"The literature on degrowth routinely argues (appropriately so) that the global north rather than the global south must be the target for change, but it may well be that the vanguard for degrowth resides, paradoxically, in the global south. It may be that subconscious bias causes us to believe that the global south must catch up with the economic production of the wealthiest states, rather than encouraging us to imagine that the wealthy states need to catch up to the level of consciousness displayed by the most radical societies in the global south."
Can economic growth be decoupled from emissions? Yes, for sure, easily even.
Can economic growth be decoupled from environmental degradation in general? Absolutely not. The sheer throughput of materials through the economy, from extraction to waste disposal, must decrease. If we address GHG emissions in isolation from topsoil and biodiversity loss, we will fail to preserve the ecosystems on which we depend for life.
"When Kohei Saito decided to write about #degrowthcommunism, his editor was understandably skeptical. #Communism is unpopular in #Japan. Economic growth is gospel. So a book arguing that Japan should view its current condition of population decline and economic stagnation not as a crisis, but as an opportunity for #Marxist reinvention, sounded like a tough sell."
V. @sol2070 https://www.currentaffairs.org/2024/03/why-we-need-degrowth