Underlabouring for political change: A response to the third Convivialist Manifesto

Abstract

The third Convivialist Manifesto advocates a coherent, balanced, humanist political philosophy. In rejecting pressures to confine ourselves to narrow empirical work and instead nailing its colours to a progressive future it acts as a beacon for politically engaged academics. This response raises concerns, however, about the authors’ vision of how convivialism should be employed. The project of assembling a global assembly of the good and the wise to agree on a convivialist philosophy seems impractical but also tangential to what the progressive movement needs. Could convivialism, instead, be a practical political philosophy, that can be used to resolve disagreements, build better policy solutions, and bring more people into the movements for climate justice and social justice?