DEGROWTH: A VOCABULARY FOR A NEW ERA
Reviewed by Sudhirendar Sharma
Will everyone get a Ferrari one day?
Degrowth: A Vocabulary for a New Era, edited by Giacomo D’Alisa, Federico Demaria & Giorgos Kallis, Routledge, 2014
It is tough to imagine ‘de-growth’ as an idea of our times. Resisting growth is to risk economic and social collapse. But to pursue it relentlessly is not without risk either – it endangers the ecosystems on which we depend. Despite the classical idea of development being declared dead several times in the past, it continues to persist because a ‘Ferrari for all’ is the dream everyone has been urged to strive for. Will the world be able to produce enough Ferraris for everyone, including those who are yet to be born? The truth is, we just don’t know.
Even if everyone were to get a Ferrari, in the future it would only be the Fiat of its generation. In the future, market managers will seek to get people to yearn for something more, without any let down in the growth of unending materialistic desires. The reach of markets into aspects of everyday life traditionally governed by non-market values and norms, will only rob us of the individual meaning of life. Isn’t unending desire the reason for growing anxiety?
De-growth, an idea that has been around for a long time, has been rechristened by a group of academicians at the Autonomous University of Barcelona. They are trying to pull society out of its current abyss. Since the movement was launched at an international conference in Paris in 2008, de-growth has engaged researchers in elaborating the idea from many perspectives. De-growth advocates shrinking production and consumption with the aim of achieving social justice and ecological continuity.
Spread over four sections, the book is a compilation of easy-to-read essays which argue that the ‘shift’ is indeed possible. It in no way advocates a return to the past, but it does suggest learning from indigenous cultures and techniques for paving an autonomous, close-to-nature, and ecological way of life.
To help de-growth ideas like frugality, sobriety, dematerialization and digital commons sink in, the editors have assembled keywords and concepts to construct a language that will move the discourse on de-growth forward. The book is not prescriptive but rather suggestive: inviting readers to devise their own sense of what de-growth means. It is a valuable book for all those who firmly believe that the modern economy has reached a dead-end.
