Green Growth or Degrowth: Two Opposing Paths to Environmental Sustainability

In the wake of worsening climate change, environmental sustainability is more important than ever if we wish to mitigate disaster and preserve our way of life. This paper will compare two methods of achieving environmental sustainability. The first is green growth, which attempts to replace non-renewable natural resources with renewable ones, and increase efficiency, while continuing to let the economy grow as usual. The second is degrowth, which advocates for a radical restructuring of society, and accepts a decrease in economic growth as a necessary consequence. The comparison will show that green growth is not good enough, because the mass consumption that results from endless economic growth is partly what drove greenhouse gas levels to what they are today. A drastic change in consumption patterns is needed to deal with climate change, and degrowth seems more likely to achieve this.