Why Degrowth Will Not Happen
Even if it is necessary
Almost everyone agrees today that there is some sort of environmental problem. In other words, we cannot continue business as usual. Things need to change. The question is: how should they change?
Two popular alternatives are the following: green growth and degrowth.
Green growth, basically, is about maintaining our levels of production and consumption—if not increasing them even further—but using technology and alternative sources of energy to mitigate the environmental problems that the current fossil fuels-based model of production creates.
Degrowth, on the other hand, is about immediately reducing the production and consumption of certain goods and services to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions urgently, as science seems to demand, while at the same time trying to replace fossil fuels with alternatives sources of energy.1
In this article, I want to briefly argue that green growth is much more realistic and thus more likely to occur (as it is already happening, albeit slowly), even if degrowth is what actually needs to be done to avoid the negative consequences that appear on the horizon.
Think about it. In case of a fair degrowth strategy (granted that today's global distribution of emissions is very unequal) it would be primarily those who emit the most that would have to reduce their emissions. What is the chance that they will do it by themselves? Will Taylor Swift, for example, stop flying in her private jet on her own? Probably not.2
This means that for degrowth to occur, a huge mobilisation is necessary. Now… how likely is that? To put it differently: what sounds more likely, many million, if not billion, of people to mobilise for the sake of climate change, biodiversity loss and general environmental degradation, or some individuals and companies to invent some sort of way to make economic activities more environmentally friendly? I don't know about you, but if I had to bet my money on one of those two options—even if, as I have shown in other writings of mine, I am quite convinced that we are f*cked anyway—I would choose the second. Why? Well, many people do not even bother to vote, which is the minimum of political action. When they do vote, they often do not take the environment into consideration to determine who to vote for. When they do take the environment into consideration, they, too, usually prefer a solution which is more aligned to green growth strategies, since many of them, even if they might currently be relatively poor, they aspire to become richer. In other words, before any significant mobilisation for degrowth would take place—a task which already seems very unlikely—a significant change in people's mentality, values, culture, etc. would be necessary. Is that likely to happen, especially in a relatively short period of time? I think the answer is obvious.
This is why degrowth will not take place, even if it is necessary.
Read also:
If you want to read more about Degrowth, Jason Hickel has written a very good introduction to it. You can find it here.
I do not mention Taylor Swift for any particular reason. There are others who emit even more through their activities. It is just Taylor Swift who came to my mind.
Degrowth would require a paradigm shift in values across the whole bloody globe. It ain't happening.
On the contrary: we are accelerating our growth. The global south would like very much to catch up to the north re living standards, thank you very much.
Also, it's impossible to do under our current global governing system of capitalism, which is dependent on growth to survive, or it collapses, taking society along with it.
As a side note, GDP is directly correlated with energy use and thus pollution.
We have fallen into a trap and there is no way out.
I don’t know anyone in engineering or sciences, that is people in the trenches of energy and sustainability, supporting degrowth. The idea usually comes from policy makers who subscribe to neo Malthusian ideas.
That being said, I’d rather bet on human ingenuity to provide solutions than on the pessimism of degrowth that will inevitable ruin our world.