Library

By: Randy Hayes, Foundation Earth

Abstract: Over the next century, communities worldwide will experience an unprecedented shift of weather with occasional extreme weather events (ecological spasms) resulting in economic spasms and occasional regional collapses. Concerned citizens and opinion leaders need to prepare before these eco-spasm collapses occurs. Far from being prepared, most opinion leaders and power brokers are not e...

By: Christoph Freydorf, Oliver Richters, Ferdin, Wenzlaff, Christian Kimmich, Thomas Koudela, Ludwig Schuster

Abstract: Der Zusammenhang von Wachstums- und Zinsrate wird in den Wirtschaftswissenschaften ausführlich behandelt. Dabei besteht Konsens, dass sinkende Wachstumsraten aus sozio-ökonomischen Gründen unerwünscht sind. Gleichzeitig deuten jedoch immer mehr Forschungsergebnisse darauf hin, dass Wachstum nicht zuletzt aus ökologischen Gründen an Grenzen stößt und mit ...

By: Extraenvironmentalist, Peter Brown

[ Peter Brown // What is Degrowth? ] from Extraenvironmentalist on Vimeo. Interview with Peter Brown made during the International Conference on Degrowth in the Americas in Montreal 2012. Extraenvironmentalist about the video: Dr. Peter Brown, professor at the Department of Geography at McGill University explains the idea of degrowth and how it can foster a relationship of economic stew...

By: Hartmut Rosa

The publisher: La vie moderne est une constante accélération. Jamais auparavant les moyens permettant de gagner du temps n’avaient atteint pareil niveau de développement, grâce aux technologies de production et de communication ; pourtant, jamais l’impression de manquer de temps n’a été si répandue. Dans toutes les sociétés occidentales, les individus souffrent toujours plus du manque de temps ...

By: David Correia

From the paper: "While Degrowth has found limited purchase outside existing anti-capitalist, anti-consumerist or scholarly circles, Beavan has become a media darling. His blog found the attention of a variety of media outlets and, after numerous articles and television and radio appearances, has become hugely popular. The effort of ‘one guilty liberal,’ it seems, tapped into a growing environme...

By: Kristofer Dittmer

Abstract: Local currencies issued by civil society are often advocated by the degrowth movement as innovations that facilitate voluntary degrowth, but also as tools for coping with chaotic instances of unvoluntary degrowth, such as the present crisis in southern Europe. This paper provides a concise history of Argentina’s barter networks, which attracted millions of participants during the econ...

By: Barbara Muraca

Abstract: A critical scrutiny is presented of the ethical assumptions of growth and degrowth theories with respect to distributive justice and the normative conditions for a ‘good human life’. An argument is made in favor of Sen's and Nussbaum's ‘capabilities approach’ as the most suitable theoretical framework for addressing these questions. Since industrialization economic growth has played a...

By: Niko Paech

Herausgeber_innen: Noch ist die Welt nicht bereit, von der Droge »Wachstum« zu lassen. Aber die Diskussion über das Ende der Maßlosigkeit nimmt an Fahrt auf. Der Umweltökonom Niko Paech liefert dazu die passende Streitschrift, die ein »grünes« Wachstum als Mythos entlarvt. Nach einer vollen Arbeitswoche möchte man sich auch mal etwas gönnen: ein neues Auto, ein iPad, einen Flachbildfernseher. R...

By: Niko Paech

The publisher: After a stressful week at work, we all feel we sometimes deserve a treat too: perhaps the latest smartphone, an iPad, or a flatscreen television. Before we know it, we are stuck in the vicious circle of consumer desire and time poverty. And that is not all: the constant demand for "more" is causing raw materials to disappear and driving environmental destruction forward. The wor...

By: Christer Sanne

Naturvårdsverket: Kan vi fortsätta att leva ett modernt och bekvämt liv i Sverige och ändå ”rädda världen”? Den här rapporten går från ord till siffror för att ge en konkret och sammanhållen bild av en hållbar livsstil år 2030. Den diskuterar också hur andra viktiga frågor i politiken påverkar miljö- och naturresursfrågorna och hur de kan hanteras för att nå en hållbar utveckling. Genom att tra...

By: Jean-Louis Aillon, Andrea Gardini

Keywords: slow, medicine, health, degrowth

By: Andrea Ferrante, Ortolani Livia

Abstract: “Food sovereignty is the right of peoples to healthy and culturally appropriate food produced through ecologically sound and sustainable methods, and their right to define their own food and agriculture systems”. The organic movement developed and led by farmers who wanted to change the relation between consumer/citizen and producers, with an explicit critique to the distribution mode...

By: Vincent Liegey

From the article: . . . Finally, Meadows failed, since he had the right ideas, but he was all wrong on the form. In Paul Ariès’ words: “ If it was enough to be politically right, we would have heard about it!”. But being right is not enough, what matters is to send the message and convey the ideas but to pretend to be “smarter” or to treat others as idiots, doesn’t contribute to a better under...

By: Dirk Loehr

Keywords: Steady state; Free money; Zero interest rate; Sufficiency

By: Marinella Favot

KEYWORDS: ERP; extended producer responsibility; e-waste; WEEE; green design; design for environment (DfE); financial mechanisms

By: Jin Xue, Petter Næss, Finn Arler

Abstract In industrialized countries, the idea of degrowth has emerged as a response to environmental, social, and economic crises. Realizing environmental limits to and failures of more than half a century of continual economic growth in terms of social progress and environmental sustainability, the degrowth paradigm calls for a downscaling of consumption and production for social equity an...

By: Maurizio Venezi

Introduction: Ever since my father’s death from epatocarcinoma I have been interested in the psychological aspects of cancer patients. The ideal adjective which best describes my personal experience of that death is DEVASTATING. Nevertheless, I feel profound gratitude towards my father, who allowed me to be part, for the first time, of this parting from life. A few months prior to this event, ...

By: Giorgos Kallis, Jeroen C.J.M. van den Bergh

a-growth, degrowth, environmental sustainability, gross domestic product (GDP), growth paradigm

By: Claudio Franzius, Ulrich K. Preuß

The EU debt crisis has clearly shown that the monetary union cannot be upheld without coordinated fiscal and economic policies. But many citizens are under the impression that their voices, and those of their national parliaments, are being sidelined in favour of ever-greater centralisation – and that, in the process, democracy is being eroded. Thus the debt crisis may easily trigger a crisis o...

By: Andreas Exner, Christian Lauk

Introduction: At the beginning of the twenty-first century, we find ourselves in a peculiar situation: although hardly anyone would deny the deep ecological crisis facing humankind, we seem to be caught in a net of assumptions that impede a practical solution. Having acknowledged that we need to reduce consumption of energy and materials drastically,1,2 we still often think that adjustments wit...