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smal:small [2025/12/05 18:47] – [Consumption] asimongsmal:small [2025/12/21 12:00] (current) – dave
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 "Small is beautiful" is a philosophy that favours small shops and restaurants rather than enormous supermarkets and chains; small farms and smallholdings rather than huge monoculture agribusiness; local businesses and mutual credit networks rather than multinational corporations and banks, and so on. "Small is beautiful" is a philosophy that favours small shops and restaurants rather than enormous supermarkets and chains; small farms and smallholdings rather than huge monoculture agribusiness; local businesses and mutual credit networks rather than multinational corporations and banks, and so on.
  
-The reasoning is that the scale of large businesses [subverts democracy](thde:the_democracy_problem), damages [nature](thna:the_nature_problem), provides unfulfilling work and blandness instead of uniqueness. ‘Small is Beautiful’ was the title of a 1973 book by [[wp>E. F. Schumacher]], who went on to found the Intermediate Technology Development Group (now [Practical Action](http://practicalaction.org/)), helping to set up small enterprises in poor countries.+The reasoning is that the scale of large businesses [subverts democracy](/demo/democracy), damages [[ntre:nature]], provides unfulfilling work and blandness instead of uniqueness. ‘Small is Beautiful’ was the title of a 1973 book by [[wp>E. F. Schumacher]], who went on to found the Intermediate Technology Development Group (now [Practical Action](http://practicalaction.org/)), helping to set up small enterprises in poor countries.
  
 The introduction of plantations and factories, producing for multinational corporations, into those countries destroys small farms and businesses and forces people into grindingly boring, unskilled and exhausting work for very little money, with profits exported out of the country. The scale means that they are capital-intensive rather than labour-intensive, which means that small businesses can’t compete when it comes to the capital investment required, and that millions of small farmers are forced off their land and into urban slums and unemployment. The introduction of plantations and factories, producing for multinational corporations, into those countries destroys small farms and businesses and forces people into grindingly boring, unskilled and exhausting work for very little money, with profits exported out of the country. The scale means that they are capital-intensive rather than labour-intensive, which means that small businesses can’t compete when it comes to the capital investment required, and that millions of small farmers are forced off their land and into urban slums and unemployment.
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-Giant corporate branches suck wealth out of our communities to pay shareholders. Small businesses keep wealth within the community.+_Giant corporate branches suck wealth out of our communities to pay shareholders. Small businesses keep wealth within the community._
  
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-GK Chesterton (left) and George Bernard Shaw had a famous debate in 1928 – socialism (Shaw) vs distributism (Chesteron). It’s [very entertaining](http://www.gkc.org.uk/gkc/books/debate.txt). Here’s the most important distributist point, from Chesterton: "… a man who owns his own tools or works in his own workshop, to that extent owns and controls the means of production. But if you establish right in the middle of the State one enormous machine, if you turn the handle of that machine, and somebody, who must be an official, and therefore a ruler, distributes to everybody equally the food or whatever else is produced by that machine, no single one of any of these people receiving more than any other single person, but all equal fragments: that fulfils a definite ideal of equality, yet no single one of those citizens has any control over the means of production."+_GK Chesterton (left) and George Bernard Shaw had a famous debate in 1928 – socialism (Shaw) vs distributism (Chesteron). It’s [very entertaining](http://www.gkc.org.uk/gkc/books/debate.txt). Here’s the most important distributist point, from Chesterton: "… a man who owns his own tools or works in his own workshop, to that extent owns and controls the means of production. But if you establish right in the middle of the State one enormous machine, if you turn the handle of that machine, and somebody, who must be an official, and therefore a ruler, distributes to everybody equally the food or whatever else is produced by that machine, no single one of any of these people receiving more than any other single person, but all equal fragments: that fulfils a definite ideal of equality, yet no single one of those citizens has any control over the means of production."_
  
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-If corporate advertising was honest.+_If corporate advertising was honest._
  
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-Small-scale, free-range chicken farming vs industrial-scale (and cruel) battery farming.+_Small-scale, free-range chicken farming vs industrial-scale (and cruel) battery farming._
  
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-Sweatshop working conditions are endured by millions of workers around the world, to generate profits for the shareholders of giant corporations. Sweatshops have their apologists, although of course none of them would actually work in one - they just want cheap products or higher returns. The excuse is that sweatshops are stepping stones to 'development' - but the entire world can't develop like the West, because of ecological constraints that the apologists don't acknowledge or understand. Also, corporates find ways to automate, removing the perceived 'stepping stones', unless it's cheaper to pay humans barely enough to survive.+_Sweatshop working conditions are endured by millions of workers around the world, to generate profits for the shareholders of giant corporations. Sweatshops have their apologists, although of course none of them would actually work in one - they just want cheap products or higher returns. The excuse is that sweatshops are stepping stones to 'development' - but the entire world can't develop like the West, because of ecological constraints that the apologists don't acknowledge or understand. Also, corporates find ways to automate, removing the perceived 'stepping stones', unless it's cheaper to pay humans barely enough to survive._
  
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-Smallholdings [produce more food per acre](https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/3-big-myths-about-modern-agriculture1/) than large monoculture farms. They also provide more interesting and satisfying work than picking fruit and veg for large landowners. Some organisations are working to help more people to start smallholdings – for example, the [Ecological Land Co-op](https://ecologicalland.coop/).+_Smallholdings [produce more food per acre](https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/3-big-myths-about-modern-agriculture1/) than large monoculture farms. They also provide more interesting and satisfying work than picking fruit and veg for large landowners. Some organisations are working to help more people to start smallholdings – for example, the [Ecological Land Co-op](https://ecologicalland.coop/)._
  
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 </WRAP> </WRAP>
  
-- Helps solve the [democracy problem](/thde/the_democracy_problem).+- Helps solve the [democracy problem](/demo/democracy).
  
 - Stronger, safer [communities](/comy/community), more interesting High Streets, unique localities. - Stronger, safer [communities](/comy/community), more interesting High Streets, unique localities.
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-Millions of small farmers in India lost their land after the ‘[Green Revolution](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_Revolution_in_India#Criticisms_of_the_Green_Revolution)’ introduced new, hybrid crop varieties that required levels of irrigation, pesticides and chemical fertilisers that the small farmers couldn’t afford. They were undercut and eventually bought out by large farmers, who got larger still after importing corporate machinery and laying off workers. All this has had a huge negative effect on biodiversity and climate, and forced millions into slums, like this one in Mumbai.+_Millions of small farmers in India lost their land after the ‘[Green Revolution](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_Revolution_in_India#Criticisms_of_the_Green_Revolution)’ introduced new, hybrid crop varieties that required levels of irrigation, pesticides and chemical fertilisers that the small farmers couldn’t afford. They were undercut and eventually bought out by large farmers, who got larger still after importing corporate machinery and laying off workers. All this has had a huge negative effect on biodiversity and climate, and forced millions into slums, like this one in Mumbai._
  
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-Large superstores destroy jobs, and completely change the kind of work done – from autonomy and creativity to drudgery and doing exactly what you’re told, like in this Amazon warehouse.+_Large superstores destroy jobs, and completely change the kind of work done – from autonomy and creativity to drudgery and doing exactly what you’re told, like in this Amazon warehouse._
  
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-Ordering a weekly [fruit & veg box](/vegb/veg_box_schemes) is an excellent way of getting healthy, local food and supporting small farms.+_Ordering a weekly [fruit & veg box](/vegb/veg_box_schemes) is an excellent way of getting healthy, local food and supporting small farms._
  
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 ## Further resources ## Further resources
  
 +- [Small is Beautiful: Economics as if People Mattered](https://www.lowimpact.org/wp-content/uploads/Small-is-Beautiful.pdf) - Schumachers's 1973 book
 +- [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Competition_law) - anti-monopoly law
 +- [The Next System](https://thenextsystem.org/learning-from-emilia-romagna) - learning from Emilia Romagna, a region of Italy with an economy based on small businesses and 8000 co-operatives
 +- [Front Porch Republic](https://www.frontporchrepublic.com/) - promoting human scale and the distribution of power
 +- [Practical Action](https://practicalaction.org/) - formerly the Intermediate Technology Development Group, founded by E.F. Schumacher to promote small businesses in developing countries
 +- [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E._F._Schumacher) - E. F. Schumacher, author of Small is Beautiful
 +- [Schumacher Center for a New Economics](https://centerforneweconomics.org/)
 +- [Schumacher Institute](https://schumacherinstitute.org.uk/) - think tank based on Schumacher's ideas
 +- [Distributism](https://wiki.p2pfoundation.net/Distributism) - on the P2P Foundation wiki
  
  
-## Specialist(s)+ 
 +## Specialist curators of this topic
  
  
  
  
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