Can Degrowth Save the Planet?

In this episode we’re joined by economist Gene Tunny and activist-scholar Anitra Nelson to ask whether degrowth can save the planet, or if we should stay the current economic course.  

As recently as 150 years ago, pretty much everyone was living in what we’d now call extreme poverty. Thanks to capitalism, that rate is now just 9%, with a reduction of 38% in the last 30 years alone. 

So what’s the problem? Well, for one thing, we’ve been plundering the natural world to fuel our growth, with little regard for its limitations. And it’s come back to bite us.

A regular economist might say – no problem. Let’s just price in the cost of climate pollution, and natural capital, recognising that we’ll need governments to take the lead. But there’s a growing challenge to market-centrism from a number of movements who share a belief that a bit more government regulation is not going to get to the root of the problem; our erroneous assumption that the natural world is limitless.

Degrowth argues that we can’t save the planet, or end the systemic ills of capitalism like inequality, using the tools that created the problem in the first place. That our addiction to growth needs to be cut at its roots. It argues for a paradigm shift which sees wellbeing decoupled from economic growth. It envisages a different way of being, of caring and relating to each other, of flourishing itself, that’s in harmony with our more noble instincts, unperverted by our current system of exploitation. 

BIOS

Gene Tunny is the Founder and Director of Adept Economics and the current President of the Queensland branch of the Economic Society of Australia. He is also an Adjunct Lecturer in economics at Griffith University and an Adjunct Fellow at the Centre for Independent Studies (CIS). He hosts the Economics Explored podcast. Gene is a former Treasury official who led teams in the Treasury’s budget and industry policy divisions.  

Associate Professor Anitra Nelson is an activist-scholar with the Informal Urbanism Research Hub (InfUr-) at University of Melbourne. Her books include Beyond Money: A Postcapitalist Strategy (2022) and Small is Necessary: Shared Living on a Shared Planet (2018). She is co-author of Exploring Degrowth (2020) and co-editor of Post-Carbon Inclusion (2024), Housing for Degrowth: Principles, Models, Challenges and Opportunities (2018) and Food for Degrowth: Perspectives and Practices (2021). Anitra is on the Scientific Advisory Committee for the joint International Society for Ecological Economics–Degrowth Conference, to be held 24-27 June 2025, in Oslo (Norway) and holds a PhD from LaTrobe University (Australia). See more – https://anitranelson.info/

CREDITS

Your hosts are Lloyd Vogelman and Emile Sherman

This podcast is proud to partner with The Ethics Centre

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This podcast is produced by Jonah Primo and Sabrina Organo

Find Jonah at jonahprimo.com or @JonahPrimo on Instagram

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