Library

Scientific paper • 2014

We Need to Change: analysing potential for degrowth across Europe

By: Mladen Domazet, Danijela Dolenec, Branko Ančić, Marija Brajdić-Vuković

Abstract: We analyse comparative findings for 18 European ‘old’ and ‘new’ democracies, based on ISSP survey data from 2011. Indices originally constructed for this analysis reveal comparative insights into the potential within different societies for supporting policies and practices conducive to a sustainability switch. The authors initially confirm the so-called ‘prosperity thesis’ (Franzen...

Scientific paper • 2014

Blue growth strategy of the EU – a real chance for a sustainable use of the seas?

By: Ralf Döring

Abstract: The aim of the paper is to show that the Blue Growth strategy of the European Union again ignores the fact that ongoing increase in economic activity is not possible while decreasing negative impacts on ecosystems and preserving the natural environment. The strategy again is not defining ways to cope with limits to resource availability, the necessity to reduce negative external...

Scientific paper • 2014

Limits to substitution between ecosystem services and manufactured goods and intergenerational decision-making

By: Moritz A. Drupp

Limited substitutability, ecosystem services, subsistence, dual discounting, sustainable development, project evaluation

Scientific paper • 2014

The Limits to Environmental Economics

By: Felix Ekardt

Abstract: By examining the problem of climate change this paper develops a substantial critique of the background assumptions that not only the formulation of economic theories but, in parts, also that of sociological/ political theories base on. However, this approach does not “supplement” to efficiency considerations” which up to now dominate the practical debate; it rather supersedes them....

Scientific paper • 2014

Railway transport and social-ecological transformation in Germany

By: Hannes Fauser

Abstract: This short paper summarizes the development of railway services in Germany in the past two decades, which have been marked by commercialization, increased competition and attempts of privatization. I argue that these policies are misled from a social-ecological perspective and have only modestly performed in terms of shifting passengers and cargo towards railway transportation. The...

Scientific paper • 2014

Gross Domestic Problem: The Politics Behind the World's Most Powerful Number

By: Lorenzo Fioramonti

GDP; power; war; markets; economists; globalization

Scientific paper • 2014

How does the monetary system work, does it require economic growth, and are there monetary policy options allowing degrowth?

By: Christoph Freydorf

Abstract: Degrowth strategies are not only depending on political decisions, but also on concepts of economic orders which permit the expectation to be stable and prosperous without the necessity of nominal or real (throughput of natural resources) growth rates. One important aspect is the monetary policy, which is widely suspected to play a crucial role for both, the necessity to growth as...

Scientific paper • 2014

Towards a sustainable society: Concept for an alternative economic system

By: Thomas Frisius

Abstract: The current capitalistic economic system is very prone to crises, social inequity and waste of natural resources. In combination, this threatens the means of livelihood for future generations and is, therefore, at variance with a sustainable development. An alternative economic system is proposed with the potential to overcome these difficulties. In this system, international trade is...

Scientific paper • 2014

Environmental movements and commoning strategies in Puerto Rico: challenging the growth paradigm?

By: Gustavo Garcia-Lopez

de-growth, common-pool resources, social movements, community-based resource management

Scientific paper • 2014

Principles and ethics of caring and sustainable economy

By: Daniela Gottschlich

Abstract: Feminist approaches take the rationale of care as a normative guideline that offers an opportunity to deal with the numerous socio-ecological crises caused by e.g. the rationale of development and resource extractivism. Taking the accumulation of capital as a guiding principle does not have a neutral effect on the efforts to secure sustainable livelihoods. On the contrary, it promotes...

Scientific paper • 2014

LOW GROW for Germany: modelling the macroeconomics of degrowth

By: Christoph Gran

macroeconomics; degrowth; scenarios; welfare; ecological economics

Scientific paper • 2014

Human Scale Development... away from bullets and machines

By: Soledad Granada

Abstract: The expansion of the modern state implies the continuous conquer of territory, and people, in order to access to resources. This conquer expresses as the continuous substitution of production models from peasant self-sustainable to agro-industrial and/or extractive, resulting in the territorial homogenization of production. This substitution, associated to different conceptions of...

Scientific paper • 2014

Money, debt, and the end of the growth imperative

By: Thomas H. Greco

Abstract: The global, interest-based, debt-money system is the primary driver of unsustainable growth, economic inequity, and environmental destruction. Almost all of the money in existence in the world today is created by banks when they make loans. The accrual of interest on these loans over time, causes the amount of debt to always exceed the means for its payment, so new loans must...

Scientific paper • 2014

Rethinking the Role of the Economy and Financial Markets

By: Tony Greenham, Josh Ryan Collins

Abstract: The financial crisis is as much a crisis of economics as of the financial system. Inherent flaws in the modern monetary system overlay and magnify conceptual flaws in prevailing neo-liberal economic policy that rely on frameworks ill-suited to the current context of ecological and social problems. Our response therefore needs to address both the reform of the financial system and a...

Scientific paper • 2014

Economy, Ecommony, CareCommony

By: Friederike Habermann

care, commons, externalisations, extractivism, commonsbased peerproduction

Scientific paper • 2014

Degrowth and Socialism: The vision of August Bebel

By: Christoph Henning

Abstract: This short paper aims to reread a socialist classic that was written in Leipzig about 140 years ago. This particular book, that was very influential in its time, is re-read with a keen eye on its implications for the degrowth-debate. It is argued that classical socialism already implied some ideas of a post-growth. The awareness of this fact could be used to stir up a public debate...

Scientific paper • 2014

Buddhist Economics beyond Schumacher - How can contemporary research on Buddhist Economics inform degrowth- approaches?

By: Katharina Hirschbrunn

Buddhist Economics, Sufficiency, Feminist Economics, Work, Employment

Scientific paper • 2014

Locking in or helping shift? Trends and developments affecting sustainable resource use and degrowth

By: Martin Hirschnitz-Garbers, Susanne Langsdorf

Abstract: A number of global megatrends are challenging the likelihood and feasibility of options for degrowth: Rising global population and affluence levels, proliferation of westernized lifestyles and production and consumption patterns with associated resource use needs and environmental impacts jeopardize the earth’s carrying capacity. Degrowth in the sense of socially sustainably and...

Scientific paper • 2014

The big sticks against degrowth - on the necessity of reembedding in order to make degrowth attainanble

By: Ernst Hollander

Abstract: 40 years ago it was harder to opt out of 'the growth society', in the US than in Sweden. At home I expected good education disregarding income. Since then Sweden has been 'normalised'. In Polanyian terms – disembedded. The same forces applies mutatis mutandis to nation states. One factor is the arrangements for international flows of finance. An illustration is the rising ratio of...

Scientific paper • 2014

Plea for a flexible economy

By: Willem Hoogendyk

Abstract: The money-driven growth has created a compulsion to produce and consume. The rich and emerging countries have become its prisoner. We should calm-down, regionalize and democratize the economy while turning money from master into servant. We need a frugal economy, no longer of supply and push, but geared to a demand within ecological bounds. Production should be flexible. Demand for...