In a recent op-ed published in Le Monde, French economist – and Emmanuel Macron’s economic program inspirer – Jean Pisani-Ferry argued that economic growth was necessary to fight against climate change and called for eco-productivism. The following op-ed is a reply to Pr. Pisani-Ferry that was originally published in Le Monde (in French).
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If making the degrowth case was like baking a cake, disproving the plausibility of green growth would be the equivalent of turning the oven on. Decoupling is only “a myth” or “a fantasy,” some would say, a notorious fallacy that requires as much attention as the confabulations of Flat Earthers. And yet, faith in decoupling is strengthening in environmental agendas all around the world, including the OECD, European Commission, World Bank, UNEP, as well as the Sustainable Development Goals where it even has its own target.read more
We all use models in daily life to explain our environment. An example: I assume that a tree will grow provided it has sufficient water, nutrients and sun. I am using a simple model here, without understanding the nitty-gritty – what exactly happens in the roots, stem, leaves and cells.
By Niko Paech
The legend of green growth depends on three basic principles: (1) Increase of resource-efficiency, (2) closed material flow cycles and (3) renewable energies. However, despite a host of innovations in the field of climate protection, the ecological damages in the area of energy have been and still are on the rise. The process of ecological modernization reveals itself as a history of technological failures and relocation of the ecological damages in space, time and systems. In addition, even the social niches in which progressive ecological lifestyles began to spark at the end of the 70s and beginning of the 80s are already drowned in a flood of material build-up, digitalization, pollution through one-way packaging and – first and foremost – air traffic. read more
