It was a privilege to speak to in the Political Ecology Research Centre (PERC) Webinar series on Hope and Collective Futures in early October. It was great to have an opportunity to speak aloud a chapter from book-in-progress Postcapitalist Economies of Care. I got some really great feedback from the attendees, and some helpful suggestions for how to move the work forward. If you would like to listen to the talk, it’s available from the PERC website, and via Youtube (below). There are other great talks on the PERC website too!
TITLE OF TALK: Transformative care in the meantime: Shaping the future through collective action
ABSTRACT: Scholars of care labour caution that care labour can be caught up in maintaining business as usual in the form of exploitative capitalist relations. But care labour also contributes to survivance — cultural and economic survival in the face of oppression. What else might care labour do?
In this seminar, I introduce an approach to thinking about care labour based on mapping ‘care surplus flows’ — the generation, appropriation and distribution of care surplus. Through an analysis of four case studies, I propose that the more collective forms of ‘care surplus flow’ enable place-based transformations, and that these transformations increase future-shaping capacities for a wider range of marginalised groups. Care labour can thus contribute to maintenance, survivance and resurgent transformation, depending on how it is organised.
