Once again, California is leading the trend.
Posted on 09/07/2019 9:54:28 PM PDT by aquila48
Degrowth “does not call for doing less of the same,” as the editors of the first comprehensive book on the movement make clear. “The objective is not to make an elephant leaner, but to turn an elephant into a snail.” They call for a radically different political-economic system needed to preserve the environment and improve well-being.
The term décroissance – French for degrowth – was first used decades ago by European intellectuals. But the term became the umbrella slogan for a movement in 2008, when an academic collective organized the first international degrowth conference in Paris.
Conference-goers made the term concrete, defining degrowth as a “voluntary transition towards a just, participatory, and ecologically sustainable society,” making clear that a downsizing process was necessary for wealthy countries. They envisioned a society organized around sharing, simplicity, and solidarity, rather than the profit, efficiency, and competition inherent to capitalism.
In the decade since the Paris conference, six other international gatherings have further cemented their ideas, including at this year’s meeting in Sweden. These conferences have helped shape an international degrowth community of academics, activists and practitioners.
The movement is also solidifying the global nature of its message. The first North-South degrowth conference is being held this week in Mexico City. The gathering is crucial: a frequent criticism of the degrowth movement is that the economies of Global South countries have the same right to grow to meet basic needs that Northern countries have. Sociologist Miriam Lang responded to this criticism at the Malmö conference. The economic “growth” that critics point to as being necessary, Lang said, generally rely on natural resource extraction and other industries that exploit local populations, reinforcing a destructive ideal of progress.
(Excerpt) Read more at inequality.org ...
Here's more...
"A survey of published scholarship on degrowth found that policy proposals align with three broad goals:
-Reduce the environmental impact of human activities
- Redistribute income and wealth both within and between countries;
- Promote the transition from a materialistic to a convivial and participatory society.
The proposals include common-sense ecological plans, like the reduction of energy and material consumption, carbon caps, bans on harmful activities, and incentives for local production and consumption. Degrowthers are also looking to transform traditional ideas of the economy with the promotion of community currencies and alternative credit institutions, reduced working hours, basic and maximum incomes, and voluntary simplicity and downshifting."
(Sounds like a lot of "un-voluntary simplicity" to me)
Once again, California is leading the trend.
Sounds to me like they’ve come up with a new name for socialism/communism masked with concern for the environment.
No amount of suppressing freedom is going to result in environmental improvements. In addition, the universal poverty that these nutcases are trying to achieve is not at all good for the environment. That is because people living in poverty cannot afford to clean up the environment, and often cannot even clean the trash from their own neighborhoods.
And what the heck is a “convivial and participatory society”? Is that the “from each according to his means to each according to his needs” nonsense, restated? If no one is rewarded for their efforts, no one will make efforts. Socialism has never worked, and tends to drive walls between people by creating an environment where no one trusts anyone. In other words, socialism destroys civil society.
Whether or not we like them, the hypocrites that run the MSM will be on the side of beef and booze and central heating and A/C for the foreseeable future.
They should give this new movement an “ism”. Since it seeks to replace capitalism and competition with simplicity, stagnation and wealth redistribution, I suggest it be called “slackerism”.
Slackerism - noun, a political and social system that rewards sloth and lack of motivation by removing capitalistic incentives for achievement and advancement. Slackerism elevates the lazy, stupid and underachieving by giving them a false sense of importance and equating their unproductive habits with some misguided belief that going backwards is environmentally friendly and socially just.
“And what the heck is a “convivial and participatory society”?”
What? You never heard of Kumbaya?
“...incentives for local production and consumption....”
You mean like Mao’s backyard iron smelters and mass starvation at the end of a gun? I have a hard time believing local communal manufacturing will be able to make a cell phone or chemotherapy drugs or tractors that work and don’t cost an unimaginably large amount of “community currency”.
That picture shows the future that the left would impose on most of us.
They seem to believe in a combination of Mao and Pol Pot.
ooo... shrinkage
/seinfeld
Destitution is an agenda they can applaud
Pictures like that should be memed, with various captions.
“How getting rid of capitalism helps the environment.”
“Socialist paradise.”
“Pristine environment achieved by redistribution of wealth.”
“Example of ‘carbon-free’ living.”
Etc.
“Slackerism”—I like it, even if my iPad doesn’t.
Mind if I put it in my “about” page, with proper attribution?
They’re not looking to shrink society. They want to take all the money earned by hard working, productive people and give it to the indolent. Then they want to eliminate the hard working, productive people so the indolent can enjoy the benefits bequeathed to them.
Unfortunately, the end result of all this will be all around misery, as the only people who knew how to produce wealth will be gone.
Except for the ruling elite, which will lack nothing and will enjoy a rich life.
Check tagline.
Economic inequality is the result of intellectual inequality.
The trend seems to be towards feudalism.
“Coalition of academics and activists.”
Sure sounds like a winning combination.
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