I have read many Guardian articles on “economic growth”, but on reading this one (Britain the only G7 economy forecast to shrink in 2023, 31 January), I felt I had to write to you. On Friday 27 January, I and six other women received suspended prison sentences for carefully cracking windows at Barclays global HQ in April 2021. We did this to call out Barclays as Europe’s biggest fossil fuel funder, and one of the world’s leading “investors” in ecosystem destruction and plastics pollution. But I also took that action, and risked prison, to call out the whole political economy and the growth-based system that is driving us all off a cliff.
I find it deeply distressing that the Guardian does such strong journalism on for example, carbon bombs and the truths behind carbon offsets, and yet seems not to join the dots with economic growth. Surely you understand that GDP has an almost 1:1 relationship with both energy and materials use? And this isn’t going to change any time soon, certainly not in the handful of years we have to body swerve away from Earth system tipping points.
“Green growth” doesn’t exist in a world where we have already broken most planetary boundaries. Humanity must shrink its usage of materials and energy, and associated waste and pollution, or ecological, economic and societal collapse will follow. Even IPCC reports have started to mention degrowth.
Please report the truth about this in every article on “economic growth” – make clear to readers that alternative economic models exist, eg degrowth, and that the current system is not inevitable, but that if we continue with it then suffering, collapse and mass death are.
Zoe Cohen
Warrington, Cheshire
