Suspicions relating to standards of living in the face of zero-growth policies
which is something that really pisses me off as a notion that seems to have been spreading via the likes of the transition towns and peak oil movement etc.
It's a nuts notion that has no grounding whatsoever in the reality of the situation, and nothing at all to do with sustainable development - it's pushed by people who basically haven't thought the idea through logically enough, although I've seen at least one pretty big hitter in the environmental movement pushing this notion recently on twitter... and challenged him on it, but got no response.
I do think that this is a notion that really needs tackling head on within the environmental movement before it does it real serious lasting damage.
In a nutshell, my objections to it are 3 fold:-
- It's impossible for us to make the massive generational switch to a low carbon, low energy intensity economy without the investment in the new infrastructure needed to make that a reality itself acting as a significant economic stimulus - if we really went for this in a big way we could basically have a full employment situation as a direct result of that investment. Virtually all forms of sustainable energy, food, resource use etc actually require more people to be employed per unit of output than the current methods, so how could that possibly not result in economic growth?
- It can not possibly be considered to be in anyway a sustainable long term situation to opt for zero growth now and leave millions on the dole or underemployed in this country as a result, never mind the rest of the world. Sustainability relies entirely on a balance between the environment, economics and society, it can not be achieved by focusing entirely on just the environmental aspect, and even if it could, how could it possibly be considered sustainable to effectively leave so many people behind in that way and just draw up the drawbridge behind us?
- Even if 1 & 2 weren't the case, then arguing for sustainable development via zero growth would be entirely counterproductive, as all those who stand to lose out from it would rightly oppose it tooth and nail, so it will never come to pass by democratic means - as such, it's an entirely counter-productive pipe dream notion that only serves to discredit the environmental movement and lead to it losing support among the very people who have the most to lose from environmental degradation and it's impacts on their lives through pollution, food prices, water scarcity, drought, famine etc.
put simply, zero growth should have no place in any serious environmental movement - at least not until the worlds poverty and unemployment problems have been resolved.
What we need is a new form of growth, one that's sustainable in environmental, social and economic terms - sustainable development. It's not an oxymoron, it is possible - for example, growth in energy efficiency and renewable energy sectors that grow the economy, employ more people and at the same time reduce the overall energy / carbon consumption of society.
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