Avec un vélo, l'homme peut partager les bienfaits d'une conquête technique sans prétendre régenter les horaires, l'espace ou l'énergie d'autrui. Un c… - Ivan Illich

La consommation obligatoire d'un bien qui consomme beaucoup d'énergie (le transport motorisé) restreint les conditions de jouissance d'une valeur d'usage surabondante (la capacité innée de transit). La circulation nous offre l'exemple d'une loi économique générale : tout produit industriel dont la consommation par personne dépasse un niveau donné exercice un monopole radical sur la satisfaction d'un besoin. Passé un certain seuil, l'école obligatoire ferme l'accès au savoir, le système de soins médicaux détruit les sources non thérapeutique de la santé, le transport paralyse la circulation.

I intend to discuss some perplexing issues which are raised once we embrace the hypothesis that society can be deschooled; to search for criteria which may help us distinguish institutions which merit development because they support learning in a deschooled milieu; and to clarify those personal goals which would foster the advent of an Age of Leisure (schole) as opposed to an economy dominated by service industries.

A transformation of the environment from a commons to a productive resource constitutes the most fundamental form of environmental degradation. This degradation has a long history, which coincides with the history of capitalism but can in no way just be reduced to it. Unfortunately the importance of this transformation has been overlooked or belittled by political ecology so far. It needs to be recognized if we are to organize defense movements of what remains of the commons. This defense constitutes the crucial public task for political action during the eighties. The task must be undertaken urgently because commons can exist without police, but resources cannot. Just as traffic does, computers call for police, and for ever more of them, and in ever more subtle forms. By definition, resources call for defense by police. Once they are defended, their recovery as commons becomes increasingly difficult. This is a special reason for urgency.