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Online debate on “degrowth”

degrowth bk

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degrowth
Image from resilience.org.

The websites Commons Transition and Resilience.org have both highlighted a very interesting online debate on the future of the term “degrowth.” Pioneered by French economist Serge Latouche, degrowth has become a rallying point for an impressive array of critics and visionaries, especially in Europe. Some have critiqued the degrowth paradigm for being too eclectic, and perhaps insufficiently anticapitalist, but conversations initiated by degrowth advocates continue to be quite illuminating for many of us here.

degrowth bkIn this dialogue, UK-based economist Kate Raworth argues that the term degrowth has outlived its usefulness and begun to limit the conversation, and Giorgos Kallis, co-editor of an important recent collection on degrowth (another editor, Federico Demaria, participated in the fall 2014 social ecology conference in Oslo), defends the term’s continuing vitality.  Interesting reading for social ecologists and others who remain critical of increasingly popular “Green growth” paradigms.