About Degrowth

Vade Mecum | Degrowth Library

Degrowth Library

We hope to gather here a reasonably comprehensive collection of references to degrowth studies, events and debates for both those new to the issue and those involved for many years. We welcome suggestions, comments, etc. Please write to us at montreal@degrowth.net.

Journal articles

Degrowth bibliography

Degrowth web sites

Video materials

Conference proceedings

Upcoming degrowth events

For the most recent news and articles, check out our Degrowth Newsfeed!

Journal Articles

Sustainable de-growth: Mapping the context, criticisms and future prospects of an emergent paradigm, Joan Martínez-Alier (a), Unai Pascual (b), Franck-Dominique Vivien (c) and Edwin Zaccai (d), Ecological Economics, Volume 69, Issue 9, 15 July 2010, Pages 1741-1747 [Note: This is a good overview, some say even a history, of degrowth thinking - Bob T..]
Environment versus growth — A criticism of "degrowth" and a plea for "a-growth", Jeroen C.J.M. van den Bergh, Ecological Economics, Article in Press
In defence of degrowth, Giorgos Kallis,Ecological Economics, Forthcoming
Questioning economic growth, Peter Victor, Nature, Vol.468 18nov2010 pp. 370-371
Editorial: Degrowth, Serge Latouche, Journal of Cleaner Production 18 (2010) pp. 519-522
Economic de-growth vs. steady-state economy, Christian Kerschner, Journal of Cleaner Production 18 (2010) pp. 544–551

Degrowth Bibliography

Bibliography on Convivial Degrowth
Bob Thomson, Ottawa, 11 March 2011

Frank Ackerman et al, "The Flawed Foundations of General Equilibrium: Critical essays on economic theory", Routledge, London, 2004 Frank Ackerman, "Can We Afford the Future: The Economics of a Warming World", Zed Books, London 2009
ALAI, "IV Foro Social Americas: Desafios para profundizar los procesos de cambio", America Latina en Movimiento #457, Julio 2010
ALAI, Sumak Kawsay: Recuperar el sentido de vida (Recovering a sense of life)", America Latina en Movimiento #452, Febrero 2010
ALAI: "Interview with François Houtart: For a general well being of humanity", Sally Burch, America Latina en Movimiento, February 2010
Xavier Albó: "To Live Well = To Coexist Well Notas 217, 10 February 2008
Samir Amin, Emerging from the crisis of capitalism or emerging from capitalism in crisis? Pambazuka New, Issue 448, 17 September 2009
Don Aucoin, "Not so fast: The argument for slowing down virtually every aspect of life", Boston Globe, 21 July 2009
Walden Bello, "The Virtues of Deglobalization, Foreign Policy in Focus, 3 September 2009
Leonardo Boff: "The Rights of Mother Earth", Inter Press Services, Rio de Janeiro, 1 March 2010
Douglas Booth, "The Environmental Consequences of Growth: Steady State Economics as an Alternative to Ecological Decline, Routledge, 1998
Ester Boserup: "The Conditions of Agricultural Growth: The Economics of Agrarian Change under Population Pressure
Peter Brown & Geoffrey Garver, "Right Relationship: Building a Whole Earth Economy", Berrett-Koehler Publishers, San Francisco, 2009
Lester Brown: "Plan B: Rescuing a Planet Under Stress & a Civilization in Trouble2003
CAOI -Coordinadora Andina de Organizaciones Indigenas): "Buen Vivir, Vivir Bien: Filosofia, Politicas, Estrategias y Experiencias Regionales Andinas", Lima, Fevrero 2010
Sing Chew, "For Nature: Deep Greening World Systems Analysis for the 21st Century!, Journal of World Systems Research, Vol. 3, No. 3, Fall 1997
Sing C. Chew, "World Ecological Degradation: Accumulation, Urbanization and Deforestation, 3000 BC to AD 2000
Monica Chuji G., "Modernidad, desarrollo, interculturalidad y Sumak Kawsay o Buen Vivir", Ponencia presentada en el Foro Internacional sobre Interculturalidad y Desarrollo, Uribia, Colombia, 23 de mayo de 2009
Modernity, development, interculturality and Sumak Kawsay or Living Well but not Better, Presentation to the International forum on Interculturality and Development, Uribia, Colombia, 23 of May 2009, translated from Spanish by Bob Thomson, Ottawa, 21 July 2009
Borisas Cimbleris, "Economy and Thermodynamics, Economy and Energy Year II No. 9, July-August 1998,
Silvia Rivera Cusicanqui, "Pachacuti: The Historical Horizons of Internal Colonialism, NACLA Vol.XXV No.3, December 1991
Miguel D'Escoto and Leonardo Boff: "A Universal Declaration on the Common Good of the Earth and Humanity", undated (around February 2010)
Herman Daly, "Steady-State Economics" 1977
Herman Daly, "The Economic Thought of Frederick Soddy", History of Political Economy, Winter 1980; 12 pp.469-488
Herman Daly, "How long can neoclassical economists ignore the contributions of Georgescu-Roegen?, Issues in ecological economics and sustainable development, pp.125-133
Herman Daly, A Steady-State Economy, Presentation made to the UK Sustainable Development Commission, April 24, 2008 - See also http://www.theoildrum.com/node/3941
Pablo Davalos, "Reflexiones sobre el sumak kawsay (el buen vivir) y las teorías del desarrollo, ALAI America Latina en Movimiento, 5 August 2008 - English Translation Reflections on Sumak Kawsay (good living) and theories of development
Degrowthpedia, A collaborative platform for information and education about degrowth.
Jared Diamond: "Guns, Germs & Steel: The Fates of Human Societies" 1997
Murray Dobbin, "To make people care, craft a 'politics of meaning'", TheTyee.ca, 9 July 2009
Alan Drengson & Yuicki Inoue, Editors, "The Deep Ecology Movement: An Introductory Anthology", North Atlantic Books, 1995
Duane Elgin, "Voluntary Simplicity: Toward a way of life that is outwardly simple, inwardly rich", Quill, New York 1981
John Bellamy Foster et al, "The Ecological Rift - Chapter 16: The Ecology of Consumption", Monthly Review Press, October 2010
Valerie Fournier, "Escaping from the economy: the politics of degrowth", International Jounal of Sociology and Social Policy, Vol. 28 No. 11/12, 2008, pp.528-545 [Note: This is a good overview of the French decroissance movement.]
Eduardo Galeano, "Uselo y Tirelo", Grupo Planeta, Barcelona, 1994
Nicolas Georgescu-Roegen: "The Entropy Law and the Economic Process" 1971
Nicholas Georgescu-Roegen, "Technology Assessment: The case of the direct use of solar energy", Atlantic Economic Journal Vol.6 No.4, December 1978
Julio Godoy, "G20: Stiglitz and Sen come in too late", Terraviva/IPS, 24 September 2009,
John Gowdy and Susan Mesner, "The Evolution of Georgescu-Roegen's Bioeconomics", Review of Social Economy, Vol. LVI, No. 2, Summer 1998
Eduardo Gudynas, Buen Vivir: un necesario relanzamiento, AlaiNet, 14/12/10
Eduardo Gudynas / Alai, Buen vivir: Germinando alternativas al desarrollo, America Latina en Movimiento #462, Febrero 2011 - English translation
Jonathan M. Harris, "Ecological macroeconomics: Consumption, investment and climate change", Real-World Economics Review, Issue No. 50, July 2008
Betsy Hartmann, "From climate refugees to climate conflict: Who is taking the heat for global warming?", in "Climate Change and Sustainable Development: New Challenges for Poverty Reduction", ed. M.A.Mohamed Salih, Edward Elgar, Cheltenham UK, ISBN 978 1 84844 409 6
Betsy Hartmann, "Lines in the Shifting Sand: The Strategic Politics of Climate Change, Human Security and National Defense", Rethinking Security in a Changing Climate, GECHS Conference, University of Oslo, Norway, 22-24 June 2009
Paul Hawken, "Blessed Unrest: How the largest movement in the world came into being and why no one saw it coming", Viking, 2007
Hazel Henderson, "The Politics of Economics", April 2009, E.F. Schumacher Society
Hazel Henderson, "The Politics of the Solar Age: Alternatives to Economics", 1988, Knowledge Systems Inc. ,
Alf Hornborg, "Ecosystems and World Systems: Accumulation as an Ecological Process", Journal of World Systems, Vol. 4 No. 2, Fall 1998
François Houtart: "Interview with François Houtart: For a general well being of humanity", Sally Burch, ALAI, February 2010.
Thomas Homer-Dixon: "The Upside of Down: Catastrophe, Creativity & the Renewal of Civilization" 2007
Tim Jackson, "Prosperity Without Growth: Economics for a Finite Planet", Earthscan, 2009
Giorgos Kallis, "In defence of degrowth", Ecological Economics, forthcoming 2011
Serge Latouche, "We Must Abandon the Religion of Growth", Degrowthpedia translation of interview in Entropia, 4 August 2010
Irene Leon (Editor), "Buen Vivir y cambios civilizatorios", Fedaeps, Quito, 2010, ISBN: 978-9942-9967-3-2
James Lovelock: "The Revenge of Gaia", 2006
Joan Martinez Alier et al, "Sustainable de-growth: Mapping the context, criticisms and future prospects of an emergent paradigm", Ecological Economics 69 (2010), pp. 1441-1747
Guiseppe De Marzo, "Buen Vivir: Para una democracia de la Tierra", Editores Plural, La Paz, March 2010, ISBN: 978-99954-1-268-5
Meadows, Randers and Behren: "The Limits to Growth",1972
Mignolo, Walter: "The Communal and the Decolonial", Turbulence, No. 5, December 2009
George Monbiot, "Heat: How we can stop the planet burning", 2007
Serge Mongeau, "Objecteurs de Croissance: Pour sortir de l'impasse: la décroissance", Éditions Écosociété, Montréal, 2007
David Parker, "Degrowth: Putting the economy back in its place", well sharp blog, 9 June 2009
Jonathan Porritt, "When real progress means standing still", Ethical Corporation, 21 September 2009
Research and Degrowth, Web site of the organizers of the 2010 and 2008 degrowth conferences in Paris (2008) and Barcelona (2010)
John Riddell, "From Marx to Morales: Indigenous Socialism and the Latin Americanization of Marxism", Monthly Review, 17/6/08
Jeremy Rifkin: "Entropy: A New World View", 1980
Jeremy Rifkin, "The Empathic Civilisation" [Relating to Mother Earth], RSA Animate video, 6 May 2010
Conrad Schmidt, "Alternatives to Growth: Efficiency Shifting", Vancouver, Conrad Schmidt 2009
Frederick Soddy, "Cartesian Economics: The Bearing of Physical Science upon State Stewardship", London 1922
Frederick Soddy, "Wealth, Virtual Wealth and Debt", 1926
James Gustave Speth, "The Bridge at the Edge of the World: Capitalism, the environment and crossing from crisis to sustainability", Yale University Press, 2008
Bob Thomson, "Pachakuti: Indigenous perspectives on degrowth", Ottawa, June 2011
Jeroen C.J.M van den Bergh, "Environment versus growth - A criticism of 'degrowth' and a plea for 'a-growth'", Ecological Economics, in press 2010
Peter Victor, "Managing without Growth: Slower by Design, Not Disaster" 2008
Peter Victor, Questioning economic growth" Nature, Vol. 468 #18 pp. 370-371
Immanuel Wallerstein, "Structural Crisis in the World System: Where do we go from here?", Monthly Review, Vol.62 No.10, March 2011
Catherine Walsh "Development as Buen Vivir: Institutional arrangements and (de)colonial entanglements", Development, 2010, 53(1), pp.15–21
Alan Weisman: "The World Without Us", 2007
Eric Zencey, "Mr. Soddy's Ecological Economy", New York Times, 11 April 2009

See other interesting bibliographies at:

Briarpatch article, "How I learned to stop destroying the planet and love the global recession"
http://www.web.ca/~bthomson/Decroissance_Index.html
http://www.cbc.ca/ideas/episodes/features/2009/07/09/climate-wars-part-12-cd/

Degrowth Web Sites

http://www.decroissance.info

http://www.ladecroissance.net

http://degrowth.com

www.decroissance.qc.ca

www.decreixement.net

www.objecteursdecroissance.be

http://www.decrescita.it

http://www.decrescitafelice.it

http://www.decroissance.ch

http://www.decroissance-bern.ch/

http://www.degrowth.ch

http://www.deshazkundea.org

decreixementmallorca.wordpress.com/

bretagnedecroissance.fr

http://www.postwachstumsoekonomie.org

http://wachstumsruecknahme.qsdf.org

http://postwachstum.net

Transition Culture

Entropia (La-Revue, France)

www.simplicitevolontaire.org

http://descrecimiento.blogspot.com

http://montreal-degrowth.blogspot.com

http://www.montreal.degrowth.org

http://www.montreal.degrowth.org/index_fr.html

http://www.montreal.degrowth.org/index_ex.html

http://montreal2012.wordpress.com

http://montreal2012fr.wordpress.com

http://montreal2012es.wordpress.com

http://www.venezia.degrowth.org

http://www.apres-developpement.org

http://www.partipourladecroissance.net

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicholas_Georgescu-Roegen

Slowcialism:

The Post Growth Institute

Video Materials

The Impossible Hamster, The New Economics Foundation, London UK
Jeremy Rifkin, The Empathic Civilisation" [Relating to Mother Earth], RSA Animate video, 6 May 2010
The Good LIfe Mark Albion's 3-minute animated movie "The Good Life - More than money!"

Conference Proceedings

A selection of the proceedings of the May 1982 symposium, Les Enjeux Sociaux de la Dėcroissance, held at UQAM in Montreal is now available. (pp. 40 out of 250 – French only – PDF)
The proceedings of the 2002 "Actes du colloque – Défaire le developpement, refaire le monde", held in Paris in February 2002 are now available online. Table des Matieres They are mostly in French and there is an immense richness of material there.
Proceedings of the First International Conference on Economic De-Growth for Ecological Sustainability and Social Equity, Paris, 18-19 April 2008 - Full proceedings (PDF – 320 pages – English
Table of Contents
Brussels Socially Sustainable Economic Degrowth Workshop, April 16, 2009
Proceedings of the Second International Conference on Economic De-Growth for Ecological Sustainability and Social Equity, Barcelona, 26-29 March, 2010 - Full Proceedings

Upcoming Degrowth Events

German Convivial Degrowth Conference, Koln, February or April 2012
Montreal Conference on Convivial Degrowth in the Americas, 14-20 May 2012
UN Rio+20 Conference, Rio de Janeiro, 4-6 June 2012
Third International Conference on Convivial Degrowth, Venice, September 19-23, 2012

Last updated: 22/08/11