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  "description": "We can't change the world by voting with our wallets—but here's what we can do.",
  "path": "/michael-maniates/",
  "publishedAt": "2026-05-14T05:33:17.000Z",
  "site": "https://www.planetcritical.com",
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  "textContent": "The Myth of Individual Responsibility | Michael Maniates\n\n0:00\n\n/2756.260884\n\n1×\n\nWhat can we actually do if we want to achieve real change?\n\nWe have been sold a comforting lie that our purchasing power is the best way to change the world. But rather than offer anything substantial, this lie promotes a myth of individual responsibility that actually inhibits the drastic structural change we desperately need.\n\n🎧\n\n __You can listen to the episode on your podcast app, in your browser,__ download__it or__ watch__it on Youtube (where automatic subtitles are provided).__\n\nMichael Maniates is an environmental social scientist working on issues of environmental governance, sustainable consumption, and sociotechnical change, and the author of _The Living Green Myth: the Promise and Limits of Lifestyle Environmentalism_ (UK version, US version). He joins me to discuss how we were sold that big green myth, how it relates to the global neoliberal overhaul of the role of markets in the 80s, how it frustrates structural change, and what we can do instead. He also reveals the social science on how people react when their attempts to change the world through this very process are repeatedly frustrated—and how this impedes future action.\n\n__Planet: Critical investigates why the world is in crisis. It is ad-free, paywall-free and 100% reader-supported. To show your support, leave a__ one-off tip__. or become a paying supporter.__\n\nSign up\n\nShare this article:\n\nX | Bluesky | Facebook | LinkedIn | Reddit | Email\n\nSocial Share Buttons\n\nShare:",
  "title": "The Myth of Individual Responsibility | Michael Maniates",
  "updatedAt": "2026-05-14T05:33:17.051Z"
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