Self Practices and the Experiential Gap: An Analysis of Moral Behavior around Electricity Consumption

Abstract: As a way to mitigate climate change, ways to reduce electricity consumption are being explored. I claim Briggle and Mitcham’s experiential gap offers a useful framework to understand the workings of our environment regarding this consumption. Via Foucauldian ethics, which holds people need to relate to their environment through ‘self practices’ in order to make moral choices, I argue that the complex and opaque electrical network makes it particularly difficult to consciously curb consumption. Efforts to make the network simpler and more transparent could enable engagement and ‘ethical consumption,’ but at the cost of decreased usability.