Dead Economists Salon Series : Degrowth, Doughnuts, Postalgia and Progress

In this meeting of the Dead Economists Salon Series we discuss the benefits and challenges with degrowth and doughnut economics that preference social and economic sustainability over economic growth and shareholder value. Hosted by: Bronwyn Williams and Peter Isztin.

We question …

• if the limits required in terms of social safety nets and resource usage ceilings could exacerbate feelings of postalgia (the feeling that today is as good as it gets) and inertia among stagnating, developed nations.
• if it’s possible to have both long run growth and long run sustainability.
• what progress is and what if could and should be.
• the ethics of intergenerational consumption smoothing.
• the fairness and necessity of the developed world imposing degrowth limitations on the developing world
• the affordability of luxury economic values
• and more…

To do this we look at Nicholas Georgescu-Roegen’s Entropy Law and the Economic Process, Kate Raworth’s Doughnut Economics, Roman Krznaric’s The Good Ancestor, and Donella Meadows’s Limits to Growth, and compare and contrast their work with the ideas of progress, limitless growth, and digital abundance, and scarcity.

Should we be growing the proverbial pie or stuffing the doughnut?

Come join us and debate…

Suggested reading:

• Limits to Growth : http://donellameadows.org/wp-content/userfiles/Limits-to-Growth-digital-scan-version.pdf
• Stay in the Doughnut, not the hole : https://theconversation.com/stay-in-the-doughnut-not-the-hole-how-to-get-out-of-the-crisis-with-both-our-economy-and-environment-intact-151917
• Doughnuts and capitalism : https://time.com/5930093/amsterdam-doughnut-economics/
• The good ancestor : https://www.theguardian.com/books/2020/jul/26/the-good-ancestor-by-roman-krznaric-review
• Future fatigue – is this as good as it gets? : https://theconversation.com/sci-fi-author-william-gibson-how-future-fatigue-is-putting-people-off-the-22nd-century-130335
• Degrowth : https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/degrowth-case-for-constructing-new-economic-paradigm/
• Growthism : https://www.resilience.org/stories/2019-03-28/growthism-its-ecological-economic-and-ethical-limits/
• Entropic economics : https://qz.com/510096/pope-francis-would-love-the-theories-of-this-dead-romanian-economist/

Time zones:

11am in Los Angeles / San Francisco
2pm in New York
7pm in London
8pm in Berlin / Paris

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