Degrowth: Plan B for the crises

Nemnövekedés

Dear friends,

We would like to invite you to a discussion
with Vincent Liegey (former spokeperson of the French Degrowth movement)
Tuesday the 25th of October, at 18:30, in FogasHáz, Budapest VII., Akácfa utca 51.
 

Program:
18h30 Introduction to Degrowth
– Who Killed Economic Growth? (7 minutes) – A Short film by the Post Carbon Institute, narrated by Richard Heinberg.
– Plan B for the crises – the Degrowth proposals.
participatory discussion.
– And after, a great time of Degrowth conviviality till the end of the night! 🙂

In 2008 we faced a world economic crisis. To avoid global bankruptcy of the banks, public money was created to support them. Three years later, again we face a new crisis. This time we have to save Sovereign States. First, among others, Greece, and this summer the world’s dominant economy, the United States of America, and now Spain, Portugal, Italy, Hungary and France. Mainstream economists and political parties explain that there are no alternatives: we need austerity plans after austerity plans and should pray for the return of economic growth!

Meanwhile, we are facing an environmental crisis; global change, biodiversity loss, peak oil and peak everything. We also face regular industrial catastrophes – the red mud spill here in Hungary, the nuclear nightmare in Japan, Deepwater and the oil pollution in gulf of Mexico…

We also face a culture of consumerism, social impacts from the austerity plans and a political crisis and we are seeing the emergence of new movements, like in North Africa, in Spain, France and now in Israel and United States (with Occupy Wall Street).

The real question is: are there alternatives? How can we make a transition to sustainable and desirable societies?

Last March, there was published in Hungary a book written by a Serge Latouche about Degrowth / Nemnövekedés (Décroissance). Degrowth is now a movement which first started in France almost 10 years ago and has become internationalized. Degrowth is a provocative slogan reminding us that an infinite economic growth in a finite world is not possible and it is also a complex set of theories about a new paradigm and thoughts on how to make a democratic and peaceful transition to a sustainable and desirable society.