In May 2023, about 7,000 people met at Beyond Growth conference in the EU Parliament to explore pathways toward a post-growth society. That year was recorded as the hottest since the 1850–1900 pre-industrial baseline used for global temperature targets. The record was exceeded the next year 2024, when, according to the Copernicus Climate Change Service, the global average temperature rose above the Paris Agreement’s 1.5°C limit relative to pre-industrial levels.
By 2025, seven of the nine planetary boundaries have been crossed, implying Earth now lies well outside a safe operating space for humanity.
At the same time, biodiversity is disappearing rapidly: the WWF Living Planet 2024 report shows that monitored wildlife populations declined on average by 73% between 1970 and 2020. It is fairly accurate to say, then, that we are living through the period of mass extinction of species.
According to the UN Emissions Gap Report 2024, emissions must drop 42% by 2030 relative to 2019 to stay on the 1.5°C pathway of the Paris Agreement, and 28% to meet the 2°C pathway.
Currently, even the most optimistic projections point to a rise of about 2.6°C this century.
Such an outcome would be catastrophic: a recent study indicates that if warming reaches or exceeds 2°C this century, it would lead to the deaths of roughly 1 billion people from human-caused global warming by century’s end—an impact likened to involuntary or negligent manslaughter.
This estimate concerns only humans; the consequences for other species would likely be even worse.
WHAT CAN WE DO?
The primary causes of excessive energy and natural resource use are tied to expanding global production.
According to the UN, rapidly reducing energy consumption requires policies that boost socioeconomic and environmental co-benefits while minimising trade-offs. There needs to be at least a sixfold rise in mitigation financing, supported by reform of the global financial system and decisive private-sector engagement. These measures are especially relevant for G20 nations and their biggest emitters.
Acknowledging that responsibility for human-caused climate change is unevenly shared prompts further debate about who should bear the costs.
The UN principle of Common but Differentiated Responsibilities (CBDR) guides how quickly each country ought to cut emissions, taking into account factors like historical emissions, geographic circumstances, and social and political context. In short, nations differ in their situations and capacities to pursue rapid reductions. Many countries in the global South have contributed the least to cumulative emissions. Nevertheless, despite the inequity——they too must lower emissions to avert large-scale catastrophe.
A good life for everyone within planetary limits is nevertheless possible, but it requires sweeping changes, particularly in the production and consumption habits in “the global North”. Scientists stress energy systems without fossil fuels, the adoption of a vegan diet and no further conversion of land to crops.
POSTGROWTH FUTURES
Optimism was also expressed at the Beyond Growth conference in the EU Parliament, where a clear vision emerged of moving beyond growth-oriented policies and practices, instead prioritising a socio-economic model centred on people’s wellbeing. Addressing climate change and biodiversity loss requires confronting the foundations of the mainstream economic model.
Countries continue to treat rising global output (GDP) as a universal remedy. Yet this aggregate, developed a century ago, cannot capture harm to nature — GDP can increase regardless of how many trees are cut down.
The ideology of growth rests on a modern/colonial logic of separation that treats nature as distinct from humans and as a resource to be exploited without regard for consequences.
From a postcolonial perspective, economic growth functions as a powerful tool for shaping nations and, in the global South, appears as a revived imperialism that drains economic value toward the global North.
Today, this colonial aspect of growth is intensified under the banner of “green growth,” which continues to transform ecological landscapes in the global South, as well as in colonised regions of the North, such as in Sápmi land.
Post-growth scholars, by contrast, argue that economic stability and employment do not have to depend on consumption growth.
“Post-growth futures” imagines an economy and society that prioritise social and environmental well-being instead of continuous economic growth. Wellbeing economics, doughnut economics and degrowth, among others, are all variants of this idea, differing mainly in their approaches to change.
A post-growth future aims to keep consumption within planetary boundaries, asserting that deep social transformation must accompany technological innovation to ease pressure on natural resources and reduce inequalities.
Post-growth futures emphasize simplifying lifestyles and shifting down consumption and indulgence. For example, instead of swapping petrol cars for electric SUVs, the focus should be on cutting the total number of vehicles and prioritising public transport and cycling.
Beyond downshifting, the post-growth agenda also advocates redistributing wealth and income, fostering cooperative and sharing economies and community initiatives such as repair shops, localising economic activity, and strengthening participatory democracy.
Proposals like a basic income to decouple earnings from labour are also part of it. The vision balances social needs with ecological limits and highlights conviviality.
Compared with degrowth scholars, post-growth thinkers may place greater weight on preventing instability that could follow from scaling down economic activity. Some authors argue these shifts will demand robust state intervention to provide financial and structural support, while others emphasise local decision-making.
The strong-state perspective, for instance, suggests governments should create climate-jobs that directly address reduction of emissions, such as jobs building rail infrastructure.
Degrowth and post-growth plans have also been criticised because many countries in the global South still need to grow their GDP.
Yet confining degrowth to the global North can also reproduce ongoing “epistemic violence” by excluding voices from the global South and their experiences with dominant development discourses. The idea of reaching a specific economic threshold rests on a misleading promise of progress and inclusion, and that conceals the harm done to some people and territories in the name of broader public goods—namely, the national economy and its growth.