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Local Is Our Future: Steps to an Economics of Happiness
From a renowned pioneer of the anti-globalization movement, a primer on working towards a localized world From disappearing livelihoods to financial instability, from climate chaos to an epidemic of depression, we face crises on a number of seemingly unrelated fronts. This well-referenced book traces the common roots of these problems in a globalized economy that is incompatible with life on a finite planet. But Local is Our Future does more than just describe the it describes the policy shifts and grassroots steps – many of them already underway around the world – that can move us towards the local and, thereby, towards a better world.
128 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2019
16 people are currently reading
574 people want to read
About the author
Helena Norberg-Hodge
24 books41 followersHelena Norberg-Hodge is a pioneer of the worldwide localization movement, and recipient of the 'Alternative Nobel Prize', the Goi Peace Prize and the Arthur Morgan Award.
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
November 13, 2019
More and more often you hear or read about the despair there is in the world, for our planet and the future of humankind. So many fictional movies and books depict the future as a bleak and barely habitable world and they are becoming true. Newsworthy this year for me: people choosing not to have children both out of fear of what the world may be like for them and also so as not to add to the high, polluting population. It need not be that way. People should be able to feel happy about having and raising families. The world CAN sustain our population and cope with more..BUT NOT if we continue on the path we are on of globalization and greed. This book not only gives you an understanding of some of the drivers behind our enormous and escalating world issues, but offers solutions and hope, that EACH and EVERYONE of us is capable of contributing to. I wish this book was given to every student, to every family, to every politician (and that it was in the drawer at every motel instead of a Bible). Many people born in the last 30 years will only know a world where the systemic pressures caused by globalization and colonization, drive their entire life. Helena does not suggest we go backwards to survive, but rather that we look to the past, to embrace what worked historically and to take that into our future. I could go on (and on) as this book has filled my mind and heart with hope, but will finish with saying: READ THE BOOK AND PASS IT ON and also an extract:
"There is no single formula for life: the need for diversity extends down to every blade of grass, to every earthworm and songbird, and to the identities of unique individuals within a myriad of different cultures. Erasing diversity is simply incompatible with life. For that reason globalization - which systematically replaces diversity with monoculture - is also incompatible with life".
"There is no single formula for life: the need for diversity extends down to every blade of grass, to every earthworm and songbird, and to the identities of unique individuals within a myriad of different cultures. Erasing diversity is simply incompatible with life. For that reason globalization - which systematically replaces diversity with monoculture - is also incompatible with life".
April 5, 2020
Local is Our Future by Helena Norberg-Hodge
This book, Local is Our Future is a book about globilisation and about hope. HNH spent time observing the people of Ladakh, known as Little Tibet as they have been affected by the outside world. Their happy and peaceful existence was destroyed by the incroachment of progress. Rather, what we generally think of as progress. From her observations she began to see the world with new eyes. This book is one of the results of that process od re-seeing the world. It is a strangely uplifting and full of hope.
This not a book that I bought and chose, it would not have been. The book a present and I was put off it when I glanced through the first chapter. The prose seemed to be dense and difficult. To me many of the doom laden pronouncements seemed to be presented as if they were written in stone, without evidence. It was, I assumed, one of those strident treatises written by true believers of whatever the latest neo-political fad happened to be.
I knew that I ought to do my friend the courtesy reading it so that we can discuss it, As a result, I began to read it properly and found that I was so wrong about this book. Yes, I found the language difficult and I would have liked more references. However the book made perfect sense and it is not a difficult read, but it starts as a depressing one. Local is Our Future begins by identifying and illustrating what is wrong with globilisation. There are so many examples. Shipping fish half the way across the world for filliting. The shipping the fish back to be sold. Exporting and importing similar food stuffs. This is rediculous. The decline of our mental and physical health. The loss of true democracy and the increase in polution. The list of problems goes on, and on.
It is a bleak and depressing picture that most of us know and understand, but really do not want to dwell on. This book paints this picture in detail and makes us take it all in.
Uplifting
Having spent the first 40 odd pages setting out the problem HNH spends the next 80 pages setting out her vision of how we change our future. How we should source food locally, grow our own if possible. There is advice on how to deploy counter arguments against the doom sayers. There are chapters that make you see that we can turn this whole thing arround.
The problem is that sometimes it seemed so difficult that I caught myself thinking that this was all pie in the sky stuff. The problem was just too big, where to begin? HNH has the answer, she sets out what is already happening. Forget large organisations what we should be looking at are the small green shoots of change. Globilisation will be defeated by individuals taking small steps.
Local is Our Future is a book of hope. It is difficult and even turgid (to my mind) at the start. Would I ever have bought it for myself? No. Is Local is Our Future, an important book? Oh yes. Have I changed my life because of it? Not yet. Has it started an internal dialogue that might well result in a change in my behaviour? Yes.
Would I recommend it as a book that is important and that should command a bigger audience? In other words, should you read it? A resounding YES.
This book, Local is Our Future is a book about globilisation and about hope. HNH spent time observing the people of Ladakh, known as Little Tibet as they have been affected by the outside world. Their happy and peaceful existence was destroyed by the incroachment of progress. Rather, what we generally think of as progress. From her observations she began to see the world with new eyes. This book is one of the results of that process od re-seeing the world. It is a strangely uplifting and full of hope.
This not a book that I bought and chose, it would not have been. The book a present and I was put off it when I glanced through the first chapter. The prose seemed to be dense and difficult. To me many of the doom laden pronouncements seemed to be presented as if they were written in stone, without evidence. It was, I assumed, one of those strident treatises written by true believers of whatever the latest neo-political fad happened to be.
I knew that I ought to do my friend the courtesy reading it so that we can discuss it, As a result, I began to read it properly and found that I was so wrong about this book. Yes, I found the language difficult and I would have liked more references. However the book made perfect sense and it is not a difficult read, but it starts as a depressing one. Local is Our Future begins by identifying and illustrating what is wrong with globilisation. There are so many examples. Shipping fish half the way across the world for filliting. The shipping the fish back to be sold. Exporting and importing similar food stuffs. This is rediculous. The decline of our mental and physical health. The loss of true democracy and the increase in polution. The list of problems goes on, and on.
It is a bleak and depressing picture that most of us know and understand, but really do not want to dwell on. This book paints this picture in detail and makes us take it all in.
Uplifting
Having spent the first 40 odd pages setting out the problem HNH spends the next 80 pages setting out her vision of how we change our future. How we should source food locally, grow our own if possible. There is advice on how to deploy counter arguments against the doom sayers. There are chapters that make you see that we can turn this whole thing arround.
The problem is that sometimes it seemed so difficult that I caught myself thinking that this was all pie in the sky stuff. The problem was just too big, where to begin? HNH has the answer, she sets out what is already happening. Forget large organisations what we should be looking at are the small green shoots of change. Globilisation will be defeated by individuals taking small steps.
Local is Our Future is a book of hope. It is difficult and even turgid (to my mind) at the start. Would I ever have bought it for myself? No. Is Local is Our Future, an important book? Oh yes. Have I changed my life because of it? Not yet. Has it started an internal dialogue that might well result in a change in my behaviour? Yes.
Would I recommend it as a book that is important and that should command a bigger audience? In other words, should you read it? A resounding YES.
March 1, 2025
My environmentalist opinions have recently led me to a focus on local production, traditional identities and organic food. I reached for this book originally because I love the sound of "localisation" - it has started to accurately represent the policies and values I champion, socioeconomically you could say. Where previously I have been looking up carbon footprints and lifestyle optimisation, this book offers a more radical take on a sustainable society, which took me aback at first.
The points I took home from this:
- Deregulation of trade has left governments under debt and pressure from global corporations, which is where those massive subsidies come from and why they can't just disappear.
- Urbanisation and centralisation of capital are effectively the same thing, a transfer of resources which is very intensive on infrastructure (and governments indirectly subsidise this by providing the means to this movement of capital).
- Globalisation inherently produces monoculture, as countries and regions become specialised and export-driven. The same applies to people in a hypercompetetive society.
- Destruction of tradition and local identities is economically desirable because markets can then be injected into them.
- "Progress" is a colonial concept in origin and continues to apply itself in exploitation of the Global South while legitimising it in Global North as "development".
I agree with a lot of this, as I become increasingly skeptical of technology and "business as usual" in the face of the planetary crisis. The focus on local alternatives to consumerist society is pleasant, and I enjoy that it starts with food - probably the easiest change to implement and build that connection with natural order again (I'm starting to eat seasonal if possible).
However, the structure of the book is a bit mixed, a lot of the points keep coming back on themselves. In some chapters I felt like I had complete clarity of the issues, in others it just felt like a lament over the destruction of humanity. Which is fair, but the Ladakh story got a bit tiring.
In the end, I'll definitely try harder than ever to support my local businesses and I'll try get into activism and a bit more of revolutionary thinking. But reaching the kind of world that Helena Norberg-Hodge talks about seems impossible to me, even if we used to have it at one point. 7/10.
The points I took home from this:
- Deregulation of trade has left governments under debt and pressure from global corporations, which is where those massive subsidies come from and why they can't just disappear.
- Urbanisation and centralisation of capital are effectively the same thing, a transfer of resources which is very intensive on infrastructure (and governments indirectly subsidise this by providing the means to this movement of capital).
- Globalisation inherently produces monoculture, as countries and regions become specialised and export-driven. The same applies to people in a hypercompetetive society.
- Destruction of tradition and local identities is economically desirable because markets can then be injected into them.
- "Progress" is a colonial concept in origin and continues to apply itself in exploitation of the Global South while legitimising it in Global North as "development".
I agree with a lot of this, as I become increasingly skeptical of technology and "business as usual" in the face of the planetary crisis. The focus on local alternatives to consumerist society is pleasant, and I enjoy that it starts with food - probably the easiest change to implement and build that connection with natural order again (I'm starting to eat seasonal if possible).
However, the structure of the book is a bit mixed, a lot of the points keep coming back on themselves. In some chapters I felt like I had complete clarity of the issues, in others it just felt like a lament over the destruction of humanity. Which is fair, but the Ladakh story got a bit tiring.
In the end, I'll definitely try harder than ever to support my local businesses and I'll try get into activism and a bit more of revolutionary thinking. But reaching the kind of world that Helena Norberg-Hodge talks about seems impossible to me, even if we used to have it at one point. 7/10.
March 8, 2022
Fine enough, but nothing new to me and not written in an exciting or inspiring enough way to make me read it without new (to me) content. If you've never thought about globalism vs. local economies, then this might be a good primer.
August 14, 2020
Love the detailing of how governmental subsidies and trade/financial deregulation’s lead to unhappy, unhealthy people in communities and potentially to right-wing extremism. There’s a lot of cool ideas in here concerning localized alternatives to the globalized monoculture of corporate marketing and advertising. One specific topic I’m interested in looking up later is community owned decentralized energy which I wish was talked about more.
The conversation with Wendell at the end of the book is very insightful. Great and easy read.
The conversation with Wendell at the end of the book is very insightful. Great and easy read.
May 4, 2020
The best articulated take I've come across on the interconnectedness of the issues we are facing, with examples of both the grassroot efforts and the policy changes that can and are making a holistic difference.
October 27, 2022
I had to give this five stars simply because it is the most readable concise explanation of the global economy and its ills that I have ever seen. It is simple to understand without dumbing down any of the issues.
Since the late 90s, early 2000s, with Australia entering into free trade agreements and the inception of the G20, I have been protesting globalisation as a flawed economic policy. This inevitably led to accusations of being a Luddite, anti-progress and wanting us all to live in the Dark Ages.
This book shows categorically that globalisation has failed, only benefiting a very few while leaving the majority of the world's population worse off.
I won't go into all the discussion as the failure of globalisation has many aspects to it. Suffice it to say that it is a disgrace that in 2016, of the 100 largest economies of the world, 69 were corporations. We have paid for these profits through unfair government subsidies, externalised environment and healthcare costs and lower standards of living for many people.
"Much of the global economy, in other words, is a giant Ponzi scheme that is (temporarily) viable only because markets fail to account for the value and use of the natural ecology - on which civilisation depends for its crops, water, air, its very livelihood."
The title of the book gives us the solution. It is the way we have lived for the majority of recorded human existence - the global economy is but a blip on the human timeline.
Since the late 90s, early 2000s, with Australia entering into free trade agreements and the inception of the G20, I have been protesting globalisation as a flawed economic policy. This inevitably led to accusations of being a Luddite, anti-progress and wanting us all to live in the Dark Ages.
This book shows categorically that globalisation has failed, only benefiting a very few while leaving the majority of the world's population worse off.
I won't go into all the discussion as the failure of globalisation has many aspects to it. Suffice it to say that it is a disgrace that in 2016, of the 100 largest economies of the world, 69 were corporations. We have paid for these profits through unfair government subsidies, externalised environment and healthcare costs and lower standards of living for many people.
"Much of the global economy, in other words, is a giant Ponzi scheme that is (temporarily) viable only because markets fail to account for the value and use of the natural ecology - on which civilisation depends for its crops, water, air, its very livelihood."
The title of the book gives us the solution. It is the way we have lived for the majority of recorded human existence - the global economy is but a blip on the human timeline.
May 2, 2021
Norberg-Hodge's brief book (145 pages) is brilliantly clear, concise, comprehensive, and powerful.
Some quotes on what she means by "localization":
"localization. noun. 1. the removal of fiscal and other supports that currently favor giant transnational corporations and banks; 2. reducing dependence on export markets in favor of production for local needs (often confused with isolationism, protectionism, the elimination of trade.)"
"[I]t's important to remember that, even now, the rules are being changed to facilitate a continuing acceleration towards the global. What localization means is simply shifting the direction of change so that it's towards the local instead of the global."
"Local economies are not some kind of prison, preventing people from moving elsewhere or choosing to travel to other cultures to experience other ways of life. On the contrary, localization moves us away from the homogenizing influence of the global consumer monoculture towards enriched cultural diversity. In this way, our opportunities for authentic encounters and exchange with other cultures are far greater."
Some quotes on what she means by "localization":
"localization. noun. 1. the removal of fiscal and other supports that currently favor giant transnational corporations and banks; 2. reducing dependence on export markets in favor of production for local needs (often confused with isolationism, protectionism, the elimination of trade.)"
"[I]t's important to remember that, even now, the rules are being changed to facilitate a continuing acceleration towards the global. What localization means is simply shifting the direction of change so that it's towards the local instead of the global."
"Local economies are not some kind of prison, preventing people from moving elsewhere or choosing to travel to other cultures to experience other ways of life. On the contrary, localization moves us away from the homogenizing influence of the global consumer monoculture towards enriched cultural diversity. In this way, our opportunities for authentic encounters and exchange with other cultures are far greater."
November 21, 2025
A quick little book; she provides a lot of helpful organizations and examples where you can get started. She's preaching to the choir a bit with me, but even I am a person that has kind of accepted globalization as a fact of life, and she really shows how much globalization stinks. She (rightly) focuses on food, but I wish she'd also talked about the growing fibershed movement (maybe it started after the publication of this book).
December 1, 2023
Personally, I feel this book's greatest strengths are in its examples of localization, particularly of food systems localization. That section itself gets 5 stars, easily.
The rest of the book is okay. Overall 3.5 stars, bumped up to 4 because of that food system localization chapter.
The rest of the book is okay. Overall 3.5 stars, bumped up to 4 because of that food system localization chapter.
March 20, 2020
It was a feel-good book. A nice change from many of the other globalization-related literature I have been reading. I enjoyed the examples of people that were making change in the world.
November 14, 2022
Esclarece un poco la realidad oculta de la globalización y da esperanzas y ganas de seguir organizandose con las amigas
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September 11, 2024Nada nuevo. No presenta ninguna idea original ni profundiza en la temática.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews