David Craig has an interesting TCW piece on degrowth. I'm not convinced that many serious people heed this kind of thinking, but the UK political arena isn't overflowing with serious people. Worth reading as the old Malthusian outlook in another new guise.
‘Degrowth’ is the agenda, but only for us plebs
HOPEFULLY you all have noticed that very few of the ruling elite’s actions and policies seem to be aimed at doing what they repeatedly promise – improving our lives – making us wealthier and happier. In fact, the answer to almost every problem from the political, bureaucratic, academic and media classes seems to be more control over us and more restrictions on our lives.
One chart produced by UK FIRES, a research programme sponsored by the Government, aiming to support a 20 per cent cut in the UK’s true emissions by 2050 by placing Resource Efficiency at the heart of the UK’s Future Industrial Strategy, gives us a good indication of our Government’s thinking:
5 comments:
Those charts are terrifying. Zero shipping? We'll see how people take to that. That bearded Trade & Industry chap whose name escapes everyone had better turbo-charge our TV, computer, and electric car manufacturing capacity. And we'll be needing a few incentives for the insect protein Industry.
I've made an argument elsewhere that the current Elite are well past their 'best before date' and going somewhat rancid.
The old Elite are desperately trying to maintain their grip on power - and they are using 'crises' as a way of preserving their control. Need the financial crises have been so fierce? Was the resistance to Brexit ramped up (they lost that one but were dilatory about implementing it)? Has immigration received to much 'value of diversity'? Was COVID just a bad flu season? Will Climate Change doom us all? All of these crises are over-elaborated to put us more deeply under the control of the old Elite.
Too much Two Tier and 'Do as I say, not as I do' - gives the game away.
Sam - it's bonkers isn't it? A reminder of how bonkers activists can be though, how reality is seen as an obstacle to be brushed aside. As if any kind of sceptical "What if?" doesn't enter into their calculations. Quite mad.
DJ - yes something fundamental seems to be changing, as if the world is becoming too complex and too informed for the old ways to work.
"Too much Two Tier and 'Do as I say, not as I do' - gives the game away."
Yes it does give the game away, yet we could say that this is how things have always been. Different rules for different social classes and the upper classes dictating standards they don't follow themselves.
"...resistance to Brexit ramped up (they lost that one..."
Only temporarily, as it now turns out.
Peter - even at the time Brexit seemed likely to be temporary.
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