by Andre Coelho | Sep 25, 2018 | News
On September 15th 2018, Donut-D-Day brought together various Dutch organizations and citizens committed to integrated systemic reforms to fight climate change, socioeconomic inequality, and unstable financial systems. The organizers used Kate Raworth‘s model of Doughnut Economics to imagine possible approaches that would balance the need for minimum standards of living for all people (the social foundation), within the environmental limits of the Earth. This day was intended to be the first encounter of longer series of meetings, aiming to connect people working on themes that are strongly linked and to facilitate their integration and collaboration.
Kate Raworth was present through a prerecorded video presentation in which she emphasized how we are currently overshooting the donut on both sides, with poverty and hunger in the center of the donut, and climate change and environmental destruction on the outside of the donut. In order to eliminate human deprivation while staying within planetary boundaries, she argues we need economies that are distributive and regenerative by design. Sources of wealth creation, particularly housing & land, energy generation, enterprise ownership, money creation, and info & technology, will need to be pre-distributed. Simultaneously, we will need to work within the cycles of the living world toward a circular or cyclical economy, investing in renewables, recognizing the potentials of waste, creating systems of repair and share, and pushing for open source standards, resources, and data. She invited people to join the discussion groups on these topics on her website.
The second presenter was Harold Boven, an economist and co-initiator of the plan Courageously Forward by the Young Democrats, which is a financially covered plan for basic income that would end all poverty in the Netherlands. Harold presented data from a Dutch study (CPB, 2016) that could not find any positive results of the 6.5 billion euros invested in activating employment policy to get unemployed people into jobs. He emphasized that basic income would not lead to inflation because it is fiscally financed and does not require the introduction of extra money. According to him, a basic income of €1200/month per single adult and €300/month per child, adding €600/month per adult when sharing a household. He presented a financing mechanism to cover the 164 billion euros annual cost for such a policy, which would come from the elimination of existing welfare programs (134 billion), the introduction of lightly progressive property taxes (14 billion), environmental and energy taxes for companies (14 billion), and inheritance taxes (2 billion). Disability payments would remain untouched. Apart from the usual advantages attributed to basic income, Harold added that it is a response to the failure to the current system and dissatisfaction with the political establishment, while presenting an alternative for emerging populism.
Anne Knol, from Environmental Defense, shared her insights on what she learned about the incredible complexities of interconnections between environmental and social problems. Anne estimated that science guides about 5% of debates, while emotion, lobby, and the interests of political parties guide the rest. She argued that campaign leaders need to present appealing stories that can compete with the story of capitalism and the widely spread and accepted idea that the market should be allowed to run its course. Anne reminded the audience about the donut economics, and to the dangers of overdoing policy on the environmental front, and then affecting people on the bottom of the income scale. On the other hand, there is the fear that if people’s standards of living are risen, that could lead to more environmental excesses. Hence the need to work on both “sides” of the donut simultaneously, ensuring a just distribution of both the costs and the benefits of environmental policies.
Herman Wijffels (Wikipedia)
The last main speaker of the day was Klaas van Egmond, professor of Geosciences at the University of Utrecht, co-initiator of the Sustainable Finance Lab, and board member of the NatureCollege. He discussed the problems in the current configuration of our financial system and the reforms necessary to break with the types of practices that led to the 2008 financial crisis and that will result in more problems in the future in they remain unchecked. Klaas explained that, in a healthy society, the main goal is the expression and implementation of values, as supported by the economy, in turn supported by the financial system. Klaas proposed that clear boundaries between the public and the private must be reinstalled, banks must not be bailed out and cannot have the power to create money. The community misses out on 40-50 billion euros per year due to money creation by private banks. This could instead be used to fund basic income and a smooth transition to sustainability. These measures would break with the cycle of growth and collapse, lead to a stable economy, and allow for complete elimination of government debts.
The day was wrapped up by Herman Wijffels, co-chair of Worldconnectors and until last October professor of sustainability and social change at the University of Utrecht. He emphasized that our current system is socially and economically dysfunctional and has been bought by capital. According to him, we are facing the end of material growth due to the exhaustion of natural resources and are on a journey through the desert to find a new promised land. Wiiffels spoke about a new type of society, with a fairer distribution of wealth, while putting the planet first. Basic income and financial reform would be key elements in the transformation of the capitalist system. In addition, he said that we need to acknowledge that masculine values are no longer appropriate for the 21st century and we should embrace feminine values, which would mean a greater care for life, connections with the Earth and all people on it.
More information at:
Donut-D-Day was live streaming on Facebook (in Dutch)
Article written by Karin Berkhoudt, reviewed by André Coelho.
by Florie Barnhoorn | Aug 5, 2017 | News
Summer 2017,
On Thursday, July 21, the city council of Amsterdam decided that it will in no way adopt stricter local rules for its social assistance recipients, not even on paper. A large majority of the members supported a motion submitted by the chairman of the GreenLeft (GroenLinks), Rutger Groot Wassink.
The motion called for Amsterdam’s alderman for Work, Income and Participation, Arjan Vliegenthart (Socialist Party), not to lay down regulations for forced compensation in a local statute (as described below) and to launch its own social assistance experiment in September. Only the VVD and the CDA voted against it. A conflict was born.
The Participation Act, which was introduced in 2015, requires municipalities to force each social benefit recipient to make a useful contribution to society, in exchange for his or her social benefit payments. This is the very controversial so-called ‘compensation’ (Dutch: Tegenprestatie). The ‘compensation’ can be voluntary work, taking up a language training or giving informal care.
The Participation Act also requires every municipality to lay down the regulations regarding the ‘compensation’ in a local statute. This document may contain for instance punitive measures that can be imposed on a reluctant recipient. Since the introduction of the law in 2015, Amsterdam has refused to fulfill these requirements. The city does not demand a compensation from every social benefit claimant and has not recorded the necessary regulations in its local statutes. However, Jetta Klijnsma (PvdA / Labour Party), the State Secretary for Social Affairs and Employment, will only give her permission for social assistance experiments in municipalities that have fully implemented the Participation Act.[1] (See also NETHERLANDS: Design of BI Experiments Proposed.)
Consequently, Amsterdam is heading to a confrontation with Klijnsma, who insists that the municipal authorities record their local rules on paper first in accordance with the law. Only then would Amsterdam be allowed to start with its social assistance experiment.
Earlier in the week, on July 14, Klijnsma called on Amsterdam to be pragmatic by incorporating the desired ‘technical adjustment’ (i.e. regulations with regard to the compensation as stated in the Participation Act and the local legislation in case of default, mentioned above) into its local statutes: “It would be very sad, if the Amsterdam City Council misses the opportunity, because of this ‘technical point’, to execute an experiment with the social assistance program. If Amsterdam participates, wide public support will be generated and the experiments will gain more significance.”
Additionally, in an attempt to pacify the situation, she stressed that “Municipalities do not need to impose that obligation in practice, because they have much ‘freedom of policy’ in the execution of the Participation Act.”
Municipal councillor and leader of GroenLinks, Groot Wassink, refers to Klijnsma’s demands as ‘ridiculous’. He does not want to ‘give in’ due to the ‘blackmail’ of an outgoing secretary of state: “It seems that the state secretary has launched a kind of punitive expedition to Amsterdam.”
Vliegenthart, who is not happy with the politicized debate with the PvdA state secretary, is nevertheless planning to implement the motion. He wants to present the design of his own experiment in September. According to the councillor, such an experiment exclusively for Amsterdam is legally possible: “I will make it legal as waterproof as possible.” The plan will be very similar to a research proposal that the city submitted earlier to Klijnsma and which was already approved.
“According to scientific research, compulsion and coercion do not help,” says Vliegenthart, “We want to make it easier for our social benefit recipients to find a job, not to impose on them restrictive measures.” He wants to start a social assistance experiment whereby recipients, who have difficulties in getting paid work, are allowed to earn some money on top of their benefits. In this way, on Vliegenthart’s view, work would be not only a compensation for society’s ‘gift’ (i.e. the welfare payments), as Klijnsma views it, but a project that really yields something.
The Council of State has already decided that the municipalities are free to include the compensation in the experiments or not. Vliegenthart also thinks so, after obtaining legal advice. “I suppose the state secretary is wrong,” he has said. However, she can still block Amsterdam’s experiment by legal means.
Groningen (including the neighboring village of Ten Boer), Wageningen, Tilburg, Deventer and Nijmegen are the first municipalities which have been given permission to begin social assistance experiments. Since early July, another municipality, Apeldoorn, has also started a social assistance experiment directed at developing self-management skills and tailor-made solutions. The municipalities of Epe, Oss and Geldrop-Mierlo, relatively rural municipalities situated in the eastern and southern part of the Netherlands, have joined the project that is led by Apeldoorn. This experiment fits within the framework of the Participation Act. The research involves about 90 participants from Epe and 450 from Apeldoorn and receives scientific guidance from Tilburg University. The trial will run until July 2019.
Under the Participation Act, up to 25 municipalities in the Netherlands may execute experiments, with each experiment lasting two years. Nationwide there is room for over 18.000 beneficiaries between the various projects.
See also Kate McFarland in The Netherlands: Government authorizes social assistance experiments in first five municipalities.
Credit Photo: Pixabay (Amsterdam, City Hall), tpsdave.
Thanks to Kate McFarland for reviewing the article and for her enthusiasm.
1. All social assistance experiments must be approved by the Ministry of Social Affairs and Employment. For that reason the ministry has developed a general administrative regulation (Dutch: Algemene Maatregel van Bestuur / AMvB). This document sets out the exact standards for the implementation of the social assistance experiments. See also The Netherlands: All that’s left is the action. Where do we stand with the social assistance experiments?↩
