Havering Friends of the Earth

Sustainable Growth

by Ian Pirie; first published 20-Sep-2024

Do we want more? Or better?

A common obsession of our governments, whether Labour or Conservative, is that we must grow the economy. But there are many people, especially in the environment movement, who are asking: doesn't it matter what we are growing?

We can now actually feel the planet heating up. The ten warmest years on record have all occurred in the past decade up to 2023. So, we know we do not need more coal-fired power stations, but we do need more solar power and wind power.

We can see our seas and rivers being choked with plastic rubbish - we know we need goods made of materials that can be recycled.

Wherever there is damage to the natural environment we can nearly always blame it on a drive for economic growth. Satish Kumar of the Shumacher College says: "The cause of climate change is the blind pursuit of economic growth."

So there are those, like Jason Hickel, the author of Less Is More, who question our obsession with economic growth. He points out that measuring growth by GDP (Gross Domestic Product) is simply wrong. This is not a new argument and I remember a vivid illustration of it: if we got a team of workers to dig holes in the road, and another team to fill them in, our GDP would go up!

Another way of putting this is that we have it the wrong way round: we treat people and nature as means to an end - the growth of the economy. So we need a new way of thinking about growth in terms of what it does to help people and nature. We need to prioritise the well-being of the planet as well as of ourselves. If we do this, we can stop the destructive obsession with economic growth for its own sake.

We can still grow, but in a sustainable way. A way that doesn't damage the environment for future generations. A way that increases our well-being, not just our material possessions.

Fortunately, we can learn from nature to help us: life in nature is cyclical, not linear like our drive for growth. James Lovelock pointed out that nature is a self-maintaining, self-correcting organism. We are a part of nature, and if we harm it we harm ourselves.

We can start by remembering: Reduce, Re-use, Recycle!