De-growth or other growth?

Francine Mestrum, PhD

www.globalsocialjustice.com

The idea of de-growth is far from new. The emergent ecological crisis has given
the concept a new impetus and its content has been somewhat updated.
However, the idea of stopping growth altogether remains very controversial and
it even seems that some advocates of ‘de-growth’ do not want to stop it. In this
article, I will give the major arguments against the concept and propose an
alternative approach. We should limit our ecological footprint, which is different
from ‘de-growing’. For some, this is a semantic debate, for others, a
fundamentally different view on our future.

Science and economy

The idea of de-growth has first been promoted by the Romanian economist
Georgescu-Roegen. His thesis was that western economic thinking is
fundamentally wrong and he applied the principles of thermodynamics to the
economy. This is how he introduced the idea of ‘entropy’ which indicates that
infinite growth is impossible and that we should take into account our
consumption of natural capital when developing economic theories. Natural
resources are being exploited without their cost ever being measured whereas a
return to an original situation is totally excluded. A comparison with financial
capital is relevant here: using one’s capital to live from is perfectly possible but
one knows this capital is finite and bankruptcy is the only possible final exit.
Bankruptcy of the planet however will be final and irrevocable. It means we have
to stop growing and to significantly reduce our economic activities.

Several authors have developed this concept of de-growth. In France, the most
famous one certainly is Serge Latouche. He considers de-growth to be
incompatible with humanism. Latouche opposes modernity, development and
technological ‘progress’. In the United States, Herman Daly is a former follower of
Georgescu-Roegen. He promotes a steady-state economy and makes a
distinction between ‘economic growth’ and ‘uneconomic growth’ that causes
more damage than it produces benefits.

Today, the idea of de-growth is mainly promoted by ‘green’ thinkers and

activists, sometimes in a rather radical way, sometimes in a more relative way.
The ‘New Green Deal’ that speaks of ‘prosperity without growth’ of the New
Economics Foundation is a good example of this last version. But it also shows
that the ideas need more clarification and that it is all too easy to create wrong
impressions.

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De-growth remains controversial and the arguments in favor of it have never
convinced me. Therefore, I want to develop a couple of ideas that lead to a less
pessimistic world view. Even if the advocates of ‘de-growth’ promise more
‘happiness’, this seems to me to be a rather easy promise to make and a difficult
one to realize.

Alternative indicators

The discussion on de-growth often takes place in a confusing context. Several

ideas are being put forward that may be correct but that do not necessarily lead
to ‘de-growth’. Let me therefore start with two statements.

The first one concerns the indicators that are used to measure our prosperity.
The GDP (Gross Domestic Product) has long been criticized, for very good
reasons. GDP measures all our economic activities, independently from their
positive or negative impact on our wellbeing or on our environment. A
devastating natural catastrophe can produce more activities and thus more
growth than a village party that contributes to social cohesion. Industrial
activities with high carbon emissions are better to enhance GDP than the work of
a craftsman. Environmental services, such as clean air and clean water are
crucial for all life but they are delivered for ‘free’ and thus are not measured in
the GDP, in the same way as the non-paid labor of mainly women is totally
ignored. This is the reason why many scholars propose a new set of indicators.
For poor countries, the UNDP has measured a ‘human development index’ that
measures GDP in combination with literacy and life expectancy. In rich countries,
an indicator for sustainable economic welfare (ISEW) is often introduced in order
to measure the sustainability and the loss of natural capital of our activities. This
indicator tells us when economic growth becomes ‘uneconomic’. These indicators
are of the utmost importance in order to get a more or less correct idea of the
real ‘progress’ of our societies. But this has nothing to do with the question of the
slowing down of our economic activities. If we can produce more economic
growth and less uneconomic growth, we are on the right track.

A second statement concerns the western unsustainable patterns of production

and consumption. It is clear that this pattern cannot possibly be generalized all
over the world. If the whole of world society were able to ‘develop’ and were
going to use as many cars as we in Western Europe, were able to buy as many
air tickets and to eat as much meat, we would need 2,5 planets in order to make
it possible. The allowable ecological footprint in Western Europe has been largely
exceeded and it will necessarily have to be reduced. How we have to do this is
another question but the answer is not necessarily ‘less growth’.

Our way of life in the North is clearly unsustainable and we have to measure our
‘progress’ in a different way. This being said, de-growth is not necessarily the
answer and I want to explain my arguments.

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Another way of life

My first reason is totally prohibitive for the advocates of de-growth: technological

progress. It does not mean that I unconditionally believe in the qualities and
possibilities of technological progress, but I do think that it can solve certain
problems. The ecological houses are a good example. Cars can drive with a
substantial minor amount of petrol. Maybe there are possibilities for the
sequestration or stocking of carbon emissions. Meat can be produced in
laboratories. These are not panaceas, but it would be unreasonable to not
examine the technological possibilities, especially in circumstances where
solutions become very urgent and where changes in attitudes are particularly
slow to emerge. The ‘rebound-effect’ that leads to higher consumption precisely
because one knows there are less negative environmental consequences, will
also have to be taken into account.

A second argument is also linked to technological progress and concerns the

recycling of waste. ‘Cradle-to-cradle’ solutions do not offer total solutions and are
never totally possible, but they do offer a possibility to significantly reduce our
resource consumption. Moreover these activities lead to more economic growth.

A third argument is a consequence of the former ones. The most important thing
to achieve is economic growth that causes no environmental damage and that
needs fewer natural resources. Recycling and services are two possible
alternatives. The ‘knowledge economy’ is not necessarily environment-friendly
but some activities – translations and conference interpreting, e.g. – will not be
more damaging that the costs for the transport of their workers or the use of a
computer. I do not understand why growth in these sectors would have to be
prohibited.

A fourth reason is obviously the ‘under-development’ in the South. The

Northern/Western pattern of life is unsustainable but it is also unacceptable to
deny Africans or Asians the material comfort that we enjoy. Growth is not a
panacea to solve poverty, but how to reduce poverty without growth remains to
be seen. To me, it seems obvious that poor countries will have to develop their
productive capacities in order to satisfy the needs of their people. It means that
third world countries need growth, growth that should try to limit as far as
possible environmental damage. In order to limit the worldwide ecological
footprint, it means we should also talk of a distribution of industrial activities and,
consequently start to plan in the way that transnational companies are already
planning their activities. They do it in function of costs; we should do it in function
of a fair distribution of incomes and of environmental damage. This redistribution
of activities is also the easiest and most direct way to realize a redistribution of
incomes. Moreover, it allows for a significant reduction of international trade and
transport and thus for less environmental damage.

My last argument against de-growth is a consequence of all former points. The

advocates of de-growth only rarely make a distinction between different types of
activities and growth. Their approach is too general, as if all growth necessarily
implies the consumption of finite natural resources. This is not correct and I think

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the most important thing is to organize growth in a different way, to produce
another kind of growth and other types of economic activities that can lead to
economic growth in the sense of Daly. I have never understood why economic
growth and growth in general should be stopped.

Another economy

The arguments in favor of de-growth clearly do not convince me. This does not
mean that I can accept the current economic system. I hope that my arguments
have already indicated in which direction I would like to see it change. I cannot
develop all the different points here, but I think that a reference to the current
economic and financial crisis, the growing inequalities and the missing gender
dimension in economic thinking are the most important ones. Let me briefly
develop the reasons that have to do with de-growth and ecology.

One of the reasons why the advocates of de-growth keep hammering at it may
be that growth has become in the past decades the only objective of economic
activities. This is a rather new phenomenon and if it is a normal evolution within
capitalism, it certainly is not within economic theory. Economy is about the
satisfaction of basic needs with scarce resources. Economy, then, is about the
allocation of these scarce resources. All other considerations fall outside of
economic theory. The economy can ‘grow’ as population grows and more needs
have to be satisfied. In fact, this is already an argument against de-growth
because the population is indeed growing and a reduction of economic activities
would lead to substantially less goods for everyone. The economy can also grow
when more and more desires are perceived as being needs. It is here that the
distinction between economic and uneconomic growth has to be made, but it
surely does not lead to obligatory growth. Originally, development was not
defined in terms of growth. In the UN development thinking of the 50s and 60s
development referred to the modernization of productive capacities, to a
diversification of activities and to a rising living standard. This necessarily implied
growth but growth was not the objective of development. It was a means in order
to achieve an end and in order to finance the development effort, independently
from the North. Only in the last decades, after the structural adjustments and
with the poverty reduction strategies, has growth become an objective, and end
in itself. The reason is quite simple: redistribution of incomes disappeared from
the agenda. It was said that poverty reduction needed growth and no one
wondered where and how this growth had to be produced, whether poverty in the
past had been reduced thanks to growth and how the growth had to be
distributed. It was only when it became clear – once again – that this
‘development’ strategy did not work and that growth did not favor the poor, that
a new concept of ‘pro-poor growth’ was introduced, which is, in fact growth
produced by the poor themselves. In other words, the poor solve their poverty
problem themselves. That is the way the World Bank sees it. But one
indisputable fact remains: poverty can only be reduced either with growth or with
redistribution.

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Other social policies

The growing poverty and inequality clearly show that something is fundamentally
wrong with growth and with the way our economic system is functioning. It will
have to be re-examined and to me it is clear that growth cannot be the objective
of economic activities. In the same way, the whole reasoning on the ‘homo
oeconomicus’ is so fundamentally flawed – especially from a gender perspective
– that it ignores or sees as uneconomic all forms of altruism. The basic tenets of
our economic theories will then have to be re-thought.

Trade unions have their own relevant reasons for rejecting all ideas of de-growth
as they refer to social problems. Less growth – as we can see in today’s crisis –
means less employment and less income for workers. Clearly, this cannot be
defended in a trade union context. Moreover, it is not easy to convince people to
abandon material comfort on a voluntary basis. The promise of ‘more happiness’
or ‘more wellbeing’ is too abstract and too incredible to be seriously considered.
From a sociological point of view then, de-growth can never be a popular idea.
Whatever one may think of the ‘happiness’ of people, it is clear that the
economic growth in the North in the past century – and its redistribution – has
given rise to a much better standard of living.

‘Without growth’, as the most recent study of the New Economics Foundation
states, is also difficult to believe in. In fact, the report itself admits it. Economic
stability, according to the authors, cannot be based on growth of material
consumption. This means it can be based on immaterial consumption and on
growth of the services sector. This is not an argument against growth. Moreover,
the report states that ‘prosperity without growth’ in the Western world has
become a financial and ecological necessity. In other words, growth in the South
is acceptable. This puts the whole idea in a very different context and one can
only say that the title of the report is very misleading.

What is growth?

I believe the concept of growth is in fact too general. It is obvious that from an
ecological point of view we have to be much more cautious than we are and that
we have to respect our planet and the resources it gives us. But growth that is
based on other elements? Just imagine that our societies decide to pay women
for their reproductive work. If we do this at the price of a domestic worker, it
would mean that our GDP would rise with 50 to 70 %. Do we have to oppose this
because it is ‘growth’?

A second more difficult point concerns growth which is based on natural

resources and the argument of Georgescu-Roegen that all growth is always
destructive. This is certainly true, though I suppose that for some resources
depletion is not immediately threatening. Our planet is finite and
intergenerational solidarity is a must, but how many generations do we have to

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take into account? If we can organize our production in such a way that our
resources will not be depleted within the coming half millennium, does that limit
our responsibility? But who knows if our planet will not be destroyed in the
meantime by a meteorite, or by a very destructive nuclear war? Or that we find
water on Mars? This ethical question is not easy to answer, though I seriously
question the assumption that we have to leave the earth the way that we have
found it. Where does our responsibility stop?

Ecological problems are social problems

It should be clear that our prosperity cannot and should not only be determined
by growth. To question the material growth and to defend a redistribution of
material growth is a logical consequence. In view of the coming climate
conference it is clear that the new emerging economies are not willing to
abandon their development only to please the West. A serious global
redistribution will have to be organized. It is also the best way to reduce the
growing income inequality in the world. More industrial activities with
environment friendly methods in the South, a serious reduction of uneconomic
growth in the North and a serious economic growth based on green technologies,
why should this not be possible? Sustainable development means that
development is not synonymous with growth and that it concerns the North as
well as the South. Much more research is needed in order to find out what
activities will have to be reduced and which ones will not. Now, everything is
lumped together and this leads to a serious blurring of lines. We already know
that the existing oil reserves will not last for a century. Countries need to have an
opportunity – as Ecuador is doing – to not exploit their oil and to protect the
rainforest and its inhabitants. If that means we can produce less plastic and can
drive fewer cars, than we have to prepare for it, now. We need other forms of
mobility. If we want to avoid a serious decline of our living standard it is best to
be pro-active. Humankind is very inventive and I trust we can find new solutions.

The most important conclusion should be that the ecological crisis cannot be paid
for by those who have nothing and who did not cause the current crisis. In the
international documents on sustainable development, the poor are either seen as
victims or as culprits. It is clear that poor people who have no money for
ecological houses will indeed consume more energy. But half of the world
population is poor and is already the most important victim of the ecological
crisis. Today, farmers suffer from drought or from floods. Islands are already
disappearing. Those who say, in general, that we have to de-grow also say
implicitly that there is no hope for the 2.5 billion poor people and that inequality
will continue to rise.

If we are prepared to re-think development and development cooperation, I am

sure we can find ecologically sustainable solutions which can be ‘sold’ more
easily to the populations of North and South. De-growth seems to be an
impossible idea. Material prosperity remains the basis for our wellbeing and our
happiness, but there certainly are limits to the growth of prosperity. This is not in

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defense of voluntary poverty, but in defense of controlling our markets and the
limitless offer of useless and damaging products. Nobody will suffer from less
neon publicity, less meat, fewer cars, less toys, less plastic bags. Re-thinking our
agricultural policies, in North and South, can deliver a better and ecologically
friendly production of everything we need. There are thousands of examples of
activities that can maintain our prosperity, improve our wellbeing and limit the
environmental damage. A determined analysis of the feasibility and the
desirability of all activities is very urgent. Stories about ‘de-growth’ and ‘without
growth’ make people afraid and fear never is a good councilor. We certainly
should limit our ecological footprint but we should not de-grow.

In discussions with the advocates of de-growth it rapidly becomes clear that

there are two divergent ways of thinking. On the one hand, some will want to
really reduce growth, to re-create communities of mutual help, away from
modernity and humanism. People then have to live ‘in harmony’ with nature,
something that never before in history really existed. ‘Nature’ is always
perceived as something positive and human beings cannot intervene in order to
master it. This story is fundamentally conservative and cannot be shared by the
left.

On the other hand, some will in fact agree with all the arguments that are given
in this article but will nevertheless continue to advocate ‘de-growth’. That is
really a pity. Of course we should say no to the obsession of growth and therefore
we should focus more and better on the positive elements of modernity and
humanism. It is possible that in a social and ecological just world we will produce
less in the North, though that remains to be seen. But to speak of ‘de-growth’
when there is no desire to absolutely reduce growth, without any distinction
between North and South and between economic and uneconomic growth does
not seem to me to be very useful. We do not need to help our anti-modern and
anti-humanist enemies.

It is clear that our ecological footprint will certainly have to be reduced, as it is

obvious that we need new indicators. Our economic system has to be re-thought
and growth will never be an objective. To develop a positive narrative around
these basic ideas, for ourselves and for the South, is a challenge that the green
and leftwing movements have not answered yet.