The right have attacked the Green New Deal on the grounds that it will hurt economic growth. In response, the left have defended it by saying it will *increase* growth. And maybe it will. But taking this approach is a bad strategy for a number of reasons:
1. If the GND *does* generate growth, that will drive aggregate resource use and energy demand up, and therefore make it paradoxically more difficult (and probably unfeasible) to decarbonize the economy in the short time we have left.
2. Clean energy infrastructure requires material extraction (for solar panels, wind turbines, batteries, etc). More energy demand means more extractivism, which will have significant social and ecological impacts - on global South communities in particular.
3. Climate change is not our only problem. More growth means more resource use, which means rising ecological impacts across all other planetary boundaries. (See: jasonhickel.org/s/Hickel-and-K…)
4. All sorts of regressive social and ecological policy is justified in the name of growth, including cuts to labour standards and environmental regulations. When we affirm growth as the ultimate objective, we play into the hands of neoliberals.
5. Finally, if the GND *doesn't* deliver growth, then it will have failed according to our own criteria, and will be attacked and rejected on those grounds.
For all these reasons, if we want our Green New Deal to be technologically feasible, socially just, and ecologically coherent, we need to abandon GDP growth as an objective and actively scale down aggregate energy use. We don't need growth; in fact, we can thrive without it.
Here's the underlying paper: sciencedirect.com/science/articl…
And here's a short discussion: jasonhickel.org/blog/2020/10/1…

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More from @jasonhickel

15 Dec
Global South countries, led by South Africa and India, have requested a suspension of the WTO's patent rules to enable them to manufacture or import affordable generic versions of the COVID-19 vaccine. Shockingly, Britain and other rich countries have refused.
This decision could be a death sentence to hundreds of thousands of people. All to enable pharma corporations to profiteer, in the middle of a pandemic, from vaccines that have been developed overwhelmingly with public funds.
Here is a report on the initial proposal: keionline.org/34235

And here is Britain's frankly condescending response: gov.uk/government/new…
Read 8 tweets
11 Dec
Here's more on the new mitigation scenario for 1.5C. How does it work? What would society look like? Are we willing to do what's required to stop climate breakdown? See thread.
1. Most models assume we need to keep growing the economy indefinitely. The problem is this makes it impossible to transition to zero emissions quickly enough; so they speculate on geoengineering and negative-emissions technologies to save us. Scientists reject this as too risky.
2. By contrast, this scenario proposes that high-income countries don't *need* more growth, and can scale down unnecessary production and consumption. This reduces energy demand (from 140 EJ in 2020 to 40 EJ in 2050), and enables a rapid transition to renewable energy.
Read 9 tweets
10 Dec
This is a powerful new intervention: a climate mitigation scenario for staying under 1.5C that does not rely on speculative negative emissions technologies. Check it out: boell.de/en/2020/12/09/…
How does it work? By scaling down excess resource and energy use in global North countries. In other words, it's a degrowth scenario. Less energy use enables a rapid transition to renewable energy. It also proposes a shift to regenerative farming to restore lands and soils.
The scenario shows that this can be accomplished while improving human well-being and providing a good life for all, in both the North and South, by reorganizing the economy around human needs rather than around capital accumulation.
Read 6 tweets
3 Dec
People mistakenly assume that the World Bank's poverty line ($1.90 PPP per day) represents what an American might be able to buy with $1.90 in poor countries abroad. But in fact the opposite is true: it represents what $1.90 can buy in the US. In other words, virtually nothing.
To put this in perspective, $1.90 can just about buy a loaf of bread in the US, or a can of tuna. To say nothing of actual nutrition, much less shelter, clothing, energy and transportation.
A minimum wage job in the US earns you about $60 per day. So living on $1.90 would be like 30 people trying to survive on a single minimum wage... with no begging, scavenging, or welfare systems to draw on, since all of these are counted as "income" by the World Bank.
Read 5 tweets
2 Dec
Last year I wrote an open letter to Steven Pinker, questioning his triumphalist narrative about global poverty reduction. I never received an answer. But I've worked on this issue a bit more since then... jasonhickel.org/blog/2019/2/3/…
Here, elaborating the argument further and connecting it to the problem of inequality: newint.org/features/2019/…
Here, which I think in some respects gets to the real nub of the issue: aljazeera.com/opinions/2020/…
Read 7 tweets
30 Nov
The Managua Declaration is a radical statement against climate breakdown that recognizes and addresses the structural drivers of this crisis. It was drafted by La Via Campesina, representing 200 million peasant families and Indigenous people worldwide. viacampesina.org/en/managua-dec…
"We are conscious that it is the capitalist system that causes predatory actions against the environment, causing severe damage to our planet. It destroys our lands, forests and seas, pillages our territories and criminalizes our struggles – all for the benefit of the few."
"The planet cannot be saved if we do not commit ourselves to leaving capitalism behind. Our struggle is for the life and the survival of Mother Earth, which is the sum of all of our lives."
Read 4 tweets

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