Subsistence

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Plant cultivation for personal use is an important traditional subsistence strategy for local communities , even if it is only operated as a supplement, as here with the Shuar Indians in the South American mountain rainforest in Ecuador (2011)

Subsistence (from the Latin subsistentia "existence": "by oneself, independence") is a philosophical term for the principle of self-preservation , which is based above all on human interaction with the environment in order to secure a livelihood and to satisfy basic needs . Subsistence is everything that is materially and socially needed for everyday survival: food, clothing, shelter as well as care and sociability. Livelihood and livelihood have the same meaning. The way in which this endeavor is made is called a subsistence strategy.

In the Anglo-Saxon language area , subsistence (in connection with economy or agriculture ) only describes the needs economy , while livelihood stands for livelihood.

Word origin

The German word “subsistence” goes back to the Latin verb subsistere , which in most dictionaries is translated as “halt, linger, withstand, stand still”. It comes from the ancient Greek hypistemi or hypo-histemi "to assume, to lay under, to lay as a basis"; this meaning can only be translated into Latin in the most distant sense, because there is the verb subsidere there ("sit down, stay back, stay seated"). In this respect, subsistence forms a unit with the words existence , consistency or resistance and could only be used transitively in the sense of “to resist” (“Dare!”). This name is already used by the ancient Greek historian Herodotus around 450 BC. Used; it is not certain whether the philosopher Aristotle also found him around 350 BC. Chr. Used in the explained sense - although it also makes sense to use subsistence together with the word substance in one sentence.

economy

Trade is also a subsistence strategy; the term should not be confused with subsistence (agriculture)

Subsistence strategy

Above all in ethnology (ethnology), anthropology (human studies), sociology and archeology as well as in general in economic history , subsistence strategy, subsistence type or subsistence form refers to specific behaviors that aim to ensure supply. In this sense, the nature of any "strategy to support life" is meant, for example hunting or growing crops; in a broader meaning also the modern strategy of “intensive agriculture and trade” or industrial production. To distinguish it from modern, market-oriented modes of production, however, the term traditional economic form is often used, although the definition of this term is more comprehensive.

The anthropologist James C. Scott speaks of a “subsistence ethic” and thus describes the subsistence strategy that follows the “safety first” principle and tries to avoid food shortages. These include avoiding and spreading risk, giving preference to food that is directly consumable, and aiming for stable and secure income. This in turn includes on the one hand technical aspects such as certain seeds, cultivation techniques etc. and on the other hand certain social arrangements, e.g. B. Certain forms of reciprocity, common land or (forced) generosity.

Subsistence farming

In connection with the economic forms of traditional societies, the term subsistence (agriculture) economy or demand economy is used, in which economic production primarily serves the purpose of self-sufficiency and is geared towards covering personal needs. Subsistence farming currently enables more than 40 percent of the world's population to have a largely independent and self-determined livelihood. On the other hand, up to 1.2 billion subsistence farmers are acutely affected by hunger and poverty, and subsistence farming is not a future-proof alternative for everyone.

Subsistence level and subsistence good

In the classic growth model according to Smith and Malthus, the subsistence level denotes the wage rate to which wages fall back in the long term after an increase in productivity.

In microeconomics , subsistence goods are described by quasi-linear utility functions . There are no income effects on the subsistence goods .

philosophy

Philosophically, subsistence means "existing by oneself and for oneself". In the Aristotelian and Scholastic philosophies, this fundamental property belongs to the substance , strictly speaking: only the spiritual substance, in contrast to the accidents (changing), which only exist through a carrier and are inherent in it. The term subsistence was coined by the Roman scholar Gaius Marius Victorinus around 330 AD, who took up the Greek expression hypóstasis ("basis").

The German philosopher Immanuel Kant defined “subsistence” in 1783 in his work Prolegomena for every future metaphysics that will be able to appear as science : “[…] that is, the necessity […] that the existence of things is based on a subject that itself cannot be a predicate of any other thing. ”In the classical ontological perspective, the reason for the truth of a one-digit attribution (example:“ this table is brown ”) is seen in the fact that the property (brown) is inherent in the designated object (this table) .

More recently, the term e.g. B. in the work of James C. Scott (1976, The Moral Economy of the Peasant) taken up under the heading "subsistence ethics"; In the legal philosophical work of Henry Shue (1996, Basic Rights), the term appears as "right to subsistence" and describes a basic human right. In both cases, “subsistence” is understood in the sense of a basic security, which is not limited to the purely physical basic needs, but rather includes participation in a society.

literature

  • Veronika Bennholdt-Thomsen: subsistence economy, global economy, regional economy. In: Maren A. Jochimsen, Ulrike Knobloch (Hrsg.): Lifeworld economy in times of economic globalization. Kleine, Bielefeld 2006, pp. 65–88.
  • Susanna Gartler: Subsistence: An Anthropological Concept Analysis. Diploma thesis University of Vienna 2011. Akademikerverlag, Saarbrücken 2014, ISBN 978-3-639-48890-6 ( PDF: 2.4 MB, 103 pages at univie.ac.at ).
  • Daniel Dahm : Sustainable Lifestyles: Urban Subsistence for a Better Quality of Life. Doctoral thesis, Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences, University of Cologne, Cologne 2003.
  • Daniel Dahm, Gerhard Scherhorn : Urban subsistence: The second source of prosperity. 3. Edition. oekom, Munich 2016, ISBN 978-3-86581-109-7 .
  • James C. Scott : The Moral Economy of the Peasant: Rebellion and Subsistence in Southeast Asia. Yale University Press, 1976, ISBN 978-0-300-02190-5 .
  • Henry Shue: Basic Rights: Subsistence, Affluence, and US Foreign Policy. 2nd Edition. Princeton University Press, Princeton NJ 1996, ISBN 978-0-691-02929-0 .
  • Sebastian Thieme: Human-friendly business practices? Subsistence ethics perspectives on Catholic social ethics, feminist economics and social politics. Budrich, Opladen u. a. 2017, ISBN 978-3-8474-2077-4 .
  • Sebastian Thieme: The Subsistence Right: Concept, Economic Traditions and Consequences. PhD thesis. Metropolis, Marburg 2012, ISBN 978-3-89518-910-4 .
  • Sebastian Thieme: Subsistence, viability and the welfare state: Basic features of a subsistence ethic In: Journal for Business and Business Ethics (zfwu). Volume 15, Issue 2, 2014 ( PDF: 170 kB, 16 pages on nomos-elibrary.de ).
  • Claudia von Werlhof , Veronika Bennholdt-Thomsen , Nicholas Faraclas (eds.): Subsistence and resistance: alternatives to globalization. Promedia, Vienna 2003, ISBN 978-3-85371-205-4 .

Web links

Wiktionary: Subsistence  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Veronika Bennholdt-Thomsen: Subsistence economy, global economy, regional economy. In: Maren A. Jochimsen, Ulrike Knobloch (Hrsg.): Lifeworld economy in times of economic globalization. Kleine, Bielefeld 2006, pp. 65–88, here p. ??.
  2. ^ A b Walter Hirschberg (Ed.): Dictionary of Ethnology. New edition, 2nd edition. Reimer, Berlin 2005, ISBN 3-496-02650-2 , p. 360/361: Keyword: subsistence .
  3. ↑ Rebecca Renneberg: Molecular genetic studies on the remains of pre-Columbian New World Camelidae from the Palpa Valley (Peru). There “Table 8: Characteristics of the social organization (according to Service 1971)”, dissertation, Göttingen 2008, pdf version p. 62.
  4. ↑ James. C. Scott: The Moral Economy of the Peasant: Rebellion and Subsistence in Southeast Asia . Yale University Press, 1976, ISBN 978-0-300-02190-5 .
  5. ↑ Urs Fankhauser: Mystery. Local, self-determined and sustainable. Worldwide importance of family farming. éducation21, Bern 2014, p. 8.
  6. ^ Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN, Food security for sustainable development and urbanization , 2014
  7. ^ Rainbow, Meyer: Subsistence. In: Dictionary of Philosophical Terms. 2005, p. ??.
  8. ↑ Immanuel Kant : Prolegomena to every future metaphysics that will be able to appear as science . 1783, p. ??.
  9. ↑ Edmund Runggaldier: Formal semantic renewal of metaphysics. In: Matthias Lutz-Bachmann (ed.): Metaphysics today. Problems and perspectives of ontology. Alber, Freiburg 2007, p. 57 (66).
  10. ^ Henry Shue: Basic Rights: Subsistence, Affluence, and US Foreign Policy . 2nd Edition. Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey 1996, ISBN 978-0-691-02929-0 .
  11. ↑ Joachim Ritter and Karlfried founder: Historical dictionary of philosophy . tape 10 . Scientific Book Society, Darmstadt 1998, ISBN 978-3-7965-0115-9 .