see also
- 2021 degrowth-auf-deutsch/
- 2020 decroissance-for-xmas-anyone/
- 2020 greta +g rowth
- 2019 stiglitz-wants-gdp-retired/
- climate crisis
- eco crisis
- ecological economics
- energy
- Greenwash
- Green Finance/Investment/ESG
- Growth! What Growth?
- natural resources
- Pluriverse
- Post -capitalist, -colonial, -growth
- sustainability
degrowth updates 12-2023
theguardian.com 4-12-2023 I’m not buying new stuff any more’: the young people getting into ‘degrowth’– Amid the cost of living crisis and threats to the climate, many are pledging to consume less and spend sustainably – by Jem Bartholomew
academia.edu gg/pdf 2016-2023 “A wealth of possibilities: Alternatives to growth” by Aaron Vansintjan
This study, commissioned by the Greens in the European Parliament and the Green European Foundation, aimed at questioning current practices and policies in six fields structuring our economic model and at investigating alternative ways that are more adapted to the current challenges by being more socially inclusive and more appropriate on climate and environmental issues
academia.edu 4-2023 Degrowth and Masculinities: Towards a Gendered Understanding of Degrowth Subjectivities – Dennis Eversberg, Matthias Schmelzer
>Economic Sociology, Critical Management Studies, Alternative forms of management and organization, Organization Studies,
Sociology of Organizations, Socio Economics, Post-Growth
academia.edu/ gg/pdf 2018 Post-Growth Organizations – Problematizing Growth – by Matthias Rätzer, Ronald Hartz, Ingo Winkler
academia.edu gg/pdf (2017): Organizing for the post-growth economy, ephemera – by Johnsen, C. G., Nelund M., Olaison, L. & Sørensen, B. M.
mayflybooks.org 2022 Degrowth & Strategy: how to bring about social-ecological transformation
Nathan Barlow, Livia Regen, Noémie Cadiou, Ekaterina Chertkovskaya, Max Hollweg, Christina Plank, Merle Schulken and Verena Wolf (eds.)
BOOK DESCRIPTION : Degrowth is a counter-hegemonic movement that has the ambitious aim of transforming society towards social and ecological justice. But how do we get there? That is the question this book addresses. Adhering to the multiplicity of degrowth whilst also arguing that strategic prioritisation and coordination are key, Degrowth & Strategy advances the debate on strategy for social-ecological transformation. It explores what strategising means, identifies key directions for the degrowth movement, and scrutinises strategies in practice that aim to realise a degrowth society. Bringing together voices from degrowth and related movements, this book creates a polyphony for change going beyond the sum of its parts.
PRAISE FOR THE BOOK : “This book is the perfect gateway to strategy and action for our time.” – Julia Steinberger
“This is a book everyone in the degrowth community has been waiting for.” – Giorgos Kallis
“This is a true gift, not only to degrowthers, but to all those who understand the need for radical change.” – Stefania Barca
“Above all, Degrowth & Strategy is a work of revolutionary optimism.” – Jamie Tyberg
>degrowth – money -Monetary theory – Ecological economics – Ecofeminism -State theory – Credit theory – Nature of money – dualism – monetary policy
The third of the #NoBackToNormal #degrowthtalks series on how to transform the monetary system with Mary Mellor, Joseph Ament, Louison Cahen-Fourot and Julio Linares. See below for bios and suggested readings.
Mary Mellor is Emeritus Professor at Northumbria University, UK, where she was founding Chair of the University’s Sustainable Cities Research Institute. She has published extensively on alternative economics integrating socialist, feminist and green perspectives.
Louison Cahen-Fourot is a post-doc researcher and assistant professor at the Institute for Ecological Economics at the WU Vienna University of Economics and Business. His research is in ecological macroeconomics and the political economy of capitalism and the environment.
Joe Ament completed his PhD at the University of Vermont where he studied with Josh Farley and researched monetary theory and policy in the context of social and ecological equity. His work currently looks at public banking at the national and local levels as well as central banking policy for combating climate change and income inequality.
Julio Linares is an economic anthropologist and social outreach for the Basic Income Earth Network. He holds an Msc from the Anthropology department at the London School of Economics. He is based in Berlin, where he is organising a basic income currency project called Circles, exploring practical ways of democratising the economy from below.
Moderators: Oxana Lopatina (on screen) and Lorenzo Velotti (off screen)
RESOURCES Ament J (2019). Toward an ecological monetary theory. Available at https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/3/923 Ament J (2020). An ecological monetary theory. Available at https://www.sciencedirect.com/science… Ament J (2020). Public money for environmental justice. Available at http://unevenearth.org/2020/01/public… Cahen-Fourot L & Lavoie M (2016). Ecological monetary economics: A post-Keynesian critique. Available at https://www.sciencedirect.com/science… Linares & Cabaña – Degrowth Money: https://www.degrowth.info/en/2020/05/… Mellor M (2017). Money for the people. Available at https://greattransition.org/publicati… Mellor M (2020) – short video on The London Economic: https://www.facebook.com/TheLondonEco…
mdpi.com / gg/pdf 2020 Toward an Ecological Monetary Theory – by Joe Ament
sciencedirect.com/ 2016 Ecological monetary economics: A post-Keynesian critique – by Louison Cahen Fouro, Marc Lavoie
Abstract – The monetary analysis of some ecological economists currently appears to be mostly articulated around the following core: a stationary economy (and a fortiori a degrowth economy) is incompatible with a system in which money is created as interest-bearing debt. To question the relevance of the debt-money/positive interest rate/output growth nexus, this paper adopts a critical stance towards the currently emerging ecological monetary economics from the standpoint of another strand of heterodox economics – the post-Keynesian approach. In its current state, ecological monetary economics is at odds with post-Keynesian economics in its analysis of the money–growth relationship. This will be shown using the theory of endogenous money and a simple Cambridgian–Kaleckian model where debt-money and a positive interest rate are compatible with a full stationary economy.
degrowth.info/blog 2020 Degrowth Money – By: Julio Linares, Gabriela Cabaña
greattransition.org/ 2017 Money for the People – by Mary Mellor
Local initiatives can lead to modest gains in sustainability, but not the large-scale transformation we need. Meeting that challenge will require, among other critical factors, substantial changes in how we create and use money. As its history demonstrates, money is a social and political construct. It is the privatization of money—and not money itself—that has fueled social exploitation and environmental destruction. Money could, by contrast, help advance a Great Transition—but only if it is reclaimed for the public. Contrary to neoliberal assertions, the state can create money free of the debt that drives destructive growth and fosters inequality. Such public money can facilitate the provision of economic security and sustainable livelihoods for all. But for such a system of public money to work, there must be robust democratic control over monetary decision-making along with vigorous oversight of its implementation.
Why Money | Myths About Money | A Brief History of Money | Reclaiming Money for the People | Democratizing Money | Conclusion: Debt-Free Public Money for Sufficiency Provisioning | Endnotes
daily.jstor.org 3-2020 What If a Shrinking Economy Wasn’t a Disaster? – The degrowth movement is building a vision of a society where economies would get smaller by design—and people would be better off for it. – by Livia Gershon
rowman.com 2019 Towards a Political Economy of Degrowth – by Stefania Barca, Patrick Bond, Hubert Buch-Hansen, Ekaterina Chertkovskaya, Giacomo D’Alisa, Santiago Gorostiza, Catia Gregoratti, Gökhan Gülbandilar, Tuula Helne, Alf Hornborg, Tuuli Hirvilammi, Mine Islar, Max Koch, Emanuele Leonardi, Felipe Milanez, Alexander Paulsson, Riya Raphael
Since the 1970s, the degrowth idea has been proposed by scholars, public intellectuals and activists as a powerful call to reject the obsession of neoliberal capitalism with economic growth, an obsession which continues apace despite the global ecological crisis and rising inequalities. In the past decade, degrowth has gained momentum and become an umbrella term for various social movements which strive for ecologically sustainable and socially just alternatives that would transform the world we live in.
How to move forward in an informed way, without reproducing the existing hierarchies and injustices? How not to end up in a situation when ecological sustainability is the prerogative of the privileged, direct democracy is ignorant of environmental issues, and localisation of production is xenophobic? These are some of the questions that have inspired this edited collection.
Bringing degrowth into dialogue with critical social theories, covering previously unexplored geographical contexts and discussing some of the most contested concepts in degrowth, the book hints at informed paths towards socio-ecological transformation.
academia.edu verso gg/pdf 2022 The Future Is Degrowth: A Guide to a World beyond Capitalism – by Matthias Schmelzer, Andrea Vetter , Aaron Vansintjan
insert post link
publishers info – We need to break free from the capitalist economy. Degrowth gives us the tools to bend its bars.
Economic growth isn’t working, and it cannot be made to work. Offering a counter-history of how economic growth emerged in the context of colonialism, fossil-fueled industrialization, and capitalist modernity, The Future Is Degrowth argues that the ideology of growth conceals the rising inequalities and ecological destructions associated with capitalism, and points to desirable alternatives to it.
Not only in society at large, but also on the left, we are held captive by the hegemony of growth. Even proposals for emancipatory Green New Deals or postcapitalism base their utopian hopes on the development of productive forces, on redistributing the fruits of economic growth and technological progress. Yet growing evidence shows that continued economic growth cannot be made compatible with sustaining life and is not necessary for a good life for all.
This book provides a vision for postcapitalism beyond growth. Building on a vibrant field of research, it discusses the political economy and the politics of a non-growing economy. It charts a path forward through policies that democratise the economy, “now-topias” that create free spaces for experimentation, and counter-hegemonic movements that make it possible to break with the logic of growth. Degrowth perspectives offer a way to step off the treadmill of an alienating, expansionist, and hierarchical system.
A handbook and a manifesto, The Future Is Degrowth is a must-read for all interested in charting a way beyond the current crises.
> Antiglobalization Social Movements – DeGrowth – Development Studies – Economics – Ecological Economics – Ecology – Environmental Sustainability – Feminism – Feminist Economics – Heterodox Economics – History of Capitalism – Keynesian Economics – Marxism – Marxist theory – Political Ecology – Political Economy – Postcolonial Studies –Social Movementst – Social Sciences – Sociology
https://www.thehindu.com 11-2021 ‘The Case for Degrowth’ review: Resetting the clock post-COVID and trying to live with less – Sudhirendar Sharma
currentaffairs.org 8-2020 The Case For Degrowth – Infinite growth on a finite planet is alarming and doesn’t even make us better off. A new book argues we must shed the ideology of “growthism.” – Nathan J. Robinson
academia pdf/gg 2016 Growth and Its Discontents: Paving the Way for a More Productive Engagement with Alternative Economic Practices – by Javier Lloveras, Lee Quinn
Abstract – Fragmented marketing debates concerning the role of alternative economies are attributable to the lack of a meaningful macromarketing dimension to which alternative economic practices can be anchored. This research frames an evaluation of existing macromarketing developments aimed at reformulating the mindless pursuit of economic growth. Raising concerns with the treadmill dynamics of marketing systems, three different approaches – green growth, a-growth and degrowth – are critically evaluated to: (a) introduce degrowth as a widely overlooked concept in the macromarketing literature; (b) expose how each perspective entails a specific organization of provisioning activities; and (c) foreground the role of alternative economic practices beyond the growth paradigm. We conclude that socially sustainable degrowth is the missing voice within macromarketing debates that lie central to elucidating the future direction of alternative economic practices.
>alternative economies, green growth, a-growth, degrowth, sustainability, macromarketing
econsystemsthinking.medium.com 1-2022 Degrowth is the Future. – The question is not whether we will face degrowth, but what we choose to degrow. (I will keep this short by linking to previous articles.)
Degrowth has the issue of being defined or rather framed by what it is against rather than what it is for.
But in our present/future environmental situation I would argue degrowth is inevitable. We can choose what we degrow, not whether we degrow.
Let’s compare two potential plans for the future: the degrowth plan and the status quo plan. The twist is that both will be framed in terms of what they seek to degrow.
Degrowth:
As stated above degrowth does not believe in abstractly and arbitrarily reducing GDP as an end goal. Segments of the economy which are necessary and benefit humans should continue to grow, while industries which do not benefit lifespan or happiness should be reduced such as “fossil fuels, SUVs, advertising, planned obsolescence, McMansions, arms, industrial beef, private jets, etc).” I would add Fast Fashion and crypto which the global south has already taken the lead in banning. Overall this reduced consumption should be justified by more leisure which would also reduce emissions.
Degrowth policies must not happen in isolation; they must be paired with various social programs to reduce the inequality that our resource use perpetuates. (Job guarantees/UBI, third world debt relief/colonial reparations etc.) There is no shortage of work to be done in preparing for climate change.
So in sum degrowth says we should reduce the following:
- Fossil Fuel Consumption
- Advertising
- Planned Obsolescence
- The Military Industrial Complex
- Industrial Beef
- Weekly Working Hours
- Global Inequality
While raising:
- Renewable Energy Output
- Public Transportation
- Climate Adaptation Infrastructure
- First and Third World Social Programs
The critics of degrowth say this is too costly and that we should stick to the plan of >2 degrees Celsius.
We should instead degrow the following:
- The pH of the ocean.
- The amount of arable land on earth
- Agricultural yields
- Fresh water supply
- Coral reefs/ Fish populations
- Ice caps/ Ice sheets
- Planetary Albedo
- Number of animal species on Earth
and grow:
- Global temperature levels
- Incidence/Severity of floods/hurricanes
- Incidence/Severity/Duration of droughts/heat waves
- Wet Bulb Temperatures
- Number of global refugees
- Wildfires
- Water wars
- Famine
- Mosquito populations/Malaria Spread
- Sea Levels
- Permafrost thaw/methane in the atmosphere
- Arctic trade routes
- Hopefully some pretty sensational geoengineering.
My takeaway from framing both climate plans this way is that degrowth may no longer feel quite as radical. As well, the status quo may not be the safe, stable, sensible path forward.
Postscript: In this article I have committed a logical fallacy known as the false dichotomy. There are two positions I’ve omitted.
Climate denialists are not represented, and neither are the technological ex machinists. I really hope they’re right, but once again they are gambling with the future of organized human life on earth.
economist.com/ 5-2022 Why long-term economic growth often disappoints – A new paper suggests technological progress is overrated
…”…The problem, according to Mr Philippon, is that tfp does not actually grow exponentially. Using the most popular data sources for long-term growth, he compares predictions from two different models to observed trends in tfp. A linear pattern—which he calls “additive growth”—consistently fits better with how progress has actually unfolded. Contrary to existing theories, that suggests previous research does not make the next idea any easier to find. It also explains why, as Mr Philippon puts it, some economists keep predicting some future wave of innovation that just never comes. …
Such moments only seem to take place about every century or so. But they do help to explain Mr Solow’s mistake: it would have been easy for him, as he was living through one of these periods of acceleration, to fall for the illusion of exponential progress. …
Mr Philippon’s statistical analysis does not speak to tfp’s deeper conceptual problems. One is that capital is hard to value. There is usually a difference between its historical cost, suitably depreciated, and the discounted value of the profits it will eventually produce. Unlike labour, which can be quantified in hours, there is no non-monetary unit with which to value oil rigs and pharmaceutical patents alike. After Mr Solow’s 1956 paper came out, a group of economists at the University of Cambridge showed that its method for valuing capital was circular, a point Mr Solow’s followers conceded. But the model is still widely used regardless. …”…
nature.com pdf here gm.art 16-3-2022 Are there limits to economic growth? It’s time to call time on a 50-year argument – Researchers must try to resolve a dispute on the best way to use and care for Earth’s resources.
degrowth.info 2-2022 The manifesto of Degrowth journal – A discourse looking for coherence
Degrowth has become a thriving academic field, with several hundreds of peer-reviewed publications and a growing community of thinkers and doers. The field is complex, being not only transdisciplinary, but also bridging science and activism. The topic it studies is not an esoteric concern: the socio-ecological crisis and public frustration with our current economic system has catapulted degrowth to previously unseen heights of engagement. Just after the Covid-19 pandemic shaking the very foundation of how we think our relation to nature and others, there has never been a better time to research degrowth.
degrowth.org– Research and Degrowth (R&D) An academic association dedicated to research, training, awareness raising and events organization around degrowth – degrowth.info has a lot of articles
eea.europa.eu/ 18-1-2022 Growth without economic growth
Economic growth is closely linked to increases in production, consumption and resource use and has detrimental effects on the natural environment and human health. It is unlikely that a long-lasting, absolute decoupling of economic growth from environmental pressures and impacts can be achieved at the global scale; therefore, societies need to rethink what is meant by growth and progress and their meaning for global sustainability.
The ongoing ‘Great Acceleration’ in loss of biodiversity, climate change, pollution and loss of natural capital is tightly coupled to economic activities and economic growth. – Full decoupling of economic growth and resource consumption may not be possible. – Doughnut economics, post-growth and degrowth are alternatives to mainstream conceptions of economic growth that offer valuable insights. – The European Green Deal and other political initiatives for a sustainable future require not only technological change but also changes in consumption and social practices. – Growth is culturally, politically and institutionally ingrained. Change requires us to address these barriers democratically. The various communities that live simply offer inspiration for social innovation.
>green techno, re-use
theverge.com 14-1-2022 Clean energy tech needs to be designed for recycling, experts say – Too many adhesives impede disassembly today – By Maddie Stone
Companies like Apple and Samsung aren’t the only ones making high-tech devices that are hard to take apart and recycle. So are the manufacturers of critical clean energy technologies like solar panels, wind turbines, and electric vehicle (EV) batteries — and unlike the consumer tech industry, which is slowly starting to reverse some of its unsustainable design practices, there isn’t much being done about it. …
“Design for recycling hasn’t really come to that market yet,” says Andy Abbott, a professor of chemistry at the University of Leicester who recently co-authored a review paper on de-bondable adhesives and their potential use in clean energy.
Instead, Abbott says, manufacturers tend to “overengineer” their products for safety and durability. Take EV batteries, which are composed of anywhere from dozens to thousands of individual, hermetically-sealed cells glued together inside modules and packs. While the heavy use of adhesives helps ensure the batteries don’t fall apart on the road, it can make them incredibly difficult to take apart in order to repurpose individual cells or recycle critical metals like lithium, cobalt, and nickel.
“At the moment, because everything is bonded together, lots of batteries end up getting shredded,” study co-author Gavin Harper, an EV battery recycling expert at the University of Birmingham in the UK, tells The Verge. “The material is mixed together, which makes subsequent steps in the recycling process more complicated.”
scientificamerican.com 6-2021 The Delusion of Infinite Economic Growth – Even “sustainable” technology such as electric vehicles and wind turbines faces physical limits and exacts environmental cost – By Chirag Dhara, Vandana Singh
…”Every stage of the life cycle of any manufactured product exacts environmental costs: habitat destruction, biodiversity loss and pollution (including carbon emissions) from extraction of raw materials, manufacturing / construction, through to disposal. Thus, it is the increasing global material footprint that is fundamentally the reason for the twin climate and ecological crises. The global material footprint has grown in lockstep with the exponentially rising global economy (GDP) since the industrial revolution. This is largely because of egregious consumption by the super-affluent in a socioeconomic system founded on growth without limits. Can we resolve this fundamental conflict between the quest for limitless growth and the consequent environmental destruction?…”… read whole article here
goodreads.com 2021 Exploring Degrowth: A Critical Guide – by Vincent Liegey & Anitra Nelson
A sense of urgency pervades global environmentalism, and the degrowth movement is bursting into the mainstream. As climate catastrophe looms closer, people are eager to learn what degrowth is about, and whether we can save the planet by changing how we live. This book is an introduction to the movement.
As politicians and corporations obsess over growth objectives, the degrowth movement demands that we must slow down the economy by transforming our economies, our politics and our cultures to live within the Earth’s limits.
This book navigates the practice and strategies of the movement, looking at its strengths and weaknesses. Covering horizontal democracy, local economies and the reduction of work, it shows us why degrowth is a compelling and realistic project.
>quality growth, wellbeing, sustainability
weall.org/ WellBeing Economy Alliance is a collaboration of organisations, alliances, movements and individuals working towards a wellbeing economy, delivering human and ecological wellbeing.
popsci.com 7/2021 What is ‘degrowth’ and how can it fight climate change? – The cure for a changing climate could be a stagnant economy. by Sara Kiley Watson
“There’s no other way to put it—as climate change envelops more and more of our daily lives, we are going to have to change the way we live. That will mean prepping for weirder weather, shifting our diet, and using cleaner energy. But, a growing economic idea is also brewing: Could a slower-growing or stagnant economy be the key to combating climate change?…”…
frugalhedonism.com 2021 The Art of Frugal Hedonism: A Guide to Spending Less While Enjoying Everything More – by Annie Raser-Rowland, Adam Grubb
academia.edu 2021 Frugal consumption, an alternative in times of crisis? A reflection on the responsible factors – by Hasna Sidmou
theconversation.com 28/10/2021 Degrowth: why some economists think abandoning growth is the only way to save the planet – podcast by Daniel Merino, Gemma Ware, Beth Stratford, Lorenzo Fioramonti, Samuel Alexander
patreon.com 23/10/2021 From Economic Fantasy to Ecological Reality on Climate Change – by Steve Keen
This was an invited talk to the Oxford Department of International Development “Climate Change and the Challenges of Development Lecture Series”, on my criticisms of the application of neoclassical economics to climate change. I focus on the new paper by Dietz et al. that allegedly calculates the economic costs of tipping points … Upon closer examination, this paper fails to consider tipping points in any credible way, and this is obvious in its incredible claim (in the original sense of the “not credible”), that:
“Tipping points reduce global consumption per capita by around 1% upon 3°C warming and by around 1.4% upon 6°C warming”
This is ridiculous: the tipping points they consider are: Arctic summer sea ice, the Greenland Ice Sheet, the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (“Gulf Stream”), the Amazon Rainforest, the Indian Monsoon, Permafrost, and Ocean methane hydrates. If all 8 of these tripped–especially with a temperature 3-6°C above pre-industrial levels, we would be experiencing a climate utterly unlike anything Earth has seen for tens of millions of years. The thought that this would just reduce global consumption by just 1.4%–compared to what it would be if none of these tipping points were triggered–doesn’t pass what Nobel Laureate Robert Solow once called “the smell test”: “every proposition has to pass a smell test: Does it really make sense?”. I show why this paper stinks in Solow’s sense.”
youtube 10-2021 From Economic Fantasy to Ecological Reality on Climate Change
theguardian.com 9/2021 Green growth’ doesn’t exist – less of everything is the only way to avert catastrophe – It is simply not possible to carry on at the current level of economic activity without destroying the environment – by George Monbiot
ncronline.org 7-2021 Pope Francis Laudato Si’ calls us to radical abundance through economic ‘degrowth’ – by Alex Mikulich
…”While the Club of Rome found that the current myopic focus on economic growth is unsustainable, it was joined by other scholars and activists who articulated paradoxical ways of living in radical abundance and harmony with the planet without economic growth. In his recent primer on degrowth, Less Is More: How Degrowth Will Save the World, economic anthropologist Jason Hickel explains:
Degrowth begins as a process of taking less. But in the end it opens up whole vistas of possibility. It moves us from scarcity to abundance, from extraction to regeneration, from dominion to reciprocity, and from loneliness and separation to connection with a world that’s fizzing with life.
Growth for its own sake, Hickel laments, creates more “illth than wealth,” when the ongoing pursuit of growth in high-income nations produces more inequality and instability, stress and depression from overwork, and increasing pollution and ill health. ….
We need a different measure of well-being. The genuine progress indicator (GPI), for example, includes not only GDP, but also negative results of economic growth, such as resource degradation, to assess the overall benefit to society. Degrowth economists employ a different visual image to convey their goal. The objective is not to make the proverbial economic elephant leaner, but to turn the elephant into a snail, as an international consortium devoted to degrowth, which includes Catholic organizations, puts it. Turning the elephant into a snail means creating an economic metabolism in harmony with diverse ecologies that serve the full flourishing of all of our human and nonhuman kin.
The term degrowth is employed as a way to decolonize our thinking, that is, to shift from assuming that there is only one way of thinking — growth — and turn away from values of domination and exploitation toward values of conviviality, cooperation and reciprocity. Whereas capitalism seeks to control and extract value from the web of ecological relations that make life, many cultures deemed “primitive” by the modern West celebrate radical interdependence and reciprocity within diverse webs of life.
The Anishinaabeg, whose original lands were in northeastern America (now Canada), have the word minobimaatisiiwin, which means “a continuous rebirth of reciprocal and cyclical relations between human and other life.” In southern African regions, Bantu languages have ubuntu, meaning human fulfillment through togetherness, and the Shona have ukama, which indicates “the interrelatedness of the entire cosmos, including the biophysical world.” The Chinese shi-shi wu-ai and Maori term mauri express “interrelatedness through the entire life force of the cosmos.” (These terms are drawn from Raj Patel and Jason Moore, The History of the World in Seven Cheap Things: A Guide to Capitalism, Nature, and the Future of the Planet.)
Perhaps paradoxically, degrowth is not about living in Scrooge-like misery — it is about living in the radical abundance of God’s creation. There are scriptural visions of degrowth, principally the Hebrew law of jubilee (Leviticus 25), which calls for the cancellation of debts every seventh year. In an era of ecological devastation, Hickel celebrates the Jubilee Debt Campaign‘s debt cancellation proposals as a “vital step toward ecological sustainability.”
The problem of living by values of consumerism and infinite economic growth is not only do our economic values violate love of God and neighbor, but growth itself destroys God’s creation and all of life as we know it. Degrowth offers a different way that celebrates the radical abundance of the whole of God’s creation while caring for all of our human and nonhuman kin.
eea.europa.eu 1-2021 Growth without economic growth – Economic growth is closely linked to increases in production, consumption and resource use and has detrimental effects on the natural environment and human health. It is unlikely that a long-lasting, absolute decoupling of economic growth from environmental pressures and impacts can be achieved at the global scale; therefore, societies need to rethink what is meant by growth and progress and their meaning for global sustainability.
degrowth.org 6-2020 Constructive criticism of degrowth is NOT support for growth: a response to Forbeshttps://degrowth.org/2020/06/15/constructive-criticism-of-degrowth-is-not-support-for-growth-a-response-to-forbes/By Vandana Sharma, Gabriela Cabaña
In a recent article for Forbes, Corbin K Barthold makes several allegations against the idea of degrowth without having a clear understanding of the concept. He also includes some quotations – originally reported in a different article (by Aaron Timms) – from a vibrant classroom discussion which took place at the 2019 Degrowth Summer School hosted by the Institute of Environmental Science and Technology at the Autonomous University of Barcelona (ICTA-UAB). Barthold presents the quotes completely out of context in order to support his own argument for growth-led economic thinking.
youmatter.world/ 2020 What does the notion of degrowth cover? What are its history and current influence? How does a degrowth mindset impact the sustainability or CSR strategy of an organization? Let’s take a closer look.
…”Degrowth: A Simple Definition – The term degrowth refers to an economic situation during which the economic wealth produced does not increase or even decrease. This concept is to be distinguished from the recession, a simple observation of a negative growth rate in the context of a productivist economy. The concept of degrowth is a voluntary process and not a reality. It is based on the principle of awareness of a finite world, with limited resources, and on the idea that only a reduction in global production and consumption can ensure the future of humanity and the preservation of the planet…” …
gdbmagazine.com 2020 Patagonia’s Rick Ridgeway on Designing for Anti-Consumerism – Consumer-driven initiatives like the Worn Wear program sells used Patagonia merchandise purchased back from customers who are done with it. – Patagonia Vice President of Environmental Initiatives Rick Ridgeway shares his thoughts on the company’s anti-consumption mission. – The global fashion industry is on track to account for a quarter of the world’s annual carbon budget by 2050. – By Kate Griffith
ojs.unito.it 2020 A degrowth perspective on the coronavirus crisis by Nathan Barlow, Constanza Hepp, Joe Herbert, Andro Rilović, Joëlle Saey-Volckrick, Jacob Smessaert, Nick von Andrian
The coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19) has caused upheaval across the world, high death tolls among the most vulnerable, border closures, financial market crashes, curfews and controls on group gatherings, among many other devastating effects.
Despite observations that pollution and emissions have reduced (McGrath, 2020; Myllyvirta, 2020; NASA, 2020), the sudden, unplanned, and chaotic downscaling of social and economic activity due to COVID-19 is not degrowth. Instead, it constitutes a clear example of why degrowth is needed, as it highlights the unsustainability and fragility of our current economic system and social structure. Additionally, the various responses to COVID-19 have shown that degrowth is actually possible, because societies and states have demonstrated a remarkable ability to change their modus operandi in response to a major crisis.
This letter will consider these three points in further detail: first, how the COVID-19 crisis is by no means degrowth; second, how COVID-19 shows that degrowth is needed; and finally, why COVID-19 indicates the potential for a degrowth transformation.
academia.edu 2019 “Geographies of degrowth: Nowtopias, resurgences and the decolonization of imaginaries and places” (Environment and Planning E: Nature and Space, 2019) Introduction to the Special Issue. By Federico Demaria, Giorgos Kal, Karen Bakker.
The term ‘décroissance’ (degrowth) signifies a process of political and social transformation that reduces a society’s material and energy use while improving the quality of life. Degrowth calls for decolonizing imaginaries and institutions from-in Ursula Le Guin’s words-‘a one-way future consisting only of growth’. Recent scholarship has focused on the ecological and social costs of growth, on policies that may secure prosperity without growth, and the study of grassroots alternatives pre-figuring a post-growth future. There has been limited engagement, however, with the geographical aspects of degrowth. This special issue addresses this gap, looking at the rooted experiences of peoples and collectives rebelling against, and experimenting with alternatives to, growth-based development. Our contributors approach such resurgent or ‘nowtopian’ efforts from a decolonial perspective, focusing on how they defend and produce new places, new subjectivities and new state relations. The stories told span from the Indigenous territories of the Chiapas in Mexico and Adivasi communities in southern India, to the streets of Athens, the centres of power in Turkey and the riverbanks of West Sussex. PDF here
europeanceo.com 2019 Cutting back: how the degrowth movement could save the planet Sophie Perryerhttps://www.europeanceo.com/lifestyle/cutting-back-how-the-degrowth-movement-could-save-the-planet/embed/#?secret=uJLQiDlGfP
thebreakthrough.org/ 3/2021 Degrowth in the Age of Dickens
John Stuart Mill was a man of immense principle who helped lay the foundations of modern liberalism. In On Liberty, he used the utilitarianism of his mentor Jeremy Bentham to craft a manifesto against strictures on freedom of thought or private action. His book The Subjection of Women, which expanded on the writings of his wife Harriet Taylor Mill, was a powerful assault on an inequality that he viewed as a relic of the past. He also campaigned in favor of racial equality. Although he was enough a man of his time to embrace the idea of colonization, he attacked colonial practice. In his writing on the economy, he favored income, inheritance, and excess-consumption taxes. And his views anticipated modern liberalism with regard to both animal welfare and the environment.
One more way that Mill’s writings from a century and a half ago feel distinctly of the moment is in his views on economic growth. In his Principles of Political Economy, Mill wrote a chapter “Of the Stationary State.”[1]In it he argued that the need for economic growth in the richest countries had run its course.
The modern degrowth movement has adapted to a time when population expansion has stalled or reversed in many countries and the threat of mass famine has receded: rather than decrying health care or food aid for the world’s poor, it has returned to a level of humanity closer to Mill’s than the neo-Malthusians. It embraces an approach of floors and ceilings: redistribution to ensure everyone worldwide can have access to infrastructure, education, and health care even while the rich are taxed to fund the safety net and reduce overall consumption. Economist Kate Raworth labels this “donut economics,”[20]where all of humanity lives within a “safe and just space” between having too little for necessities and consuming too much for the environment. The movement champions many policies that liberals of all persuasions should surely support, including taxation to finance greater global equality of opportunity and regulation to reduce pollution. Such policies are a central reason that past economic growth has been associated with a higher quality of life, and are even more important to ensure the same for future growth.
Just because past technological progress has saved us from Malthusian doom (or millenarian misery, if I may) does not mean it always will. There are reasons to believe that the rate of innovation is slowing just as global environmental problems become more severe. Given that the world looks so different from 170 years ago, statements that were before their time back then might well be right today. Indeed, the increasingly “weightless” nature of both production and consumption (labor productivity growth driven by bigger ideas rather than bigger machines, consumption growth driven by services, not goods) suggests we might be reaching a potential saturation point of needs and desires when it comes to physical products in rich countries.”
globalpolicyjournal.com Degrowth: Solving the Impasse by Magical Thinking 23/2/2021 Branko Milanovic outlines the ideological divides and rhetorical tactics distinguishing degrowers and growers.
tandfonline.com 01/2020 Degrowth and critical agrarian studies Julien-François Gerber
Abstract: Degrowth refers to a radical politico-economic reorganisation that leads to smaller and more equitable social metabolisms. Degrowth posits that such a transition is indispensable but also desirable. However, the conditions of its realisation require more research. This article argues that critical agrarian studies (CAS) and degrowth can enrich each other. The Agrarian Question and the Growth Question should be addressed in concert. While degrowth should not fall into the ‘agrarian myth’, CAS should not embrace the ‘myth of growth’, even when green and socialist. Ideas of one philosopher and four agrarian economists are presented, with illustrations from Bhutan, Cuba and North America, hoping to offer a preliminary research agenda for ‘agrarian degrowth’.
Introduction: Compounding growth, environmental degradation, and widespread alienation are the three most dangerous contradictions for our time. – David Harvey (2015, 57–8) If the spectre of communism was haunting Europe in the mid-nineteenth century, even though ‘all the powers of old Europe [had] entered into a holy alliance to exorcise this spectre’ (Marx and Engels 2011 [1848], 61), it is perhaps the spectre of degrowth that is today haunting the industrialised world, while all the imperial powers tend to deny the urgency of the situation (Akbulut et al. 2019). For the economic élites, the lack of growth is a most frightening idea, but for other people, degrowth may represent a way out, a ‘concrete utopia’ (Latouche 2009; Muraca 2017) from which alternatives can be rethought.
time.com – amsterdam-doughnut-economics/ 22/01/2021 Amsterdam Is Embracing a Radical New Economic Theory to Help Save the Environment. Could It Also Replace Capitalism? CIARA NUGENT “In cities that are grappling with the immediate social and economic effects of COVID-19, though, the doughnut framework is proving appealing, says Joshua Alpert, the Portland-based director of special projects at C40. “All of our mayors are working on this question: How do we rebuild our cities post-COVID? Well, the first place to start is with the doughnut.” …”
CasP bnarchives.yorku.ca 10/2/2021 Living the good life in a non-growth world – Investigating the role of hierarchy by Blair Fix read or download here
Humanity’s most pressing need is to learn how to live within our planet’s boundaries — something that likely means doing without economic growth. How, then, can we create a non-growth society that is both just and equitable? I attempt to address this question by looking at an aspect of sustainability (and equity) that is not often discussed: the growth of hierarchy. As societies consume more energy, they tend to become more hierarchical. At the same time, the growth of hierarchy also seems to be a key driver of income/resource inequality. In this essay, I review the evidence for the joint relation between energy, hierarchy and inequality. I then speculate about what it implies for achieving a sustainable and equitable future.
From_growth_to_degrowth_to_a_steady_state.pdf
dailtyjestor.org What If a Shrinking Economy Wasn’t a Disaster? The degrowth movement is building a vision of a society where economies would get smaller by design—and people would be better off for it.
degrowth.net/ The concept of degrowth is now widely researched and practiced across Europe, but so far remained largely unexplored in the Netherlands. The first Utrecht Degrowth Symposium was organized to change this and to introduce degrowth thinking to the larger public. An interest in alternative, not growth-addicted pathways to sustainable future turned out to be high, as the event attracted more than 300 people from all over the Netherlands and from diverse sectors of the economy – academia, NGOs, public institutions, businesses. For those who could not come, we present below summaries of the three presentations. If you wish to watch the entire lecture yourself, video recordings can be found at the end of each summary.
Décroissance: A Project for a Radical Transformation of Society by Barbara Murcaca
europeanceo.com 10/2019 Cutting back: how the degrowth movement could save the planet by Sophie Perryer
“Constant growth may not be the marker of success it’s cracked up to be. The degrowth movement promotes an active downscaling of the economy as a pathway to environmental sustainability and a more fulfilling lifestyle …
The term ‘degrowth’ was first proposed in the 1970s by the Franco-Austrian philosopher André Gorz, but it did not emerge as a movement until the late 2000s, when the first international degrowth conferences were held in Paris and Barcelona in 2008 and 2010 respectively. “These were landmark events that cast this radical movement onto the global stage,” Brendan Gleeson, Director of the Melbourne Sustainable Society Institute, told European CEO. Some of the ideas associated with the degrowth movement have since entered mainstream socioeconomic debate, particularly in connection with sustainability. For example, Sara Fromm, a sustainability activist and member of Research & Degrowth, has noticed the term being used by the Spanish media …
During the two-year Finnish UBI programme, participants were given €560 per month, no strings attached. While UBI was not found to affect the participants’ ability to find work, it did have a positive impact on the health, stress and concentration levels of those receiving it compared with those in the control group. “Those in the test group were also considerably more confident in their own future and their ability to influence societal issues,” noted the researchers who carried out the study.”
Jason Nickel 2018 The contradiction of the sustainable development goals: Growth versus ecology on a finite planet
There are two sides to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which appear at risk of contradiction. One calls for humanity to achieve “harmony with nature”… The other calls for continued global economic growth equivalent to 3% per year … The SDGs assume that efficiency improvements will suffice to reconcile the tension between growth and ecological sustainability. This paper draws on empirical data to test whether this assumption is valid, paying particular attention to two key ecological indicators: resource use and CO2 emissions. The results show that global growth of 3% per year renders it empirically infeasible to achieve … (rapid enough) … reductions in aggregate. … The paper presents alternative pathways for realizing human development objectives that rely on reducing inequality … rather than aggregate growth.
>Social Movements, History of Economic Thought, Transnational History, Ivan Illich, Alternative Economies, Environmental Sustainability, DeGrowth, Comparative Historical Analysis, Georgescu-Roegen
academia.edu gg/pdf 2017 Sustainable degrowth: Historical roots of the search for alternatives to growth in three regions – by Iris Borowy, Barbara Muraca, Matthias Schmelzer
“In September 2014, more than 3,000 people from all around the world gathered at the University of Leipzig for the 4th International Conference for Ecological Sustainability and Social Equity. Bringing together academics spanning multiple disciplines – mostly from the social sciences, economics, and humanities, but also engineers and natural scientists – as well as practitioners working on bottom-up alternative economies and social activists involved in struggles around ecology, social justice, or globalization, this conference represented the provisional climax of the international degrowth debate. The Leipzig conference marked a significant step for what is increasingly called the inter- national degrowth movement: it brought into dialogue different streams and traditions of growth critique and laid the ground for a stronger international network and for alliances with other movements (Brand 2014; Eversberg and Schmelzer 2016). Yet, how did the degrowth movement emerge and what historical roots and inspirations does it invoke? …
The future of economic growth is one of the decisive questions of the twenty-first century. Alarmed by declining growth rates in industrialized countries, climate change, and rising socio-economic inequalities, among other challenges, more and more people demand to look for alternatives beyond growth. However, so far these current debates about sustainability, post-growth or degrowth lack a thorough historical perspective.
This edited volume brings together original contributions on different aspects of the history of economic growth as a central and near-ubiquitous tenet of developmental strategies. The book addresses the origins and evolution of the growth paradigm from the seventeenth century up to the present day and also looks at sustainable development, sustainable growth, and degrowth as examples of alternative developmental models. By focusing on the mixed legacy of growth, both as a major source of expanded life expectancies and increased comfort, and as a destructive force harming personal livelihoods and threatening entire societies in the future, the editors seek to provide historical depth to the ongoing discussion on suitable principles of present and future global development. History of the Future of Economic Growth is aimed at students and academics in environmental, social, economic and international history, political science, environmental studies, and economics, as well as those interested in ongoing discussions about growth, sustainable development, degrowth, and, more generally, the future. …”
opendemocracy.net/ Breakdown or breakthrough? Degrowth and the Great Transition We have already surpassed the known limits to growth, so degrowth is our only option. Zack Walsh
apolitical.co wellbeing-is-more-than-gdp-so-how-can-we-measure-it
developongeconomics.org Is Degrowth an Alternative to Capitalism? JANUARY 5, 2020 GÜNEY IŞIKARA
“The newest book by Giorgos Kallis, one of the most prolific degrowth advocates is entitled Limits: Why Malthus Was Wrong and Why Environmentalists Should Care. It is a short and accessible read which contains some important and unconventional arguments. In what follows, I will first briefly summarize the core arguments of the book, which promises to provoke important discussions on the matter of limits and subjects. Then I will reflect on the fuzziness of the primarily cultural conceptualization of capitalism, and argue that neither self-limitation nor degrowth qualifies as a mode of production, such that they could constitute an alternative to capitalism.”
tandfonline Degrowth and critical agrarian studies Julien-François Gerber Jan 2020
Compounding growth, environmental degradation, and widespread alienation are the three most dangerous contradictions for our time. – David Harvey (2015, 57–8)
…For the economic élites, the lack of growth is a most frightening idea, but for other people, degrowth may represent a way out, a ‘concrete utopia’ (Latouche 2009; Muraca 2017) from which alternatives can be rethought. …The current state of our Biosphere does not indeed look good, and the measures taken are grossly insufficient. … On the socioeconomic front, things look hardly better. Disconnected from ecological reality, capitalism continues to deploy its inbuilt tendency to grow and seek new accumulation opportunities, both virtually (financialization) and materially (extraction and production). Debts and derivatives have reached unparalleled levels worldwide, increasing the risk of economic meltdown (Durand 2017). Relative poverty is on the rise everywhere (WIR 2018), while global GDP shows no sign of absolutely decoupling from ecological impacts (Hickel and Kallis 2019). Not unsurprisingly, then, more and more people and movements are starting to question the world’s trajectory of maldevelopment … This article argues that critical agrarian studies (CAS) and degrowth can bring essential elements to each other, and that the bridges have so far remained too rare …” read paper here
Green Political Economy Policy Analysis Framework : A REDD+ Study in the Brazilian Amazon by Tiago Reis “A strong State approach for REDD+ is indicated as the best model to prevent forest commodification, ensuring positive outcomes for forest dwellers, landholders, forest ecosystems as well as a cost-effective mitigation strategy for climate change.” read or download PDF here
Institutional_change_for_strong_sustainable consumption H. Spangenberg 2014
The environmental space concept illustrates that socially unsustainable underconsumption must be overcome and environmentally unsustainable overconsumption must be phased out. The planetary boundaries help to quantify the “ceiling,” while the social protection floor concept operationalizes the linea de dignidad, the minimal conditions for a dignified life. In order for Western societies to respect these limits, significant institutional change is needed with re-spect to both orientations and mechanisms. For the ceiling, this article suggests a shift to an orientation of “better but less” for affluent groups, and toward “enough and better” for those still living in poverty. The corresponding mecha-nisms include a redistribution of income and wealth, a cap on income, an unconditional minimum income, and a strengthening of democracy. The choice of instruments has to take into account that consumption is to a large degree not an individual but a social act and to employ informational, financial, and legal measures that overcome the prefer-ence of decision makers for market instruments. Implementing these changes would alter the fabric of our societies. Important first steps can be taken here and now. read or download PDF here
sustainabilitycommunity.springernature.com Feasible alternatives to green growth : Can job creation and sustainability coexist in a post-growth economy?
theecologist.org/June 2020/ From degrowth to decolonisationrg
“How can we use the principles of degrowth to shape a truly decolonized future?
Something about Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s Message from the Future didn’t sit right with me. … In this iteration of the future, it is taken for granted but not explained how the oppressed and those oppressing could co-exist in harmony. Why was this overlooked in the mainstream discourse surrounding this beloved viral video? … analysis would in fact show that no previous large-scale attempts—capitalist or socialist—were able to remain within ecological limits. Perhaps these holes stood out to me because I had been engaging with the framework of degrowth.”
theguardian 19/01/2021 europe-relationship-africa-colonial-racism Europe can only fix its relationship with Africa if it exorcises its colonial ghosts by Shada Islam
whatdesigncando.com have-your-doughnut-and-eat-it-too/Circular Economy
“How do we define growth, today? Is it social justice, wealth, technology, health? … It’s no secret that GDP … dictates modern economics, but GDP cannot account for the widespread inequality and change our planet is facing. Simon Kuznets, who first defined this measurement, warned early on that “The welfare of a nation can scarcely be inferred from a measure of its national income.”
It’s certainly hard to argue that wealth equates to welfare when today, 2 out of 3 countries have worse living conditions than they did 40 years ago. Poverty, injustice, and climate crisis exist on an unprecedented scale, and the richest 1% of the population own half the global wealth.”
apolitical.co Wellbeing is more than GDP — so how can we measure it? Opinion: after experiments with different indicators, there is still no clear winner This opinion article was written by Aisling Irwin, a journalist covering science, development and environment at the EU Horizon Magazine, and was originally published by the EU Horizon Magazine. For more like this, see our economic development newsfeed.
thefuturelaboratory.com/blog/its-time-for-brands-to-engage-with-de-growth
opendemocracy.net can-europe-make-it/limit-growth-liberate-degrowth/
De Growth – Taking Stock and Reviewing an Emerging Academic Paradigm – Martin Weiss, Claudio Cattano
Sustainability perspectives from the European Semi-periphery Rumiana Stoilova Mladen Domazet Dinka Jerolimov Jelena Puđak Mislav Zitko This edited volume brings together 12 original contributions and an editorial theoretical framing, from 14 authors of different disciplines and training. The main framework of its theoretical and empirical contributions is determined by the relationship between environmental, social and economic systems. In elucidating this relationship the theoretical and empirical insights (based on an analysis of empirical data on the attitudes and values of nationally representative samples) reflect the specific views from the ‘European semi-periphery’, both in theoretical explorations, positioning along global development and impact indices, and analyses of public opinion survey data. This is important in the context of the role of European centres of development paradigm viewed from the global perspective of common environmental limits, and its reflection in numerous societies on the semi-periphery. Theoretical contributions elucidate the understanding and significance of sustainability …” read or download PDF here
“Why power is not a peripheral concern: Exploring the relationship between inequality and sustainability” Danijela Dolenec, Mladen Domazet and Branko Ančić investigate the correlations between levels of inequality within the said European countries and personal concern, activation and sacrifice commitments within their populations. They expand the models and instruments from the article “Prosperity and environmental sacrifice in Europe: Importance of income for sustainability-orientation” with measures of social inequality and international indicators of material deprivation. Whilst acknowledging the strong influence of income in support for environmental conservation among general population, this chapter exposes the fallacy behind the expectation that only affluent European societies hold value orientations important for the switch to sustainability. Read or downlod PDF here
The Social Case for Degrowth Jack Herring Oct 13, 2019 · 9 min read
The underlying premise of the social case for degrowth is that endless growth would not be desirable even if it were to become compatible with ecological sustainability. Exploration into the two arguments behind this claim — that a) growth is inherently based on exploitation and injustice and b) that beyond a certain level growth does not lead to improvements in well-being — illuminate the social case for degrowth.
architectural-review On the money: the merits of degrowth by Phineas Harper and Maria Smith
failedarchitecture.com/degrowth-is-about-redistribution-by-design-not-by-collapse/
Jason Nickel Outgrowing growth: why quality of life, not GDP, should be our measure of success
braveneweurope.com/jason-hickel-degrowth-a-response-to-branko-milanovic
History of the Future of_Economic_Growth Iris Borowy Matthias Schmelzer
History of the Future of Economic Growth
The future of economic growth is one of the decisive questions of the twenty-first century. Alarmed by declining growth rates in industrialized countries, climate change, and rising socio-economic inequalities, among other challenges, more and more people demand to look for alternatives beyond growth. However, so far these current debates about sustainability, post-growth or degrowth lack a
thorough historical perspective. This edited volume brings together original contributions on different aspects of the history of economic growth as a central and near-ubiquitous tenet of developmental strategies. The book addresses the origins and evolution of the growth paradigm from the seventeenth century up to the present day and also looks at sustainable development, sustainable growth, and degrowth as examples of alternative developmental models. By focusing on the mixed legacy of growth,
both as a major source of expanded life expectancies and increased comfort, and as a destructive force harming personal livelihoods and threatening entire societies in the future, the editors seek to provide historical depth to the ongoing discussion on suitable principles of present and future global development.”
read or download PDF here History of the Future of_Economic_Growth Iris Borowy Matthias Schmelzer
Julio Linares and Gabriela Cabaña / demurrage money “Towards an Ecology of Care: Basic Income Beyond the Nation-state”
https://www.degrowth.info/en/2019/07/decoupling-is-dead-long-live-degrowth/
Green growth is trusted to fix climate change – here’s the problem with that
THINKING DEGROWTH TO SUCCESSFULLY ACHIEVE THE ECOLOGICAL TRANSITION Interview with Agnès Sinaï PDF
irishtimes.com 2019 mindless-growth-robust-scientific-case-for-degrowth-is-stronger-every-day
Who owns the Green New Deal? 2020 Making sense of remote ownership problems and place-based governance Geoff Garver
globaljustice.org/blog 2019 Degrowth-and-perspectives-about-it-from the south – Dorothy Grace Guerrero
Value_Growth_Development_South_American Lessons for a New Ecopolitics by Eduardo Gudynas 2017
ABSTRACT – Current debates on politics and ecology in South America offer a number of lessons on the
controversy concerning ecosocialism and degrowth. Some recent experiments on the South American left show a strong emphasis on socialism while deploying conventional developmentalism including decisive social and environmental impacts. In this dispute the different conceptions of value are very clear. Original perspectives on Buen Vivir as a radical critique of development point to alternatives that are at the same time post-capitalist and post-socialist, alternatives in which the recognition of the intrinsic value of the non-human is a core component.
unevenearth.org 2019 degrowth-should-be-a-core-part-of-the-just-transition
Green_economy_and_carbon_markets for conservation and development – a critical view 2015 Kathleen McAfee
Green economy aims to use economic rationality and market mechanisms to mute the most ecologically damaging effects of globalized capitalism while reviving economic growth in the global North, fostering development in the South, and decoupling economic growth from environmental decline. An archetypal application of green econ- omy is transnational trade in ecosystem services, including reduced emissions for defor- estation and degradation (REDD?). By compensating developing countries for maintaining forests as carbon sinks, this approach is meant to transcend politics and circumvent conflicts over the responsibilities of industrialized and ‘less-developed’ countries that have stymied global climate policy. However, carbon-offset trading is unlikely to result in lower greenhouse gas emissions, much less combined conservation and development gains. The troubled record of payment for environmental services and other schemes or commodification of nature illustrates that living ecosocial systems do not fit the requirements of market contracts. Disputes over proto-REDD? projects point to the dangers that REDD? will disadvantage or dispossess rural communities and distract attention from underlying causes of forest and livelihood loss. Two decades of all-but- futile climate negotiations have shown that global warming cannot be managed by means of technocratic expertise nor dealt with separately from the politics of inequality and the paradox of economic growth. The deceptive promise of greening with growth can blind us to these realities. Counter-hegemonic discourses to growth-centered green economy under the headings of buen vivir, mainly in the global South, and degrowth, mainly in the global North, therefore merit attention.
Re-thinking oil: compensation for nonproduction in Yasuní National Park challenging sumak kawsay and degrowth
Lucía Gallardo Fierro “In this article I argue that understanding the Initiative as an environmental matter and not as a problem of oil rent dependency exemplifies the limits of sumak kawsay and degrowth as proposals for an alternative to development. Results from Yasunı´ show that the Initiative ended up reproducing the fictions of nature valuation instead of delinking nature from the valuation process.” Read PDF here
Core tenets of the theory of ecologically unequal exchange Dr. Martin Oulu Read PDF here
“In this article, core tenets and claims of the theory of ecologically unequal exchange (EUE) are synthesized. EUE theory postulates a net flow of natural resources from peripheral developing to core industrialized countries through international trade, a situation which undermines the development of the periphery while enhancing that of the core. The key claims and EUE mechanisms are categorized and discussed under three topics: 1) the structure of the capitalist world-economy, 2) monetary valuation, and 3) equity and justice. The treadmill logic of capitalism in which capital extracts ecological resources and release waste in an endless pursuit of profits creates an expansionary dynamic which draws peripheral countries into exploitative market relations. This peripheralization is supported by ‘free trade’ economic policies, while nation-states and other political-economic institutions such as the WTO and IMF provide the regulations which ensure proper functioning of the system. Monetary valuation caps it by obscuring the inverse relationship between thermodynamics and economics, in which low-entropy energy and materials indispensable in economic production processes are lowly priced while processed goods which have dissipated most of their matter-energy are highly priced, ensuring that biophysical resources and profits accumulates in the industrialized Northern countries. This EUE framework is applied to the EU’s Raw Materials Initiative from the vantage point of policy as implicit theory. By challenging mainstream policies and their underlying theories, the EUE perspective demonstrates that alternatives to neoliberal policy prescriptions exist and policy can play a crucial role in bringing about the necessary structural changes”
https://vocabulary.degrowth.org/look/embed/#?secret=G9LFXsUHyW
www.economist.com Is low economic growth a sign of success?
Yes, says Dietrich Vollrath, an economics professor, in a new book
washingtonpost Let’s celebrate slow economic growth by Charles Lane
Annual Revies 2018 Annual Review of Environment and Resources Research On Degrowth
Giorgos Kallis, Vasilis Kostakis, Steffen Lange, Barbara Muraca, Susan Paulson and Matthias Schmelzer
see also
Little Big Bill’s Techno Fix
De-Growth on Bloomberg
ECO CRISIS – Climate
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