The degrowth movement wants to intentionally shrink the economy to address climate change, and create lives with less stuff, less work, and better well-being. But is it a utopian fantasy?
This sounds nice for someone in a developed country who has all they need, and is only satisfying their wants. But for most of the world, economic development is a necessity and a lifesaver. Child mortality is reduced, life expectancy and education level increased, child labor decreased, as a country’s economy grows.
This is not a fringe right-wing idea. This is the very real effect of economic growth in developing countries, i.e. most of the world.
Degrowthers often seem to forget that applying their ideas will literally kill millions in developing countries, by preventing the economic developments that would have saved them.
FWIW, I am not a fan of unbridled capitalism either but think that it is important to consider science in important matters like this and not just go with gut feeling. That applies to both fascism and degrowth.
I think a more fair take is that we need growth in underdeveloped places and degrowth in highly developed places. It’s less about changing the total economic output and more about changing how that output is distributed.
Which is a direct function of development. All of Africa produces less CO2 than Alabama, and Alabama is the least developed state in the developed world.
Degrowth addresses that, contrary to your opinion. Degrowth in the global north provides the space for the global south to properly develop, something that has been systematically denied to them in many places by western powers through unequal exchange and neocolonialism.
Lmao no but that’s a great mental image. Global north and south don’t exclusively refer to northern and southern hemisphere. Though, rewilding is a component of most degrowth strategies I’ve encountered. Obviously it’s much more complicated than just planting trees, entire ecosystems would need to be developed, but I guess sort of in a way it would be like moving the Amazon to the northern hemisphere, only that degrowth would advocate for redeveloping underdeveloped areas in the global south rather than further damaging wild ecosystems to develop more sprawl.
Edit: by space I meant in terms of emissions, development costs to land, etc. currently we’re already exploiting most of these countries resources, and destroying their ecosystems, through the aforementioned unequal exchange and neocolonialism, but under de growth, these regions would instead be able to exploit their own resources for their development, instead of being harangued into exporting raw goods by the global north for our oversized consumption habits.
It seems like the choice is to die from the environmental issues or die from poor health care? There is no way anyone survives with the current state of things.
Its often includes with a more holistic approach to restructuring society. Degrowth is only a part of the puzzle a lot of radicals are advocating for in order to combat climate change. A lot of proponents of degrowth also call for a solarpunk style of city planning, decentralized/libertarian (real libertarian) politics and plenty more
It’s not that radical, we lived with less than this for tens of thousands of years before the industrial revolution.
This sounds nice for someone in a developed country who has all they need, and is only satisfying their wants. But for most of the world, economic development is a necessity and a lifesaver. Child mortality is reduced, life expectancy and education level increased, child labor decreased, as a country’s economy grows. This is not a fringe right-wing idea. This is the very real effect of economic growth in developing countries, i.e. most of the world.
Degrowthers often seem to forget that applying their ideas will literally kill millions in developing countries, by preventing the economic developments that would have saved them.
FWIW, I am not a fan of unbridled capitalism either but think that it is important to consider science in important matters like this and not just go with gut feeling. That applies to both fascism and degrowth.
I think a more fair take is that we need growth in underdeveloped places and degrowth in highly developed places. It’s less about changing the total economic output and more about changing how that output is distributed.
No, it’s about how much carbon we are putting I to the atmosphere. Pretty simple issue actually.
Which is a direct function of development. All of Africa produces less CO2 than Alabama, and Alabama is the least developed state in the developed world.
Degrowth addresses that, contrary to your opinion. Degrowth in the global north provides the space for the global south to properly develop, something that has been systematically denied to them in many places by western powers through unequal exchange and neocolonialism.
How does degrowth in the northern hemisphere give space to the southern hemisphere? Are we going to relocate the Amazon rainforest or something?
Lmao no but that’s a great mental image. Global north and south don’t exclusively refer to northern and southern hemisphere. Though, rewilding is a component of most degrowth strategies I’ve encountered. Obviously it’s much more complicated than just planting trees, entire ecosystems would need to be developed, but I guess sort of in a way it would be like moving the Amazon to the northern hemisphere, only that degrowth would advocate for redeveloping underdeveloped areas in the global south rather than further damaging wild ecosystems to develop more sprawl.
Edit: by space I meant in terms of emissions, development costs to land, etc. currently we’re already exploiting most of these countries resources, and destroying their ecosystems, through the aforementioned unequal exchange and neocolonialism, but under de growth, these regions would instead be able to exploit their own resources for their development, instead of being harangued into exporting raw goods by the global north for our oversized consumption habits.
I still do not fully understand it, but thank you for the response.
It seems like the choice is to die from the environmental issues or die from poor health care? There is no way anyone survives with the current state of things.
Its often includes with a more holistic approach to restructuring society. Degrowth is only a part of the puzzle a lot of radicals are advocating for in order to combat climate change. A lot of proponents of degrowth also call for a solarpunk style of city planning, decentralized/libertarian (real libertarian) politics and plenty more