Conceptual roots of degrowth Fabrice Flipo To cite this version: Fabrice Flipo. Conceptual roots of degrowth. First International Conference on Economic De-growth for Ecological Sustainability and Social Equity, Apr 2008, Paris, France. pp.24 - 28. hal-02510344 HAL Id: hal-02510344 https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-02510344 Submitted on 17 Mar 2020 HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access L’archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est archive for the deposit and dissemination of sci- destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents entific research documents, whether they are pub- scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, lished or not. The documents may come from émanant des établissements d’enseignement et de teaching and research institutions in France or recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires abroad, or from public or private research centers. publics ou privés. First international conference on Economic De-growth for Ecological Sustainability and Social Equity, Paris, April 18-19th 2008 principal article to degrowth4. This topic has been the Conceptual roots of degrowth object of several articles in Le Monde and elsewhere. One FLIPO Fabrice can find files on the subject in places as improbable as TGV Magazine. The wave is deep and give the impression that it will last. Author: Fabrice Flipo, philosopher, associate professor at It has started to touch the large political parties. Yves TELECOM & Management SudParis, 9 rue Charles Cochet has pushed this idea within the Greens, but he didn't Fourier, 91011 Evry. win the nomination for the presidencial race. The “Utopia” E-Mail: [email protected] motion, led by Frank Pupunat, is the first to have called the religion of growth into question within the PS. It obtained 1,05% of the votes at the Mans Congress November 2005. 1. Introduction The network of objectors to growth, who are not exclusively partisans of degrowth, has beenvery active Degrowth: the term challenges, raises questions, is found in around the unitary candidacy of the geft. Nicolas Hulot, improbable places and catches many people unaware. Here advised by, among others, Jean-Paul Besset, was introduced we trace a small descriptive panorama of it, prior to by "Politis" as the crusader of degrowth5 - and was entering into the detail of these issues, which are on the denounced by "La Decroissance" as an “écotartuffe”. conference agenda. Corinne Lepage has refuted this idea, which she considers too negative, and Domenica Voynet prefers “decrease of the ecological footprint”, which is very different. 2. Increasing audience The magazine "Entropia" was launched in the presence of Degrowth is gaining an audience on the left. This term, some fifty people in November 2006 at the French National used by J. Grinevald to translate the title of the work of Assembly, to help give theoretical substance to the idea of Nicholas Georgescu-Roegen1, whose original title, "The 2 degrowth. The editorial board is composed of Jean-Paul Entropy Law and the Economic Process" , was known only Besset6, J. - C. Besson-Girard7, François Brune8, Alain to groups of experts when the newspaper “Decroissance”, Gras9, Serge Latouche10 and Agnès Sinai11. The magazine first published in March 2004, re-launched this concept to is presented as a “magazine of theoretical and political the public. The newspaper prints 45,000 copies, of which study of degrowth” - “Entropia falls within a long tradition 25,000 are sold. It has doubled its frequency of publication, of examining ideas and action, a place favouring expression becoming a monthly. Several web sites are devoted to of a growing collective thought, working itself out in the degrowth: Decroissance.info is a site self-managed by local passage of time. A reflection on the crest of the groups; Decroissance.net is the official site of the Institute fundamental questions of our time, for the expansion of of Economic and Social Studies for Sustainable Degrowth, awareness an unprescedented human condition, for the with the same approach as the newspaper "La enrichment of theoretical, poetic and political imaginary of Decroissance"; Ladecroissance.org is the web site of the after-development”12. The title of the journal, “Entropia”, journal "La Decroissance. Several “marches for degrowth” does not refer to entropy in a physical sense, this concept have happened in various places (from Lyon to Magny- raised to a fad in economics by Nicholas Georgescu- Cours in June 2005, in Loire-Atlantique, in Nord-Pas-de- Roegen, but to the Greek “entropè”, action to be turned Calais and in Charente-Maritime). Others are planned. over, to look beyond oneself in order to contemplate the Degrowth even has its own party: the Party for Degrowth path travelled, and to take time to wonder whether it (le Parti pour la Décroissance - PPLD), founded on April 8 wouldn't be better to change. 2007 in Dijon. It calls for a “degrowth based on equity, For Entropia, "all thoughts which refuse self-criticism are sustainability and values that are humanist, democratic, no longer thoughts, but beliefs. They leave the earthly republican, non-violent, defending human rights and grounds of clarity for the mirages of hope. For more than fighting all forms of discrimination and totalitarianism”. Many small newspapers support this idea of degrowth: "l'âge de faire", Silence", etc. Degrowth circulates 4 undercover to a large degree, it generates debates which Peut-on continuer comme ça ? Pollution-inégalités-énergie, la théorie de la décroissance revient, 25 mars 2006. support a symbolic reappropriation of our surroundings. 5 Edition du 9 novembre 2006 The engineer Nicolas Ridoux has synthesized an overview 6 of the elements of degrowth in a small, well done book3. Ancien rédacteur en chef du Monde, coordinateur du « Pacte écologique » de Nicolas Hulot, auteur de « Comment ne plus être Degrowth is not limited to the small or medium circulation progressiste… sans devenir réactionnaire » chez Fayard press. The 25th of March 2006 edition of Le Monde 2, a 7 Paysan, artiste, auteur de « Decrescendo Cantabile » chez supplement of the daily newspaper, devoted its cover and Parangon 8 Auteur de « Les médias pensent comme moi », « De l’idéologie aujourd’hui » etc. 9 1 Demain la décroissance: Entropie-écologie-économie, Professeur d’anthropologie à Paris 1-Sorbonne, auteur de « La foreword and translation of I. Rens and J. Grinevald, Lausanne, fragilité de la puissance » chez Fayard Pierre-Marcel Favre, 1979, 2nd ED. magazine and [supplement], 10 Economiste, auteur du « Pari de la décroissance » (Fayard, La Decroissance, Paris, Sang de la terre, 2006. 2006), « Survivre au développement » et bien d’autres ouvrages 2 Harvard University Press, 1971. 11 Journaliste, co-auteure de « Sauver la Terre » avec Yves 3 N. Ridoux, La Décroissance pour tous, éditions Parangon, Cochet 2006. 12 Entropia n°1, novembre 2006. http://events.it-sudparis.eu/degrowthconference/ 24 First international conference on Economic De-growth for Ecological Sustainability and Social Equity, Paris, April 18-19th 2008 fifty years, “growth” and “development” have stuck by this show that growth benefitted the poorest, because the phase irrational and dogmatic rule. In the Seventies, however, of growth of pollution gives way to a phase of stabilization some heterodox researchers unfrightened by perspicacity then of reduction of impacts, while economic growth (Illich, Georgescu-Roegen, Ellul, Partant, Castoriadis…) benefits a growing number of people. Las ! Well drew up themselves against this dictatorship of economics documented, Herve Kempf supported all criticisms, the and provided the foundations for a framework for innocence of the rich person was not proven, nor the degrowth. Disturbing thought that it is. Since a only few tendency of economies to dematerialize themselves nor the years ago, and especially since conference: “Demolish capacity of growth to reduce the numbers of the poor. Like development to remake the world” (UNESCO 2002), Sylvia Perez-Vitoria reminded them, growth is especially publications like "Silence" and "The Ecologist", the the growth of inequalities and the exploitation of the newsletter "La Ligne d'horizon, les amis de François majority by an increasingly rich minority. The journalist Partant”, gave him a growing space in their columns. The Brice Couturier was irritated, while Mrs. Kosciusko- bi-monthly "La Decroissance" has contributed, for three Morizet relied very largely on scientific and technological years, to accentuate its iconoclast and provocative progress, even while she stated her wishes for a cleaner character. Because this concept of degrowth indeed upsets growth, “made in moderation”. the signs and the lines: the theoretical and symbolic signs of The debate testifies to the embarrassment of the elite before recognition like the lines of traditional political cleavages. the ecological question. The old concepts, through which This situation can generate theoretical and political skids the global crisis has arrived, seem impotent. Degrowth and drifts which require the greatest vigilance in thought spills the beans, like the MIT report and that of the Club of and practice.”13 Rome before it18. Whereas growth is called upon And in fact skids happened. Texts from degrowth theorists everywhere as the solution to all problems, in the North as have been found on sites in Greece, whose links with the in the South, a veritable universal "open sesame", it asserts extreme-right are notorious. That threw some confusion a scandalous conclusion, and not exactly well founded, into the ranks of degrowth proponents, a little less so with namely that on the one hand growth does not have a future respect to the theorists. Greece is indeed usually the since it does not solve the ecological problem, and on the salvager of ideas without the awareness of authors, the other hand since it doesn't have the universality that one journal MAUSS having already had this experience in the supposes. past. Growth is the result of a whole range of policies and Beyond false polemics, there is lots of work to do.