Recognizing our hybridity and interconnectedness: Implications for social and environmental justice

The consumption of resources

Research needs to break new ground on understanding social and cultural relationships and power dynamics across diverse groups as they relate to wellbeing and environmental stewardship in new economies that support environmental abundance and biodiversity (Pauli, 2010) but also addresses the plea made by Pikketty (2015) for more transparency, who makes it quite clear that doing more with less is something that elites could learn from the poor. In particular further praxis is needed to explore the wider potential of Max-Neef’s Human Development Index (1991) as it relates to regeneration, sustainability, human capital and capacity building locally and regionally on ways to scale up engagement on the question: How should we live?

The use of the less powerful sentient beings and the planet as a resource for plunder is not a new phenomenon. Planetary Passport (McIntyre-Mills, 2017) addresses the questions: Can the social, economic and environmental deterioration of life chances experienced by the majority on this planet be understood as systemic silencing based on power and control? How can we prevent the extent of plunder evident in the so-called ‘Panama Papers’ (Chakraboritty, 2016) that revealed the extent to which wealth is hidden in offshore accounts and forms of accounting that are anything but accountable to the majority? In this book the widening gap between the rich and poor is explained as being in the interests of the wealthy who control governance systems as a ‘plunderbund’ (see Hay, 2013). The issue is how is this possible? Harari (2011) sketches out the idea that human beings evolved through their ability to create grand narratives about what constitutes reality and what can be considered right and legal. This is why it is important to reconsider ‘what the problems are represented to be’ (Bacchi, 2009).

Cultural memory refers to a practical record of what works, why and how to support living systems. It is rooted in respect for norms and values. First Nations remember their stories by referring directly to landmarks, rather than recording history in books. The plants, animals, rocks and rivers hold stories and act as memos for thinking. The Aboriginal sacred text is the land. They are its caretakers and in ideal terms according to Rose (1992) they see some life forms ‘as family’ (Rose, 2013) which makes all the difference as to how they relate to living systems. Memory is coded in the landscape to help oral cultures to retain knowledge to enable them to survive and to thrive (Kelly, 2016).

As Major Sumner, an Ngarrindjeri Aboriginal elder in South Australia and custodian of the Murray River, stresses: we are the land and the land is us. Re-establishing relationships with the land is at the heart of effective cultural ecosystem management. Many non-Aboriginal people desire more environmentally sustainable lives, but little is known about the influences of choices around what constitutes the effective management of land, water and food sources. Government response to human wellbeing is often based on economic development, which inadvertently increases consumerism, resulting in greater environmental degradation. Stewardship like all concepts is shaped by assumptions and values. Flannery (2012) considers that stewardship is based on awareness that the land and biologically diverse ecosystems are a cultural heritage on which the wellbeing of current and future generations depends. Anthropocentric versus non-anthropocentric stewardship needs to be carefully considered to ensure that human consumption is not at the expense of environmental considerations and future generations of life (Parker, 2012) because we are interdependent and vulnerable.

The challenges are to address planetary issues. Thus when framing research it is important to realize that the wellbeing of individual citizens cannot be protected unless the global commons is protected. Research needs to address a different approach to the way in which we live our lives in terms of our consumption of energy resources, fresh water, transport and meat consumption and the implications for wellbeing and sustainable living (Pretty, 2013). Thus new local forms of engagement and governance (Held, 2004) are needed to protect residents against environmental hazards and the subsequent economic and social consequences. Major challenges in local communities include the need to achieve or maintain: (a) access to safe housing (including energy and water), appropriate education and employment; within (b) liveable cities; that are in turn supported by (c) sustainable regions. Some scholars (Dryzek, 2010) argue that a lack of cultural understanding about our interlinked and entangled lives affects human rights insofar as it shapes access to water, energy and food security. There is a groundswell of democracy that seeks to save the planet from our consumption choices, but little is known about those consumption choices and what motivates people to consume excessively. It has been argued that after a certain point, increased consumption does not lead to more happiness (Pretty, 2013). Thus, increased consumption, driven by increased economic growth, does not make people happier. Indeed, in more egalitarian societies, all people consume less and are less status conscious (Wilkinson and Pickett, 2009). Thus, the link between greater equality or wellbeing and the prevention of global warming appears to involve ‘limiting consumerism’ (Wilkinson and Pickett, 2009: 221). It is assumed that greater social and economic equality will provide the key to reducing the cultural pressure to consume. These are policy challenges locally and regionally that need to be addressed if this agenda is to be advanced. Specifically, it will require balancing individual and community needs to achieve sustainable human rights within and beyond nation-states.

The globalized market needs post-national controls to ensure control of the movement of funds (see McIntyre-Mills et al., 2014). By recognizing that we are part of overlapping biospheres, rather than competing nation-states, a way forward may be possible. But enabling the transformation of identity through governance and public education is the challenge for ethical systemic governance. This has become increasingly difficult as governments focus on political survival, rather than addressing the social, economic and environmental crises. Morality becomes politically disposable, because of a lack of understanding of our interconnected existence. Strong cosmopolitans recognize the need to contain capitalism. Our so-called containment anxiety – linked with our identity and need to define ourselves – cannot be addressed by living a schizophrenic existence in which we see ourselves as benefiting at the expense of other nation-states. We already have regional conflicts fuelled by energy shortages and competition for the last of the non-renewables. Satellite monitoring from above seems to be more of a priority at the moment by the USA than space travel. Digital communications are already widely used but their potential is under-tapped, as stressed in this article and other research on wellbeing, representation, accountability and sustainability (McIntyre-Mills and de Vries, 2011, 2013).

Stiglitz, the ex-head of the World Bank, along with his colleagues (Stiglitz et al., 2010), has adopted similar ideas based on his experiences in response to an invitation from Sarkozy to address the poverty and global financial issues facing Europe. It recognizes the systemic social, economic and environmental challenges. Stiglitz et al. (2010: 15) use a multidimensional measure of wellbeing. These are as follows: (1) material living standards (income, consumption and wealth), (2) health, (3) education, (4) personal activities including work, (5) political voice and governance, (6) social connections and relationships, (7) environment (present and future conditions) and (8) insecurity, of an economic as well as a physical nature. Leisure should also be valued. According to Stiglitz et al., the essence of the commissioned work’s findings is that wealth needs to include stocks for the future – social, economic and environmental. Together with vulnerability to job loss, many people across the world also face risks associated with fires, flood and drought.

The implications of greed and lavish consumption on others and the environment

The will to make a difference is the challenge, according to David Held et al. (2005: 33–34), who calculate the amounts in American dollars required to make a difference to the life chances of others:

We may lack the will but it cannot be said that we lack the means. … What do we require to make a substantial difference to the basic wellbeing of the world’s poorest? Again the statistics are available. … Required would be $6 billion per annum on basic education, 9 billion per annum for water and sanitation, 12 billion per annum for the reproductive health of women, 13 billion per annum for basic health nutrition. … These figures are substantial, but when judged against the major consumption expenditure in the US and EU they are not beyond our reach. Moreover if all the OECD agricultural subsidies were removed and spent on the world’s poorest peoples this would release some 300 billion per annum. … In addition a small shift between military and aid budgets – 900 billion and 50 billion a year globally would make a marked difference to the human security agenda.

But the Sydney Peace Prize winner Vandana Shiva (2002) sums up the challenge for this century as one of preventing the commodification of life and stresses the need to learn from nature and across disciplinary specializations. The ability to see the big picture in terms of what we value and why, ranging from social thinkers to physicists, should be encouraged:

… all the indications are that the universe is at its simplest at the smallest and the largest scales. … One can draw further parallels with the selfish, individualistic behaviours that are often the root cause of our environmental and financial crises. Within physics I see the idea of a ‘multiverse’ as a similarly fragmented perspective, representing a loss of confidence in the prospects for basic science. Yet I believe all of these crises will ultimately be helpful if they force us, like the quantum physicist, to remake our world in more basic and far sighted ways. … If we can only link our intelligence to our hearts, the doors are wide open to a brighter future, to a more unified planet … to quantum technologies that extend our perception. (Turok, 2012: 256–257)

According to Shiva (1988, 2002, 2011) multinational companies and the World Bank and the World Trade Organization have made it possible to patent the conditions of life and to link the so-called Green Revolution in India with terminator seeds that do not self-generate because they have been genetically modified, resulting in spiralling costs associated with the purchasing of seeds and the pesticides needed (despite the claims by the manufacturers). Shiva (2011) argues that this has led to many farmers being unable to afford to buy seed and that some are driven to suicide. Shiva argues furthermore that the attempt to criminalize farmers who store old varieties of seed could lead to undermining the seed diversity and that this could lead to increased food insecurity as a result of vulnerable monocultures of foods. The idea that the very basis for life – seeds and genes – can be patented is part of the process of commodifying people, animals and the fabric of life. Patents supported by international trade undermine both the developed and the developing world through eroding human and planetary health. Shiva’s (1988) praxis (like Gandhi’s) is to find ways to intervene where it is most needed.

The Open Democracy Forum was the starting point for research in response to David Held et al.’s (2005) proposal shared through Open Democracy that the core challenge of the day is to address the vast differences in standards of living between rich and poor through reforming world trade and using the market to address global warming by means of a global covenant that prevents unilateral interventions. In response to his critics Held claims that the resources exist for a reformed United Nations to make a difference, if there is a will. But the UN according to Scruton (2005: 47–48) is corrupt, the bureaucrats are overpaid and he argues that national sovereignty is the only way to make a difference through controlling corruption. But nationalist responses fall short of correcting the market failures and Held did not anticipate the extent of the market failures that have actually occurred. The problem is not only concerning externalities that are not factored into calculations of the degradation to the environment, it also involves shifting the extraction of profit to where labour is cheaper and where governments and citizens are less likely to complain about degradation of the environment and short-term profits at the expense of future generations. This undermines not only the conditions of employment so that full-time employment becomes less available, but also the very fabric of life on which all economic development depends. This is aided by the lack of control of the market and the movement of funds (see McIntyre-Mills et al., 2014).

Where to from here? How do we work democratically with this complexity and how do we govern this complexity (Flood and Romm, 1996)? Perhaps we merely need a simpler approach, namely recognition that what we do to others and to the environment, we do to ourselves. Stuart Hall (see Akomfrah, 2013) stresses the notion of identity today as one that requires a long narrative response to explain our origins. Where we live, where our parents live and where we came from and why. If we accept a strong version of cosmopolitanism along the lines suggested by Martha Nussbaum (2006) in Frontiers of Justice, then we must accept that immigration is tied to the notion of separate nation-states that are no longer relevant.

Possibilities and risks: Constructing and deconstructing narratives of the state

How can we achieve cultural transformation of consumption patterns? There is little doubt that accelerated climate change will adversely affect wellbeing and sustainability in Australia (Flannery, 2005; Pretty, 2013; Stiglitz et al., 2010) – particularly if we continue to consume at current rates (Davies and World Institute, 2008) – resulting in significant devastation and a compromised quality of life. The impact of climate change has been underestimated (Ellis et al., 2016; Lovelock, 2009; Rockström et al., 2009). Local solutions need to be explored more deeply, in order to provide lessons for regeneration. Indigenous cultures teach us about stewardship and relationships with the land, but these relationships have been lost in non-Aboriginal cultures, which is one of the reasons why the UN First Nations legislation can be used strategically as a means to co-create webs of meaning and to regenerate narratives of being custodians of the land. Our interconnectedness and interdependency need to be recognized in ways that protect both people and the planet. Alternative ways of framing human–nature relationships in legal, ethical and spiritual terms are illustrated by the Bolivian ¹ and Ecuadorean constitutions in line with their belief in Mother Earth or ‘Pachamana’. Despite the fact that the rhetoric is undermined by the political reality of ‘business as usual’, it provides a first step. The next step is providing the necessary ‘planetary passport’ that aims to inspire loyalty to the planet as well as acting as a monitoring system to protect living systems. The concepts of stewardship and resilience are important notions through which to explore the nexus across wellbeing, consumption choices and the environment. We need to develop a deeper understanding of how the intangible aspects of perceived wellbeing can be measured. But we also need to measure them in relation to the link between wellbeing and sustainability (Stiglitz et al., 2010) while being mindful of the potential for the market to colonize the approach as summed up in Table 1.

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Table 1.

Steps forwards and backwards.

Steps forward	Steps backwards
• Indigenous notions of citizenship for protection of people and the planet • Liberative potential of Aarhus Convention for ongoing engagement (Cao, 2015; Florini, 2003) • Liberative potential of constitutions that protect both people and the planet • Training in democracy and political engagement beyond so-called representative democracy which is very limited – need engagement to ensure that people understand the implications of choices. This will make the populism of Trump and Le Pen more transparent (McIntyre-Mills, 2017) • Valuing human rights and capabilities for all sentient beings (Nussbaum, 2011) • By valuing living systems as the basic fabric of life (Shiva, 2011, 2012) • Universal Declaration of Human Rights • Pachamana or Earth Mother constitution	• Corporate citizenship supports property and commodifies living systems • Measurements of nature lead to commodification and greenwashing • UN moving towards labelling and self-monitoring (Cao, 2015) with less emphasis on corporate liability in International Criminal Court • Cynical rhetoric while pursuing ‘business as usual’ in corporations
• Social, economic and environmental indicators of wellbeing and wellbeing stocks need to be monitored from below and from above to ensure that they do not lead to ‘greenwashing’. • Legal architecture is needed to implement change so that people and the planet are not exploited for short-term gains for the minority in this generation.

The number of refugees

The social contract refers to protection of citizens within the boundaries of a nation-state. According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Antonio Guterres (2014), for the first time since the Second World War, the global figure for displaced persons has now passed 50 million and, by 2050, this figure could be as high as 150 million (Rusbridger, 2015: 13). And yet the needs of the displaced are not addressed through the current architectures of democracy, governance and education. Surely it is time to reframe the social contract and to support public education to enable people to join up the dots.

As Guterres (2014) notes, there are more displaced people today than after the Second World War:

Within a few years, Syria has gone from being the world’s second largest refugee-hosting to becoming its fastest refugee producing country. … UNHCR has registered far over 2.3 million Syrians as refugees in the region, and governments estimate the total number of those who fled at over 3 million. … Few refugee influxes have generated this profound an impact on their host countries, with dramatic demographic, economic and social consequences. The pressure is felt heavily in all areas of daily life, as budget deficits are increasing, growth suffers and jobs, salaries and price levels are affected across the region, leaving local families struggling to make ends meet.

The discourse above remains rooted in the notion that bounded nation-states are inevitable. The argument developed in this article is that the nation-state needs to take as a given that the cosmopolitan human rights come first and that nation-states serve regional needs. They need to be seen as part of an overlapping region with responsibility at a regional level for food security and human security. The costs of climate change will place a heavy burden not only on the state but on the surrounding regions. How do we move from the containerist approach that undermines justice through limiting compassion to citizens at the expense of human rights? Bohman (2005: 111, 102) stresses Arendt’s concept of ‘the capacity to begin a democratic dialogue’, but:

For democracy to promote justice, it must already be just. Call this the democratic circle. While it can never be said to disappear, the circle can become virtuous through what I refer to as the ‘democratic minimum’: the achievement of a democratic arrangement sufficient for citizens to exercise their creative powers to re-shape democracy according to the demands of justice – that is the capacity to initiate democratic deliberation [challenges for sociological praxis]. (cited in McIntyre-Mills, 2014b: 31)

The greatest challenges for sociological praxis are the consequences of inaction that will potentially pose an existential risk to humanity. Sociologists need to address these challenges in their research and as policy advisers. The challenges include representation of the increasingly diverse populations within nation-states along with accountability to ensure that resources (e.g. water, food and energy) are used fairly, equitably and sustainably in local and regional biospheres. How can governance protect the global commons and the collective good? How can complex social, economic and environmental challenges that are perceived differently by different stakeholders with different values be addressed?

The work of Ann Florini provides possibilities as does the work of Danielle Archibugi. Florini (2003) suggests the potential of the Aarhus Convention could be scaled up to enhance accountability. It is taken for granted these days that the silo approach to the nation-state is acceptable. But given the entangled nature of globalization and the need to protect the global commons we can no longer address socioeconomic and environmental challenges within bounded areas. In an era of social, economic and environmental convergence of risk we need to accept the possibility of new forms of governance to protect those who are not protected by the nation-state, because they are not citizens.

Strong cosmopolitans such as Archibugi (2010: 319) stress the need for global democracy to support global governance by means of a constitution spanning nation-states and thus creating ‘overlapping spheres of power’. Just as decisions are made at the nation-state level by legal systems buttressed by constitutional law:

At the global level, similar institutions should also have the task of deciding on the decision-making clout of the stakeholders and of assigning competencies. (Archibugi, 2010: 320)

Unlike the federalist or confederal model, Archibugi argues that global constitutions replace sovereignty at the national level and instead of ‘one state one vote’, the principle of ‘one individual one vote’ prevails for global citizens. Archibugi envisages that citizens and their governments would participate in decisions and that an international court would make decisions and that ‘the member states would accept the compulsory jurisdiction of the international courts’. Archibugi stresses that each state would ‘retain their own armed forces’, but that humanitarian interventions could draw on the resources of many states and could be ‘managed by cosmopolitan institutions’.

According to Dean (2009), the Marxist argument against cosmopolitanism is that normative and legal arguments are inadequate to address the class inequalities within and between nation-states. But the cosmopolitan response is one of promoting social democracy and redistribution of energy resources through governance. Beardsworth (2011: 168), for instance, draws on the work of Chevalier that:

… proposes a new Marshall Plan for the developing world in the context of the explosive interaction between population growth and a world of scarce resources. (Chevalier, 2009: 142)

The problem is that the greatest emitters per capita need to accept their responsibility to developing nations who need to consider development as a way out of poverty. In light of the above, how then can we develop a way forward to create transnational webs of shared meaning that are buttressed by governance to protect the global commons and the public good (Levin, 2006)?

Held et al. (2005) proposed that the core challenges of the day are to address the vast differences in the standard of living between the rich and the poor through reforming world trade and through using the market to address global warming by means of a global covenant that prevents unilateral interventions. As noted above, the market failures Held et al. (2005: 15) anticipated fall short of what has actually occurred. The problem is not only one of externalities that are not factored into calculations of the degradation to the environment, it is a way of thinking and ‘being in the world’ that shifts the extraction of profit to where labour is cheaper and where governments and citizens are less likely to complain about degradation of the environment. Short-term profits are made at the expense of future generations. This undermines the conditions of employment so that full-time employment becomes less available.

Arguments for and against the national, transnational and supranational organizations have been raised by idealists, pragmatists and realists. A way to bridge the divide is through expanding pragmatism to consider the consequences for current and future generations by addressing wellbeing and developing governance systems to ensure that stocks for the future are developed through limiting the way in which production processes and distribution practices benefit the minority at the expense of the majority.

A sustainable local community is determined by a sustainable region in which food, energy and water supplies are considered as major determinants for wellbeing. No community can be expected to transform from a high carbon lifestyle (or aspiring to this lifestyle) without feeling part of the design process and owning the decisions as to how resources should be used. Young people, the disabled, asylum seekers and sentient beings (Nussbaum, 2006) along with future generations live ‘precarious lives’ (Butler, 2005). Those perceived as different are not protected (Young, 2011). The ability to show compassion underpins cosmopolitanism (Butler, 2011). Butler’s work stresses ‘the need to rethink the human as a site of interdependency’. She emphasizes that humanity needs to be able to ask for assistance and we need to be able to anticipate that we will be heard and that people will respond with compassion. Unless this is possible it leads to a life that can be unbearable. Do we wish to live in a world where we do not want to help one another and in which we deny the pain of sentient beings (Butler, 2011)? If we are prepared to recognize not our resilience, but our mutual vulnerability, it provides a basis for stewardship. We are all reliant on others and need to be able to depend on our connections with others. What if we could acknowledge our vulnerability and what if we could foster a sense of caring for others that recognizes our humanity and our links with others? ‘Species’ as a concept is a central concern for the book Planetary Passport (McIntyre-Mills, 2017), which is discussed in relation to the issue of categorization, membership, displacement and decision-making (in terms of state sovereignty, territory, colonization and its implications for human, animal and plant life). As urbanization encroaches on the wild spaces and displaces other forms of life, relationships that are anthropocentric need to be reframed to enable regeneration and sustainable living that is non-anthropocentric.

Thus Planetary Passport makes a case for recognizing our hybridity and interconnectedness. The attitudes to animals has been shaped by the ‘us/them’ and ‘zero sum’ approach, and it is now being applied to human beings who are unwanted. The contributions made by Donaldson and Kymlicka (2011) to animal rights through exploring our relationships with other animals need to be given centre stage in redressing the current political impasse in animal rights. Donaldson and Kymlicka (2011: 253) cite scholars who think that the collapse of habitat and food resources will occur first and then the ethical choices will change. They re-emphasize that by 2025 there will be insufficient water and land to support meat eating and that meat diets are unhealthy. (They could have added that meat has been linked with sugar ² as two of the most carcinogenic substances.) Surely if all that separates us from other primates is a small percentage of the genome – then we need to respect our connections with other creatures and we need to take seriously the contribution we should be making as stewards of the environment and other creatures by recognizing and appreciating the biodiversity of which we are a strand.

The challenges of governance need to be addressed by working across disciplines. Gibbons et al. (1994) argue that the ability to work across boundaries is vital for ‘The new production of knowledge’ and vital for ‘the dynamics of research’ to address current complex challenges. The so-called ‘tragedy of the commons’ argument developed by Hardin (1968) is a construction informed by simplistic thinking. Ironically, it is often used as the starting point for environmental thinking, but in fact it originated as an argument developed by Locke in support of the enclosure movement and private property in Britain. The argument being that contained areas of land are cared for better than the areas of land that are held in common and shared. But ironically it is the privatization and commodification of land and natural resources that have led to environmental pollution and degradation. The lack of trust between nations has evoked the rhetoric of nationalism and state protectionism. This has led to ‘seeing like a state’ (Scott, 1998), which in turn leads to the argument for competition and the zero sum approach which argues that one nation can profit at the expense of others. The organizational philosophy and governance arguments that flow from this philosophy are based on limited disciplinary paradigms that can profit at the expense of others. Ideally, a universal respect for social and environmental justice could enable subsidiarity as a means to support freedom (Follesdal, 2006; Poe, 2010) to the extent that it does not undermine the quality of life of this generation or the next.

Dualist thinking pervades our consciousness and is reflected in socially unjust and environmentally unsustainable designs for society. Designs need to be supported by constitutions, based on a priori norms, and consequentialist or a posteriori approaches, based on testing out ideas within context and with future generations in mind (see Table 2). Global axioms to protect future generations and the poor of this generation need to guide legal constructs and legal decisions at the local level. The principle of subsidiarity could rest comfortably with global axioms – provided that the caveat is made that people at the local level can be free and diverse to the extent that their freedom and diversity does not undermine the rights of others or future generations of life . This challenge of balancing individual and collective social, cultural, political and economic concerns needs to be buttressed by regional parliaments and courts that focus on social and environmental justice at a post-national level. The desire of the rich to consume and the desire of the majority of the poor to leave the ghetto are expressed through emulating the rich. For example, sociodemographic research shows that debt and bankruptcy in developed nations – such as the USA and nations within the EU – are driven by advertising, easy credit and the desire to ‘keep up appearances’ by emulating the standards of the very rich (Frank, 2007; Wilkinson and Pickett, 2009).

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Table 2.

Architecture for governance in overlapping domains to maximize changes towards a more sustainable future.

	Structure	Process	Action
Micro-level Individuals	Capabilities of human and sentient beings protected at the local level through agency and advocacy. Their rights to quality of life and the responsibility to protect decent standards through local structures need to be supported by the principle of subsidiarity and stewardship through an adapted form of the Aarhus Convention (see Florini, 2003; Nussbaum, 2006, 2011).	Questions raised and posed to local government by individuals who invoke the UN 2030 Agenda and linking personal troubles as public issues relevant to the whole of community spanning social, economic and environmental concerns (Layard, 2005) to support green democracy (Dryzek, 2010), the global commons and human rights (Ertuk and Purkayastha, 2012).	Local government, NGOs and individuals (see Florini, 2003) to regenerate local habitat to support living systems.
Meso-level States and regions	Aarhus Convention (1998) linked to Global Covenant.	Monitory democracy and governance to address state/market/civil society concerns from below (Keane, 2009) to protect human and animal habitat as part of a dynamic living system (McIntyre-Mills, 2017).	Networking NGOs and INGOs to address representation and accountability (Carens, 1995).
Macro-level Cosmopolitan governance	Legal structures to protect the global commons and social justice (Hayden, 2010). Structures to support the Global Covenant such as a scaled up Aarhus Convention and Biospheres Convention.	International Criminal Court and United Nations to support ‘world environmental citizenship’ (Hayden, 2010).	Global action to pass laws to protect social and environmental justice in overlapping biospheres informed by legal imagination and social engagement (Fourade and Savelsburg, 2006).

Source: Adapted from Archibugi (2010: 322, cited in McIntyre-Mills et al., 2014: 92 and updated in McIntyre-Mills, 2017).

Making and invoking treaties and conventions that control commodification need to be a priority and need to be ongoing if justice is to be maintained. The approach could be buttressed through federations supported by, for example, the Lisbon Treaty (Horvath and Odor, 2010), which requires that social, economic and environmental legal considerations be met. Unfortunately the structural and process mechanisms of the EU are not able to manage the distribution of power or funding (Rhodes, 1997). Clearly if the EU is to survive it needs to be supported by a means to balance individual and national interests with the collective good of the union. More and more members of the union are disenchanted for a number of reasons.