluctant to talk about: the party. Not the traditional parties that operate within the confines of liberal institutions, but mass-based, working-class parties — vehicles for building real power. These must be rooted in unions, communities, and popular organizations. They must operate with internal democracy but also with strategic coherence. That may mean a return to something like democratic centralism, which proved more effective than horizontalism in achieving structural change.
FT: That resonates deeply. Many of us from our generation saw the rise and fall of the “movement of movements.” We believed in horizontalism — in assemblies, autonomy, consensus. But over time, it became clear that these forms were not durable or effective enough to confront capital. They were easily neutralized or repressed. Now we’re facing a crisis of mass demobilization, especially among the working class. After decades of neoliberal attacks, unions and labour organizations have been hollowed out or co-opted. But at the same time, the promises of social democracy are clearly dead. Capital no longer shares anything with workers. So the old bargain is over, and the big question is: how do we rebuild?
That’s the question of the century, and it begins with clarity about what the working-class movement should be fighting for. Right now, many unions are trapped in a defensive posture — trying to preserve jobs by aligning with capital, hoping that growth will trickle down and keep their members afloat. But this logic is a trap. It’s embarrassing, frankly, that unions in 2025 still see capitalist growth as the solution to working-class precarity.
We need to move beyond shop-floor struggles for wages and conditions and reclaim the transformative ambitions of the labour movement. That means fighting for public job guarantees, for universal public services, for democratic control over production. Unions should be at the forefront of the ecological transition, not an obstacle to it. They must break from the logic of capital and align with the broader interests of humanity and the planet. Imagine: we can bring hundreds of thousands of people into the streets for wage demands. But why not go further? Why not demand the decommodification of higher education, or worker control over industry? We have the numbers. We have the power. What we need is the political vision.
MDS: I want to build on that. If we’re serious about rebuilding mass parties, how do we ensure that they’re internationalist in outlook? The far right has no problem organizing across borders. They collaborate. They strategize globally. But the left often retreats into national frameworks — especially in places like Norway, where people tend to focus on just protecting the welfare state. How do we organize transnationally, especially across global supply chains, where most of the world’s labour exploitation actually happens?
That’s such a crucial point. The Left’s political imagination is still largely confined by the nation-state, but capital is global. Supply chains are global. Fascism is increasingly global. Our response must be, too.
As the imperial core loses access to cheap labour and resources, the ruling class will respond by turning inward — crushing domestic labour and militarizing society. We’re already seeing this happen, and if the Left doesn’t offer an alternative, then capital will manage the transition through violence and repression.
We should be organizing along supply chain lines — coordinating strikes and campaigns not just within countries, but across them. Global South workers, especially women in factories and agricultural sectors, are the backbone of the world economy. If we build solidarity between them and workers in the North — based on shared struggles rather than pity or charity — we can disrupt the system at its core. Imagine the power of coordinated actions across production nodes — from Bangladesh to Germany, from Mexico to Norway. That’s the level of strategic vision we need to develop. It’s not just possible — it’s necessary, and it begins with rebuilding internationalist institutions of working-class power.
FT: Yes, and to bring this home — our movements are facing a major generational question. We’ve seen waves of mobilization crash, time and again. The old forms don’t work anymore. But how do we reconstitute organization under current conditions, when the working class seems demobilized and the Left’s institutions are still captured by liberalism?
It’s true. We’ve been through a long process of disorientation. The neoliberal assault dismantled the organizational infrastructure of the working class — its parties, its unions, its media platforms. So we’re not starting from zero, but we are starting from a much weaker place, and you’re right: many institutions that still exist are stuck in a defensive mind-set. They’re clinging to social-democratic promises that no longer hold. Capital no longer needs to compromise. It’s offering nothing to the working class — not even stability.
The challenge is to rebuild — not just react. We need a new organizational paradigm. That means clarity, discipline, long-term vision. It means being unapologetically political. And yes, it probably means a return to mass-based parties — but rooted in contemporary conditions, learning from both the strengths and the mistakes of the past.
DK: That reminds me of something from an earlier generation. In the Netherlands, in the late 1970s and early 1980s, we had massive horizontalist squatter movements — tens of thousands of people willing to take the streets, occupy buildings, and physically resist police repression. It was revolutionary in energy, if not always in strategy. But we had no party structure. And eventually, the state responded with brutal repression and a cross-party political crackdown. The movement was dismantled, and within a few years, the Netherlands became one of the first “third-way” neoliberal democracies. That history is a warning.
Exactly. We’ve seen this pattern again and again. Horizontalism is great for mobilizing people quickly, for creating moments of radical imagination. But it’s not enough. When push comes to shove, it gets swept away. We need durable structures — organizations capable of holding ground, advancing demands, and taking power. We must learn from past failures, but also reclaim past strengths. Organization, discipline, clarity of vision — these aren’t authoritarian. They’re necessary. If we don’t build vehicles that can carry the struggle forward, we’re leaving the field open for authoritarian reaction.
FT: Finally, to loop back to the beginning — this really is a bifurcation moment, isn’t it? As Immanuel Wallerstein used to say, world-systems eventually reach points where their trajectories split. Either we find a way forward through transformation, or we spiral into fragmentation, repression, and ecological collapse.
Exactly. That’s what makes this moment so serious. Even if the far right isn’t fully aware of what it’s preparing for, the logic of global decline is pushing us in that direction. As the imperial core loses access to cheap labour and resources, the ruling class will respond by turning inward — crushing domestic labour and militarizing society. We’re already seeing this happen, and if the Left doesn’t offer an alternative — a post-capitalist vision rooted in justice, democracy, and ecological stability — then capital will manage the transition through violence and repression.
But we do have a chance. We know that human needs can be met with dramatically less energy and material throughput. We can build universal public services. We can stabilize prices without growth. We can reorganize production to serve life rather than profit. That’s the vision we must fight for. Not in the abstract, not one day, but now. Because the world we could live in is still possible, but it’s slipping away.
Jason Hickel is a professor at the Institute for Environmental Science and Technology at the Autonomous University of Barcelona, and the author of several books including The Divide: A Brief Guide to Global Inequality and its Solutions and Less Is More: How Degrowth Will Save the World.
This article was originally published on the German website of the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation.