Economic measures needed to tackle global warming

In preparing for a workshop I was helping organise on Alternative Economics I came across the Degrowth Conference held earlier this year. The conference focused on the concrete steps that needs to be taken to move our society beyond an economic system that is based on continual growth.

“Many analyses from various scientific disciplines imply that a growth-based economic and social system cannot have a future: Despite a growing number of technological solutions for “Green Growth”, inequality and the destruction of nature are significantly on the rise. It is high time to develop economic and social models that are independent of growth and can provide for a good life for everybody.” – Degrowth Conference website.

There are a number of excellent talks from the conference which are available to watch on youtube including the following talk by Naomi Klein on the importance of changing the economic structure to enable us to effectively respond to the ecological and social crisis,like global warming, that we are facing now. Sadly but unsurprisingly, Klein’s list of urgent actions to deal with global warming, such as the need for reduction in fossil fuel mining and decentralised community owned electricity grids, reads like the exact opposite actions to what our current government is doing.