Library

Scientific paper • 2016

Sustainable Farm Systems? Applying Energy—Landscape Integrated Analysis in past and present Western agricultures

ELIA (Energy Landscape Integrated Analysis) is a method that combines energy analysis of agroecosystems (energy flows and capacity to store energy within them) with land cover / land use change and so it represents the energy imprint over a landscape. First applied to Vallès County in the Barcelona Region a similar study is here replicated to a new time point and to other ten cases across...

Scientific paper • 2016

Sustainable smartphone consumption from a rational and value-based perspective

By: Shirin Betzler

Knowledge societies that promote equality and innovation over material wealth and production are unthinkable without modern information and communication technologies (ICT). However, there has been growing awareness about the ecological as well as economic and social challenges related to the growth of ICT, such as environmental pollution through the invasive extraction of natural resources, or...

Scientific paper • 2016

Technologies for a Degrowth Transition

By: Tomislav Medak

I'll broach the degrowth transition from the combined perspective of social construction of technology and world system theories. I'll seek to demonstrate how dominant technological complex functions to integrate yet thwart the advancement of semi-periphery. Narratives of a socially more just and ecologically more sustainable future would frequently have us believe that exising technologies...

Scientific paper • 2016

Theoretical and historical perspectives on technology

By: Mauro Bonaiuti, Melf-Hinrich Ehlers, Mario Pansera, Pasi Heikkurinen, Lukáš Likavčan

This is the first of a planned ‘trilogy’ of sessions on the contentious relationship between degrowth and technology. It represents the first of three subthemes of a special issue on degrowth and technology, which is currently being edited for the Journal of Cleaner Production. The aim of this special session is to bring together different theoretical and historical perspectives on technology,...

Misc • 2016

Inside the Green Economy - Promises and Pitfalls

By: Barbara Unmüßig, Lili Fuhr, Thomas Fatheuer

The economic and ecological bases of a general prosperity are in danger, the gap between rich and poor is widening. The concept of the Green Economy offers a new model, based primarily on large-scale technological solutions. But the Green Economy cares little about politics, barely registers human rights, does not recognize social actors and suggests the possibility of reform without conflict....

Art contribution • 2016

Eco-modernism vs. Degrowth

By: Students of the Summer School on Degrowth, Environmental Justice

A sketch by students of the Summer School on Degrowth and Environmental Justice

Scientific paper • 2016

Degrowth and techno-business model innovation: The case of Riversimple

By: PeterWells

Automobility Degrowth Small scale Corporate governance Car industry Technological innovation

Misc • 2016

movum - Heft 10: Effizienz und Suffizienz

By: Uwe Schneidewind, Elmar Altvater, Nico Paech, Felix Werdermann

Heft 10 des Magazins movum> zum Thema Effizienz und Suffizienz Kurzbeschreibung: Effizienz allein bringt keine substanzielle Reduktion von Ressourcenverbrauch, Emissionen und Abfällen. Wir brauchen auch Suffizienz – die Befreiung vom "Immer mehr". Und zwar nicht individuell, sondern als Politik. Das Heft als PDF

Presentation • 2016

Degrowth Conference Budapest, 2016 – Technologies for a Degrowth Transition. A Faustian Bargain?

By: Tomislav Medak

Presentation by Tomislav Medak I'll broach the degrowth transition from the combined perspective of social construction of technology and world system theories. I'll seek to demonstrate how dominant technological complex functions to integrate yet thwart the advancement of semi-periphery. Narratives of a socially more just and ecologically more sustainable future would frequently have us...

Scientific paper • 2016

Degrowth Conference Budapest, 2016 – Framing the Privacy Debate and Big Data Governmentality in Degrowth Theory

By: Julien Rossi

Presentation by Julien Rossi Data surveillance by private companies and public intelligence agencies is intricated, and research has shown how citizens have become willing participants in their own surveillance. This brings forth a new type of governmentality that is legitimised by hegemonic imaginaries on “Big Data” and innovation which are closely related to the imaginary of technological...

Presentation • 2016

Degrowth Conference Budapest, 2016 – Can technologies help to reduce the physical and human degradation in transition towards a degrowth society?

By: Pasqua L'Abbate

Presentation by Pasqua L'Abbate This article outlines the role that technology has to play in order to enable human beings to move towards a degrowth society. Against the background of the problems we face today, the authors E.E. Schumacher, N.Georgescu-Roegen and others have been re-examined. This work also explains the concepts of entropy and emergy and the “fourth” principle of...

Presentation • 2016

Degrowth Conference Budapest, 2016 - Science and degrowth

By: Fabrice Flipo

Presentation by Fabrice Flipo Political prayers lie on the growth’s comeback to ensure financial incomes to be given out. That for science is seen by many essentially as a tool to provide techniques able to raise productivity, whatever the environmental or social consequences. For those reasons, and especially since the second half of the 20th century, public policy and investment have allowed...

Interview • 2015

Redaktionskonferenz - Dein unbekannter Zweitjob

By: Andrea Vetter, Sven Preger

Teil der Sendung ist Andrea Vetter. Im Interview mit Sven Preger spricht sie über Konviviale Technik. Über die Fragen was ist Konvivialität und wann ist Technik konvivial? In welchem Kontext? Über unser Menschen Bild und das Mensch sein. Und zuletzt über die Rolle, die konviviale Technik in Zukunft spielen kann oder sollte. Am 27.8.2015, Minute 16:26 bis 24:00

Report • 2015

Sustainable development and de-growth

By: Swati Agarwal, Mihir Mathur

The two authors from India are arguing that: > Economic growth based on consumption is dependent on the exploitation of natural resources > Sustainable development demands lifestyle changes as much as technology and innovation > De-growth of the wealthiest economies rather than clean technology is the need of the hour

Position paper • 2015

A Degrowth Response to an Ecomodernist Manifesto

By: Jeremy Caradonna et al

From the text: The Manifesto has already received strong criticism from an array of commentators, but none of these assessments has yet critiqued it from the perspective of “degrowth,” which is an approach that sees the transition to sustainability occurring through less environmentally impactful economic activities and a voluntary contraction of material throughput of the economy, to reduce...

Scientific paper • 2014

Farm-hacking open agricultural machines: the role of peer-based open design communities in achieving sustainable production

By: Michel Bauwens

Abstract: Corporate R&D communities design for scarcity with planned obsolescence not as a bug but as a feature. Open design communities design for inclusion, modularity, bio-degradability, the shared use of machinery and combined with distributed microfactories, prefigure a demand-based economy 'of scope' that aims to replace a suppy-driven economy 'of scale'. This intervention will offer...

Scientific paper • 2014

Are The Inherent Limits in the Process of Industrialization? A Study on the Seed Sector in the U.S. and in Germany

By: Barbara Brandl

Abstract: The development of seeds is essential for a sustainable and socially adapted type of agriculture. This relationship has been widely discussed and is usually invoked by natural scientists. However, a social science perspective on the connection between plant breeding research and agricultural production allows a broader perspective. In order to explore the effects of seed production on...

Scientific paper • 2014

Phosphorus Governance for Sustainability

By: Felix Ekardt

Abstract: This article broaches the legal treatment of the non-substitutable nutrient phosphorus, which is indispensable for life. We not only address the case of a highly important resource problem that has hitherto received little attention in the political discourse, but also focus on the excessive and wasteful entry of phosphorus in the environment. It is the sum of multiple minor actions...

Scientific paper • 2014

Technology Assessment and Degrowth: how can they come together?

By: Julia Hahn

Abstract: TA with its strong focus on technological development and what it means for our society can offer helpful insights for degrowth regarding the strong connections between technological development and economic growth as well as problem-oriented approaches. Participatory TA for example aims at incorporating the values and experiences of lay people into the decisions on and designs of...

Scientific paper • 2014

Towards a methodological luddism for ICTs

By: Lanka Horstink, José Luís Garcia

Abstract: This proposal stems from the need for an experimental and reflective method - which we call “methodological luddism” - that will allow us to reevaluate the structure of humans' relationships with information technologies. Luddism as a method should not be confused with its original meaning - destruction of machines and equipment -, but understood as a means to examine the conditions...