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Climate Change, Capitalism and Degrowth Trajectories to a Global Steady-State Economy

Koch, Max LU (2015) In International Critical Thought 5(4). p.439-452
Abstract
Climate change (CC) is one of the major and most encompassing threats in the world today. While the facts and high-consensus predictions among natural scientists are increasingly well-known, the understanding of CC as a socio-ecological issue is much less clear and

uncontroversial. This paper summarizes the available climate science expertise and then discusses the genesis of CC as a socio-ecological issue highlighting its parallel development with capitalism. It moves on to review institutional approaches to study the link between

capitalist diversity and greenhouse gas emissions and outlines future research directions with emphasis on a possible reconciliation of Marxian and “degrowth” thought. Due to the lacking... (More)
Climate change (CC) is one of the major and most encompassing threats in the world today. While the facts and high-consensus predictions among natural scientists are increasingly well-known, the understanding of CC as a socio-ecological issue is much less clear and

uncontroversial. This paper summarizes the available climate science expertise and then discusses the genesis of CC as a socio-ecological issue highlighting its parallel development with capitalism. It moves on to review institutional approaches to study the link between

capitalist diversity and greenhouse gas emissions and outlines future research directions with emphasis on a possible reconciliation of Marxian and “degrowth” thought. Due to the lacking evidence for absolute decoupling of economic growth, material resource use and

carbon emissions it is argued that all societies, whether socialist or capitalist, will need to deprioritize economic growth as policy goal in the course of the twenty-first century. International critical thought should be dedicated towards analyzing the structural challenges and opportunities in building a global steady-state economy as well as associated postgrowth societies. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
keywords
steady-state economy, climate change, capitalism, degrowth, post-growth society
in
International Critical Thought
volume
5
issue
4
pages
439 - 452
publisher
Routledge
external identifiers
  • wos:000214719000002
  • scopus:85016329667
ISSN
2159-8282
DOI
10.1080/21598282.2015.1102078
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
c50f5cfd-e1b9-4227-968f-60803725514a (old id 8465911)
date added to LUP
2016-04-01 10:42:27
date last changed
2023-03-27 04:02:21
@article{c50f5cfd-e1b9-4227-968f-60803725514a,
  abstract     = {{Climate change (CC) is one of the major and most encompassing threats in the world today. While the facts and high-consensus predictions among natural scientists are increasingly well-known, the understanding of CC as a socio-ecological issue is much less clear and<br/><br>
uncontroversial. This paper summarizes the available climate science expertise and then discusses the genesis of CC as a socio-ecological issue highlighting its parallel development with capitalism. It moves on to review institutional approaches to study the link between<br/><br>
capitalist diversity and greenhouse gas emissions and outlines future research directions with emphasis on a possible reconciliation of Marxian and “degrowth” thought. Due to the lacking evidence for absolute decoupling of economic growth, material resource use and<br/><br>
carbon emissions it is argued that all societies, whether socialist or capitalist, will need to deprioritize economic growth as policy goal in the course of the twenty-first century. International critical thought should be dedicated towards analyzing the structural challenges and opportunities in building a global steady-state economy as well as associated postgrowth societies.}},
  author       = {{Koch, Max}},
  issn         = {{2159-8282}},
  keywords     = {{steady-state economy; climate change; capitalism; degrowth; post-growth society}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  number       = {{4}},
  pages        = {{439--452}},
  publisher    = {{Routledge}},
  series       = {{International Critical Thought}},
  title        = {{Climate Change, Capitalism and Degrowth Trajectories to a Global Steady-State Economy}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/21598282.2015.1102078}},
  doi          = {{10.1080/21598282.2015.1102078}},
  volume       = {{5}},
  year         = {{2015}},
}