No Local: Why Small-Scale Alternatives Won't Change the World

by Greg Sharzer

Can making things smaller make the world a better place? No Local takes a critical look at localism, an ideology that says small businesses, ethical shopping and community initiatives like gardens and farmers’ markets can stop corporate globalization. These small acts might make life better for some, but they don’t challenge the drive for profit that’s damaging our communities and the earth. No Local shows how localism’s fixation on small comes from an outdated economic model. Growth is built into capitalism. Small firms must play by the same rules as large ones, cutting costs, exploiting workers and damaging the environment. Localism doesn’t ask who controls production, allowing it to be co-opted by governments offloading social services onto the poor. At worst, localism becomes a strategy for neoliberal politics, not an alternative to it. No Local draws on political theory, history, philosophy and empirical evidence to argue that small isn’t always beautiful. Building a better world means creating local social movements that grow to challenge, not avoid, market priorities.

Genres: Nonfiction, Politics

189 pages, Paperback

First published April 16, 2012

Reviews

[Dan Sharber · Rating 5 out of 5]

this book should really be part of series called 'the marxist case for/against...' this book while short so was thorough and so well structured and argued that it should be a lesson to marxist everywhere. to the point, 'solutions' which attempt to opt out of or avoid confronting the capitalist system can not be strategies for liberation. as the book makes clear though, if you want to grow your own food and enjoy being part of a co-op or csa or something then that's great! find joy anywhere you can. but for those who elevate that sort of thing to political activism, you are wasting your time. and this book will clearly explain that to you. the power in this book though is not simply that it debunks a lot of the hype around 'localism' (though that is why i picked this up in the first place) but rather that it gives you a complete marxist analysis for why localism is a failure. this analysis and explanation covers everything from labor theory of value and socially necessary labor time to combined and uneven development. and while that might seem like a lot it doesn't feel like the marxism is shoe-horned in there to simply show off. the case is coherent and clear and also entertaining. finally the book even has bright spots! i find a lot of time as a marxist i have to debunk the well meaning but utopian schemes that this or that person comes up with. it can get to be a drag to be the downer sometimes. but this book doesn't simply take down localism but it also shows what sort of local political activity can lead to collective, anti-capitalist action. and as i started this review out with, if you get personal enjoyment out of local forms of commerce or agriculture then go to it but why not get involved with something more thoroughgoing as well?

[Stephie Jane Rexroth · Rating 4 out of 5]

Despite page-by-page reverence for the prophetic genius of Marx, I tend to agree with the author's critique of localism: noble attempts to ease the symptoms of capitalism without changing the system itself. Pro-market groups operate within capitalism to try to reform it into a friendlier, more caring and sustainable, less destructive version of exploitation. Anti-market groups attempt to avoid the system altogether. Both fail to directly confront and challenge it; worse, end up enabling neoliberalism instead. The final two chapters on the goals, beliefs, values and morals of the petite bourgeoisie (Ch 4) and how localism can be used to uncover contradictions in capitalism as means of opposing it (Ch 5) were insightful, though just scratching the surface and not revolutionary enough.

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"The localist lifestyle is another way to ease the loneliness of individual class striving, rather than a way to stop capitalist degradation… Permaculture technologies, DIY bicycle repairs and biofuel production, open-source software writers and the Burning Man festival in the Nevada desert: these are all wonderful things to do, but what ties pro- and anti-market localists together is a desire to escape alienation 'within' capitalism because they can't see a way out."

"The economics of localism ignore capitalist laws of motion, and the ideology of localism reflects the hopes and fears of the petit bourgeoisie. What about localism's politics? In a neoliberal age, localism helps fill the gaps that market deregulation creates… But if small-scale alternatives can't change the world, this doesn't mean local spheres are irrelevant. When local activism opposes capital rather than avoiding it, it creates the potential to build a better world."

"The local changed from a space to analyze and resist to a free space where one could make their own world… But the power of positive thinking doesn't change the global division of labor that forced workers to move abroad for a better wage and send remittances home. This is the danger of postcapitalism: by trying to redefine people as social actors with real power, it redefines the much greater power of capital out of existence. In doing so, it actually reproduces the determinist, structuralist accounts of capital it loathes. By refusing to fight neoliberalism, the "noncapitalist imaginary" leaves capitalist reality untouched. The most oppressed members of the working class, local communities of people of color, must drag themselves out of the predicament capital placed them in, by being as flexible and adaptable as possible."

"In a society that takes away the means to survive outside the market, and offers either unemployment or tedious work as a reward, workers have every right to survive however they can. For many people, this means scavenging, growing food or setting up a cooperative, and we should celebrate their sheer tenacity. But surely the most important question is: how do we change society so people can flourish, not just survive?"

"We can confront global institutions of power in local spaces: when anti-capitalists take on local and community struggles, they're educating themselves and others about how to resist capitalism on the ground… The fight for reforms must have a revolutionary strategy at its heart, confronting the capitalist social relations that localism refuses to do."

[Donatella Gasparro · Rating 4 out of 5]

12 years after its publication, with all the eco/bio/local/slow- stuff becoming more and more commodified, co-opted, and widespread, No Local remains a very relevant book.

Despite the slight sloppiness and rushed character of a few arguments, especially in the first third of the book - maybe due to Sharzer's still maturing sharpness back then - the book delivers a convincing roast to what was left of believable in the bourgeois localist movement. I particularly enjoyed the central part of the book, which thoroughly elucidates the petite bourgeoisie ideology roots of localism. If you're also entertained by witty critiques of post-structuralist/post-capitalist theories (e.g. Gibson-Graham) you'll find some good arguments in here.

While calling for political strategy and class struggle - instead of localist niche alternatives born out of moralism and individualism - Sharzer unsurprisingly falls short of pointing to any practical strategy, concluding the short book with Participatory Budgeting (and its failures) as an example of politically-relevant localism, but disappointing on any concrete counter-movement proposal.

Marx reverence, as others have noted, is, to put it mildly, prominent, but it is justified given the topic treated and the ambition of the work. This is very clearly a Marxist critique of localism.

Overall, No Local is a relatively readable contribution (if you're not alergic to Marxism:) ) that I'd definitely recommend to those suspicious of slow-foodism, urban gardening and fancy food coop-ing, and to those trying to puzzle together elements for truly emancipatory politics beyond capitalism.

[Joey Diamond · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some of the writing in this drive me up the wall but overall it's a pretty convincing demolition of 'localist' approaches to politics, particularly food politics.
I got the most out of the section explaining how local projects often do the work of neoliberalism and are actually part of capitals' need to lower costs AND the section about the values of the petite bourgeoisie... this really synthesised a lot of how grossed out I have been lately by people's moralism about consumer choices... now I see why.

I wish I had more faith in revolutionary politics though, he sure does make an end to capitalism sound good.

[Elwyn · Rating 3 out of 5]

I would have given it four stars, but reading nonfiction isn't really my thing. Very good book to read.