By Dr. Leida Rijnhout
Acting Secretary General ANPED, Northern Alliance for Sustainability, Brussels – Belgium
There are still some certainties in life: we have one planet, we have limited natural resources, all economic activities need natural resources, so economic growth is limited as well. Nevertheless most of our policymakers, economists and politicians keep on stressing that economic growth is necessary for solving the problems in the world. But unfortunately this economic growth obsession in the Northern countries is bringing us at the moment more problems than solutions. The gap between the poor and the rich is getting wider, environmental degradation is getting worse and irreversible, armed conflicts because of scarce natural resources are increasing and massive migration flows are destabilising cultures and economies.
Already in the seventies a handful of enlightened economists started to point out that our economy has to remain within the limits of our environmental capital and capacity of absorption of waste (including the CO2-emissions). For a good oversight on the issue of economic growth and sustainable development, please visit: http://www.sd-network.eu/?k=quarterly%20reports.
After many years it is more or less accepted that the huge “over-emissions” of CO2 by the industrialised world cause big environmental and social problems in the developing world. In Copenhagen this fact was one of the difficult points to deal with for the Northern countries. That is to say: they recognise the fact, but don’t want to accept the logical consequences. We have to cut down drastically our emissions of CO2 in a relative short period and compensate the caused damage.
The same is happening for the over consumption of worlds natural resources. The Northern lifestyle is based on overexploitation of resources (mainly from the South). We are using their productive lands, air, water, minerals, cheap labour, forests – for our way of living and don’t leave enough for endogenous development of their own economy. It is even worse. We leave them with erosion, pollution, desert, health problems, corruption and conflicts.
Just like the proposals we see in the climate change debates there is a need for using the contraction and convergence model in the debate of achieving a fair and equal use of natural resources. For giving space to the developing world it is crucial that the industrialised world will be freed of their growth and consumption addiction.
But, alas, those new analyses of our economic reality do not gain enough space to change the way of thinking and acting. Not only in the world of politics or economics, but also mainstream civil society organisations don’t want to recognise that economic growth will not help us out of environmental and/or developing problems. Environmental NGO’s and Trade Unions have strong beliefs in Green growth, Green jobs and often see sustainable development as the creation of win-win situations: technological solutions that will bring jobs and decrease environmental degradation. They are right, no doubt about it, but it will not be enough to achieve a fair and sustainable economy.
The majority of NGO’s, working on international cooperation, still believe that economic growth is necessary to fight poverty. The more we produce, the more we can share of this accumulating wealth. That would be true if the cake (the planet) grows with us. The new economics foundation (UK) calculated that we need far more than one planet for a little poverty alleviation (not even eradication). See: http://www.neweconomics.org/publications/growth-isn%E2%80%99t-working
Main questions remain: why this collective denial? Why is it so difficult to face the truth? Why do politicians, policy makers, most of civil society organisations still believe in the Business-as-usual model (with some green and social adaptations)?
Luckily there are alternative voices getting stronger. There is a growing movement of organisations stressing the need for “degrowth”, “zero-growth”, etc. The most important goal for them is to put back our global economy within the limits of the carrying capacity of the planet for the use of resources and the absorption of waste. And to achieve a fair distribution of the access of resources. Maybe we have to focus more on wealth reduction in favour of poverty eradication?
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Thema des Monats 01/10
