Nearly all the world’s governments and vast numbers of its people are convinced that addressing human-induced climate change is essential if healthy societies are to survive. The two solutions most often proposed go by various names but are widely known as “green growth” and “degrowth”. Can these ideas be reconciled? What do both have to say about the climate challenge?
The crude version of green growth – the solution that dominates the discourse of developed countries – is essentially that technology will save us if we get the incentives right. We can stick with the idea that economic growth is the central determinant of human flourishing, we just need technological fixes for unsustainable industrial practices. These will emerge if we get prices pointing in a green direction, which is first and foremost about carbon taxes.
