Degrowth is unlikely and I would argue harmful. A species’s prerogative is to grow. The way I’ve reconciled with past generations is realising that whatever they did (with all negative impacts) was done thinking it was the best to advance forward. Considering my maternal grandparents did not have shoes until they were adults, I understand why for them industrialisation was seen as an opportunity. And to a certain extent, it was. At the cost of global planetary health.
Green growth, and its mechanisms (renewables and especially regenerative solutions) are much more efficient at bringing growth. And also dealing with the most pressing problems effectively. Degrowth means poverty, poverty means people won’t think about tomorrow since they are too busy thinking about surviving the day.
Hi Alicia, thank you for your comment. Till now, what is proven to be harmful is the economic growth that has occurred over the last years and the vast use of fossil fuels which accompanied it. You acknowledge it yourself too, when you mention that industrialisation happened at the cost of global planetary health.
I do not share with you the objective of achieving growth. For developing countries, certainly. But I do not see the necessity of endless growth, and in the developed countries, materially, we have developed already enough—at least in terms of quantity. Many of the existing problems are more an issue of distribution and what we allocate resources for rather than of not having enough.
If by “most pressing problems” you refer to environmental problems, it doesn’t seem to me that green growth is that effective yet or, even more, that it can be fast enough. We need to decrease our greenhouse gas emissions urgently, and stop producing and consuming certain things seems to be necessary, at least short term.
The association of Degrowth with poverty in the developed world seems absurd to me. But even if you would consider the necessary reduction of goods and services as poverty, well, the current “abundance” comes at a high cost, and soon it will either stop being as abundant anyway or we will stop being able to enjoy them, both due to various climate change impacts.
You, Sir, seem to be attributing ultimate power to those who are in charge. I do not think this is true, despite the very high power imbalance that I think does exist today.
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.
I am not an engineer myself (I am a researcher in sustainability, among other things) but I do have engineer friends who do support degrowth. But that is actually irrelevant. It is not for engineers to decide if degrowth is necessary. Certainly, they have technical insights about the transition to more environmentally friendly production, but they often lack knowledge about how fast this transition needs to be done, what environmental impacts the extraction of minerals cause, etc.
Where did you get the notion that degrowth is not the result of human ingenuity or that is driven by pessimism? This is a mistaken view.
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.
Degrowth is unlikely and I would argue harmful. A species’s prerogative is to grow. The way I’ve reconciled with past generations is realising that whatever they did (with all negative impacts) was done thinking it was the best to advance forward. Considering my maternal grandparents did not have shoes until they were adults, I understand why for them industrialisation was seen as an opportunity. And to a certain extent, it was. At the cost of global planetary health.
Green growth, and its mechanisms (renewables and especially regenerative solutions) are much more efficient at bringing growth. And also dealing with the most pressing problems effectively. Degrowth means poverty, poverty means people won’t think about tomorrow since they are too busy thinking about surviving the day.
Hi Alicia, thank you for your comment. Till now, what is proven to be harmful is the economic growth that has occurred over the last years and the vast use of fossil fuels which accompanied it. You acknowledge it yourself too, when you mention that industrialisation happened at the cost of global planetary health.
I do not share with you the objective of achieving growth. For developing countries, certainly. But I do not see the necessity of endless growth, and in the developed countries, materially, we have developed already enough—at least in terms of quantity. Many of the existing problems are more an issue of distribution and what we allocate resources for rather than of not having enough.
If by “most pressing problems” you refer to environmental problems, it doesn’t seem to me that green growth is that effective yet or, even more, that it can be fast enough. We need to decrease our greenhouse gas emissions urgently, and stop producing and consuming certain things seems to be necessary, at least short term.
The association of Degrowth with poverty in the developed world seems absurd to me. But even if you would consider the necessary reduction of goods and services as poverty, well, the current “abundance” comes at a high cost, and soon it will either stop being as abundant anyway or we will stop being able to enjoy them, both due to various climate change impacts.
The only reason degrowth won't happen is that the people in charge won't let it happen because they're not smart.
You, Sir, seem to be attributing ultimate power to those who are in charge. I do not think this is true, despite the very high power imbalance that I think does exist today.
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.
I am not an engineer myself (I am a researcher in sustainability, among other things) but I do have engineer friends who do support degrowth. But that is actually irrelevant. It is not for engineers to decide if degrowth is necessary. Certainly, they have technical insights about the transition to more environmentally friendly production, but they often lack knowledge about how fast this transition needs to be done, what environmental impacts the extraction of minerals cause, etc.
Where did you get the notion that degrowth is not the result of human ingenuity or that is driven by pessimism? This is a mistaken view.
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.
It is certainly not happening and it is unlikely that it can happen anytime soon; or at least soon enough, if we take our predicament into account.