(in Polish) Let’s talk about degrowth 4208-Pop-OG

Economic growth lead to an unprecedented improvement in material well-being, but also to a dramatic rise of material and energy flows, that destabilized the natural systems on a planetary scale. As the global ecological crisis worsen, the deeply intertwined nature of social, economic, and ecological life is becoming more apparent than ever. Despite recurring calls for sustainability, the much-needed transformation has not taken place yet. Instead, the very possibility of any meaningful change is being questioned, with fatalistic visions of imminent civilizational collapse becoming increasingly widespread.

Degrowth is a call for reimagining the future. Its history traces back to 1970s discussions about limits to growth, which gave a fertile ground for many social-activist movements. Only recently the term has re-entered the academic world, and stirred the discussion about possible futures. In its core degrowth offers a vision for the radical transformation of society. More than just a critique of GDP growth, it provides a holistic overview and a radical questioning of the growth society - drawing both on natural sciences’ elaboration of biophysical limits and on social sciences and humanities’ insights on social imaginary and cultural frameworks. In order to avoid collapse of a growth society, degrowth calls for an ecologically sustainable and socially equitable downscaling of production and consumption. Contrary to sustainable development, degrowth intends to re-politicize and democratize the limits to growth discourse, by including marginalized voices, exposing power structures, and envisioning new futures.

The focus of the course is on discussing various sources of degrowth, its current streams, and its relevance for socio-ecological challenges of the contemporary world - both at a global and local scale.

The readings will include a set of participatively selected journal papers and book chapters (in English, approximately 10-25 pages/week).

Main areas of interest include:
● Economic growth: a measure, a social paradigm, an economic imperative, and its limits
● History of growth: inventing scarcity, capitalism and growth, consumer society
● Foundations of degrowth: post-development studies, bioeconomics, anti-utilitarianism, happiness economics, environmental justice, radical democracy
● Strategies of degrowth: commons, oppositional activism, radical reformism, economics of care, voluntary simplicity
● Degrowth political agenda: shorter working hours, social and solidarity economy, rethinking debt, etc.
● Degrowth in practice: concrete utopias, open-localism, eco-communites, etc.
● Competing visions of the future: ecomodernism, social ecology, eco-fatalism.

Type of course

general courses

Learning outcomes

Knowledge:
Students shall be able to recognize and distinguish key perspectives in the degrowth debate.
Skills:
Students shall acquire skills to explain and evaluate degrowth arguments and practices for changing the growth-based economy. Students shall learn to interpret and examine processes of growth and degrowth by applying relevant conceptual frameworks, allowing them to start their own search for possible avenues for sustainable societal transformation. Students shall develop their ability to undertake interdisciplinary analyses. They shall further develop their skills at presenting - both in oral and written form.
Attitudes:
The course aims to encourage reflection on both own and other people's attitudes, values and norms with regard to biophysical and social limits of the current mode of development.

Assessment criteria

The assessment criteria include: (a) activity during the workshop and (b) final assignment (essay or research mini-project).

Bibliography

BOROWY, Iris; SCHMELZER, Matthias (red.). History of the Future of Economic Growth: Historical Roots of Current Debates on Sustainable Degrowth. Taylor & Francis, 2017.
D'ALISA, Giacomo; DEMARIA, Federico; KALLIS, Giorgos (red.). Degrowth: a vocabulary for a new era. Routledge, 2014.
DEMARIA, Federico, et al. What is degrowth? From an activist slogan to a social movement. Environmental Values, 2013, 22.2: 191-215.
ESCOBAR, Arturo. Degrowth, postdevelopment, and transitions: a preliminary conversation. Sustainability Science, 2015, 10.3: 451-462.
GORZ, André. Reclaiming work: beyond the wage-based society. Polity, 1999.
GÓMEZ-BAGGETHUN, Erik; NAREDO, José Manuel. In search of lost time: the rise and fall of limits to growth in international sustainability policy. Sustainability Science, 2015, 10.3: 385-395.
ILLICH, Ivan. Tools for conviviality. Harper & Row, 1973.
JACKSON, Tim. Prosperity without growth: foundations for the economy of tomorrow. Routledge, 2016.
JOHANISOVA, Nadia; WOLF, Stephan. Economic democracy: A path for the future?. Futures, 2012, 44.6: 562-570.
KALLIS, Giorgos; MARCH, Hug. Imaginaries of hope: the utopianism of degrowth. Annals of the association of American geographers, 2015, 105.2: 360-368.
KALLIS, Giorgos. In Defense of Degrowth: Opinions and Manifestos. Uneven Earth Press, 2018.
LATOUCHE, Serge. Farewell to growth. Polity, 2009.
MARTINEZ-ALIER, Joan. Environmental justice and economic degrowth: an alliance between two movements. Capitalism Nature Socialism, 2012, 23.1: 51-73.
MOORE, Jason (red.). Anthropocene or capitalocene?: Nature, history, and the crisis of capitalism. Pm Press, 2016.
NELSON, Anitra; SCHNEIDER, François (red.). Housing for Degrowth: Principles, Models, Challenges and Opportunities. Routledge, 2018.
PAULSON, Susan. Degrowth: culture, power and change. Journal of Political Ecology, 2017, 24.1: 425-448.

Additional information

Information on level of this course, year of study and semester when the course unit is delivered, types and amount of class hours - can be found in course structure diagrams of apropriate study programmes. This course is related to the following study programmes:

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Description of 4208-Pop-OG in USOSweb