The Journal of Cleaner Production will be issuing a special volume on the topic of technology and degrowth and is looking for interesting scientific contributions. Abstracts of 400 to 500 words can be submitted until 31 August 2015. The special volume aims to both provide 1) a state of the art selection of current discussions of the role of technology within Degrowth in academia and practice and 2) a deepened reflection on technologies with the aim to specify perspectives and to overcome their entrenchment. The full call for papers can be accessed here
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We all use models in daily life to explain our environment. An example: I assume that a tree will grow provided it has sufficient water, nutrients and sun. I am using a simple model here, without understanding the nitty-gritty – what exactly happens in the roots, stem, leaves and cells. Thinking in models is not only useful to understand our world, but also to solve problems. Let’s assume the ...
Degrowth has been described as a “movement” rather than an ideology1, and as such it presents several variations. For some of its proponents, degrowth is a proxy for sustainable consumption, and to a lesser extent production2. A second group of degrowth advocates are those for whom an emerging discussion of “sufficiency” as a societal norm is taking shape, as a result of activism3. Finally, a t...
In a recent article with Stefan Drews, we discussed why degrowth might be an unfortunate name and slogan for the alternative economics movement. We listed several expressions that could possibly be better, but we were also upfront about their disadvantages. Here I propose a new term that might combine the advantages of the word degrowth with those of its more positive alternatives. For an asse...
