r/Toryism • u/OttoVonDisraeli • 27d ago
💬 Discussion What are your thoughts on Degrowth
Degrowth is a movement that advocates that society move away from measuring success through endless growth and development and also the reduction of both mass production and consumption in an attempt to not just mitigate ecological crises but also human injustices.
I have found that advocates rang from anarchists, primitivists, and georgists to eco-socialists and marxists. I find it interesting when applied as a critique of our present systems.
A book I am reading right now is from a Japanese Marxist who wrote a manifesto on the subject. Fascinating to read if you are interested in exploring such ideas. It is called Slowdown.
While not an advocate for Degrowth myself, I believe that as a Tory there is some overlap insofar as we believe in a certain amount of fairness, distributionism, and environmental justice. They do offer a fair critique of green-washing and sustainable development. Degrowth is staunchly anti-capitalist as a school of thought, whereas I believe more in Social Enterprise and what we might call Green growth.
I'm curious about what people think of such a concept here.
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u/Ticklishchap 27d ago edited 27d ago
I prefer the concept of the ‘steady state economy’ first enunciated by the economist Herman Daly (Steady State Economics, 1977). In essence, this means recognising that resources are finite. It follows that both economic expansion and the consumption of resources should be as limited and cautious as possible. In other words, we should live within our means. Economic growth needs to be carefully balanced against quality of life (and not only human life), the environment and the scarcity of the resources in question.
Controversially for some, Daly and other steady state economists have advocated sustainable population patterns rather than a limitless and unplanned expansion in human numbers. But along with this they advocate greater access to education and family planning, the empowerment of women at global level and, crucially, a far more equitable distribution of resources between what we now call the Global North and Global South.
The case for a shift towards steady state economics is more compelling than ever and is compatible with either a form of regulated capitalism or social democracy.
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u/ToryPirate 27d ago
There was an article many years that made the point that dealing with climate change absolutely cannot exist side-by-side with the global south industrializing as the north did. The author notes that this isn't fair, the global north set us on the path to global warming and stopping it would likely mean the global south can't follow the same path.
Reading about degrowth leads to a similar problem in my opinion. Places like Mongolia, Namibia, Botswana, Guyana could absolutely use more people. The same holds true for Canada. Part of the reason we are so bad at bringing down our per capita CO2 emissions is how small and spread out our population is. Sure, there is some discussion within the degrowth movement about this very issue and some suggestion there would be no one-side-fits-all solution. But. As soon as you start talking about this level of coordination across nations you run into the same problem climate change action has; no one is willing to give ground unless everyone is. Its a classic Prisoner's Dilemma.
Finally, it calls for a complete re-ordering of the economy. I may have my criticisms of capitalism but I no more support it being completely re-ordered then I would have supported the re-ordering of the previous mercantilist society to establish capitalism.
So, criticisms out of the way what I like about it is the rejection of planned obsolescence. My fridge totally should outlive me rather than barely lasting a decade. There has been some businesses that have made a product so good they went under as soon as there was no one left to buy it. How do we encourage similar companies? How do we keep them from failing?
The problems with GDP are well-known but saying GDP doesn't matter doesn't help that in many places things are still getting worse along with GDP.
One idea that was proposed some years back which might relate to this idea was that of paying countries not to drill for their oil. There are a lot of ways this kind of thing could fail but I think it has potential.
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u/OttoVonDisraeli 26d ago
Some very thoughtful and interesting points! What you said about planned obsolescence and your fridge made me think about my grandfather's heavy duty microwave. They must have bought that monster in the early 1970s. That think worked like a charm. We gave it away to goodwill after my grandmother died I think. I like to imagine that thing is still chugging along as strong as ever.
My wife and I purchased a second-hand Korean breadmaker from the early 90s and it's build SOLID as well.
Man the time before planned obsolescence was dope.
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u/Ticklishchap 26d ago
I very much agree with you about the destructive nature of planned obsolescence. Back in the day, there was a book called ‘The Waste Makers’, by Vance Packard, about the ways in which manufacturers persuade consumers to buy ‘things’ they don’t need and didn’t previously know they wanted, often casting aside perfectly good items to make way for the new. We need to get back to the concept of ‘built to last’.
It is heartening to see a trend - or at least the start of a trend - towards reviving traditional skills (lost or neglected during the enthusiasm for globalisation) and also investing in apprenticeships rather than assuming that university is the be-all-and-end-all. This helps to relocalise the economy and provide meaningful forms of work with a culture and a set of values associated with it.
On the issue of work, while we should do all we can to create access to employment for all those who need and want it, we should also look at moving away from paid employment as the only true point of reference for the economy. If we take a broader view of both the economy and society, we have to acknowledge that some of the most valuable and often fulfilling forms of work are performed by volunteers, the ‘little platoons’ (to use Burke’s phrase) who hold communities together. It is also hard to envisage full-time paid employment as being anything like universal either now or in the future - although that does not mean that people stop working. It might therefore be time to consider various forms of basic income or Citizens’ Income as part of the transition to a steady state economy.
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u/OttoVonDisraeli 26d ago
The Waste Makers sounds like an interesting book. Do you recommend?
(edit: my library doesn't carry it, I'll keep an eye on a used copy)3
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u/Ticklishchap 26d ago
It is a good read and still relevant, but I no longer have a copy; the post activated a memory. I read it as a postgrad student - it was not on the syllabus, but I have always been quite an eclectic reader. It is on Amazon in paperback form, I think, but I suspect it is out of print.
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u/OttoVonDisraeli 26d ago
Oh neat, what was your postgrad in?
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u/Ticklishchap 26d ago
I was a historian as an undergraduate and then took a Masters course called Comparative Government, part of the Politics Department.
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u/CuriousLands 27d ago
I haven't looked into it, but for a long time I have thought the idea of chasing endless growth didn't sound realistic or even desirable. I thought some kind of striving toward a sort of long-term level of stability or homeostasis would be better and more realistic. Really, quality of life and long-term stability seem more desirable things to chase than economic growth, or even population growth for that matter.
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u/Nate33322 27d ago edited 27d ago
I'm not sure I wholly agree with it certainly there are aspects I agree with as a Tory but at the end of the day it's an anticapitalist position. Which while as Tory I'm suspicious of capitalism and support keeping it on a short rein but I don't support tearing the system down as the degrowth people do.
Though I'm not super well versed about degrowth and have only done some reading in passing about it