Why Is This Economic Model Consigned to Such an Ignominious Little Left-wing Niche?
In 1972, the Club of Rome published its alarmist report The Limits to Growth. 52 years ago, the world had not yet discovered climate panic. Indeed, climate science was still developing its nascent modeling techniques – not yet recognized by a general audience. The Club’s work was based on a realization of the finite supply of natural resources on the planet more than the impact of what has come to be known as the “Anthropocene” epoch of geological history. But it was the pioneering document for what we now call degrowth – a new ideology on the Left, more fashionable in Europe and Asia than in the U.S. There has always been strong opposition to its premise; degrowth stipulates that economic growth (measured by GDP), the foundation of capitalism, leads to destruction of the ecosphere – and perhaps humanity! The Club of Rome was exiled from its original sponsorship by the OECD following its report.
Why is degrowth only talked about on the left, shunned by mainstream economics? And even left-skewed economists in the U.S. only discuss it in a derogatory way. It appears that the problem lies mostly in its call to eliminate the most fundamental economic basis of society – scarcity. Scarcity, after all, is a feature, not a bug, of capitalism at large. No degrowth advocates have been able to suggest any believable plan for bringing about such an enormous, revolutionary change even to the most developed world economies. Two prominent left-wing writers on the subject are Aaron Bastani in the UK, and Kohei Saito from Japan. Bastani is best known for his 2019 book, Fully Automated Luxury Communism (FALC), and Saito for at least two recent books, Capital in the Anthropocene (2020), and Slow Down! A Degrowth Manifesto(2024, an English translation). Their thinking has emerged from that Club of Rome directive of a half-century ago; they apply its principles to our current age of climate anxiety. We can’t save the planet unless we cut our consumption – and especially the rich world’s disproportionate share of that consumption.
While both authors are proud millennials, they have distinct approaches to the degrowth problem. Bastani might be described as a “techno-optimist” – he feels that advancing technology will save us from eco-catastrophe, and the only challenge is the political mechanism needed to bring about appropriate adaptation, such as a reasonable Universal Basic Income (UBI) for all those who will no longer need to work in productive labor. Saito, however, derides Bastani by name. Saito is NOT a techno-optimist; he advocates redistribution between the developed, first world and what he calls the “periphery” of the Global South. He faults the “imperial mode of thinking” which has dominated capitalism for the last two centuries, shifting costs to the periphery for the profit of the center. Saito hearkens more to that long-established anarchist tradition of Mutual Aid (he stresses worker cooperatives as the primary means of production for future societies, with less emphasis on the power of the state). Saito has coined the expression “degrowth communism” to describe his ideal social arrangement, instead of Bastani’s FALC. Both authors are trying to revive acceptance of the term “communism,” with a small “c,” as used by those early anarchists, as well as Marx – reading their books helps me understand why they’ve chosen that historic term. Both writers claim to be Marxists, but only Bastani fits my understanding of what Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels were proselytizing in their Communist Manifesto (1848) and Capital (1867). Saito did his dissertation research on “late” Marx, especially the Critique of the Gotha Programme (posthumously published), which he insists shows the father of modern socialism embracing a newly discovered ecological conscience (fitting neatly into our present day mindset) as he sensed his own productivity waning – his mortality.
Ultimately, degrowth emerges for both Bastani and Saito as an alternative means of production – with redistribution key. What strikes me, especially with Saito’s “degrowth communism,” is the realization that GDP, the way we measure growth, is dependent on accounting in dollars! If GDP were measured differently, we could conceivably claim degrowth, but still ensure a decent living standard, and aspirational pretense, while de-emphasizing fossil fuels and other destructive profit-seeking behaviors. Saito calls this measuring “use value” instead of scarcity-priced value of goods and services. Add some reasonable technological advances to the mix, good democratic institutions, and we may still be able to achieve Saito’s goal of worker cooperative-based degrowth communism. His “imperial mode of thinking,” unfortunately, may be a trickier lift. The world still has far too many vestiges of colonialism – alas, this may be the bigger problem, extending even to multi-national corporations. Over-acquisitiveness (greed), of course, exists in all societies, but all societies try their best to minimize its influence. My belief is that mass communication, across national borders, across linguistic separations, is still the best bet to accomplish social revolution – especially if it avoids loaded terms like “communism” and “capitalism.”
We all know that you can’t sell reductions in standards of living politically. And any government that tries to impose austerity on its population, even for a “higher cause,” is not likely to survive for long! Bastani and Saito attack this problem differently. But they both leave a path open to achieve the long-term sustainability that unbridled capitalism looks unable to realize. For both authors, the secret seems to lie in “guardrails.” Both focus more on incentives than disincentives – requiring governments to use taxes and grants for both clean energy and local worker control of means of production. Neither makes any mention of disincentives – like enforcement of the law – in their analyses. It may be that both incentives and disincentives are required to get the best results. These are what Keynesian economists have always referred to as guardrails. Of course, cultural institutions (schools, religion, media) have an important role as well, across the generations, in fostering an ethical, cooperative orientation of the members of any society. It seems that we could all have a hand in the development of those appropriate cultural institutions. And, sometimes, it almost looks like we’re on the right path. It’s the aspirational, in the end, that matters most – not the actual. Keep eyes forward! Karl Marx would have approved.
— William Sundwick
Warp and Woof 