Pic from Etienne Girarde on Unsplash
The global environmental crisis is a fact. The urgent need for sustainable solutions to stop environmental damage is more pressing and ubiquitous than ever, and it’s clear that these solutions need to consider both social and environmental justice. While in theory there is a large societal consensus that action is needed within this decade, opinions vary as to what kind of changes are needed, and how to achieve them. In this context, research on ‘degrowth’ or ‘postgrowth’ plays an important role in various research fields and social movements, and forms the basis of a dynamic discussion about the potential and limits to growth.
While advocates of economic growth argue that the solution lies in technological innovation and market mechanisms and that without further growth there is no development and wealth, critics warn that ‘green growth’ is a narrative that is used to displace socio-ecological costs elsewhere, while technology is neither able to repair existent damages and lost resources nor to make people live happier and healthier lives. Degrowth ideas and practices demand to be sustainable both socially and environmentally.
Engaging with contemporary interdisciplinary research on ‘post-growth-societies’, Istituto Svizzero seeks to feature a debate on ‘the limits to growth’. This was the title of a report published by the Think Tank Club of Rome in 1972. In the context of the first environmental movement in the 1970ies it provoked a debate that is seeing a revival in recent academic fields and social movements. What does it take to transform our societies to achieve a more just distribution of resources and more resilient systems, today and for future generations? How can we imagine a good life beyond growth?
In collaboration with the University of Lausanne, the University of Ferrara and Harvard University.
Organizing board:
Dr. Maria Böhmer
Prof. Christian Arnsperger
Prof. Viviana Asara
Dr. Viktoria Cologna (SNSF postdoc mobility grant)
More information on the website. Possibility to attend in person or online.
In a recent op-ed published in Le Monde, French economist – and Emmanuel Macron’s economic program inspirer – Jean Pisani-Ferry argued that economic growth was necessary to fight against climate change and called for eco-productivism. The following op-ed is a reply to Pr. Pisani-Ferry that was originally published in Le Monde (in French). Recently, there have been calls for eco-productivis...
For the third year in a row, the Degrowth Summer School is being held on the Climate Camp in the Rhineland. It runs from the 18th to 23rd of August. Just 10 days before the start of the Summer School the foundation „Stiftung Umwelt und Entwicklung Nordrhein-Westfalen“ has cancelled our funding. The reason they‘ve given us: The Summer School takes place too close to actions of civil disobedience...
By Niko Paech The legend of green growth depends on three basic principles: (1) Increase of resource-efficiency, (2) closed material flow cycles and (3) renewable energies. However, despite a host of innovations in the field of climate protection, the ecological damages in the area of energy have been and still are on the rise. The process of ecological modernization reveals itself as a histo...
