Bjork the Autarch

Iceland's chill has led Bjork to tune in to her inner philanthrocapitalist. (Hat Tip CalendarGirl ). In this interview, Bjork describes her reaction to Iceland's economic woes and explains what she is actually doing to build a new economy based on green localist principles. Admirable for its pragmatism, is it a model for all of us?

Bjork is looking to encourage MBA students, geeks and rural workers in Iceland to produce business plans that provide good incomes in the knowledge and eco-tourism economies in order to avoid building more  aluminium smelting plants --- that's what Iceland resorts to when it is in a fix, exploiting its huge hydro potential.

The dilemma faced by Iceland today---pay bills by inviting  ALCOA (The Aluminium Company of America, whose CEO was Donald Rumsfeld) to build more dirty business, or feel financially poorer but preserve the environment---is one we will all face soon. Is environmentalism a luxury?

Bjork wants to attack the problem by offering an alternative to ALCOA, a vision of "a new, independent, environmentally friendly Icelandic economy". She is building -- or thinking of building, I am not sure which -- an incubator for these new businesses. Sounds very attractive:

It's one big institution where everybody who has a good idea goes and they all work together and help each other and then companies start to come out of there. But it takes like eight years. For me, it's sort of like a record company. It's like an indie label in a way. It's grassroots, where all these people can come and feed off of each other and get support. Where if one person gets a good idea, the other five will help them..

But there are pieces of the idyl that are much less attractive:

•  [We want to] "build this purely Icelandic thing up with Icelandic money, Icelandic companies."
• "We should make companies here made of Icelanders, both working class and the brainpower, discover new things that stay in the country."
• "Why not have the Icelandic people who are educated in high-tech and work already in those factories in the higher paid jobs, why not let them build little companies who are totally Icelandic with the knowledge they have? Then they get the money and it stays in the country."

There are hints of looking to use the incubator and environmentalism to keep the nasty world out in all these identitarian references. Why can't we have what David Hayes and Andrew Dobson have characterised as a Cosmopolitan Localism -- a localism and environmentalism that does not see the world as a threat, and that has the confidence to live its identities in the open? Iceland has just been slapped for its Viking raider hubris of the past 10 years. So a desire to retreat into autarchy is understandable. But it too should be resisted. It is just as much of a perversion as the raider mentality.

(Thanks to  verapalsdotir for the photo)