Their evidence is outdated.

A growing literature is now exploring options for so-called degrowth, which aims to promote human wellbeing and ecological resilience without requiring GDP growth (Hickel et al., 2021; Kallis, 2017; Keyßer and Lenzen, 2021; Wiedmann et al., 2020; Kallis, 2020). The experiences of the last few years, including COVID-19, may have shifted public understanding and opinion on these issues, especially in richer countries, which are best placed to lead with new policies. In a recent survey of people in G20 countries, 74% of respondents supported the idea that their country’s economic priorities should move beyond profit and increasing wealth to focus more on human wellbeing and ecological protection (Gaffney et al., 2021). Overcoming the research-implementation gap remains a challenge, however. We do not yet know how degrowth policies could be adopted at scale or how they would interact with our current economic processes and patterns of behaviour. Nonetheless, our climate predicament demands openness to new approaches. To better understand the options, further research into basic relations between societal metabolism and social-ecological wellbeing is crucial (Haberl et al., 2019; Hagens, 2020; King, 2020; Leiva and Schramski, 2020; Schramski et al., 2015; West, 2018; Fischer-Kowalski and Haberl, 2015; Garrett et al., 2020; Giampietro et al., 2013; Ringsmuth et al., 2016). Although the many challenges and risks associated with a fundamental economic transition are formidable, arguably, they may be overcome on the time scale of a human life (decades).4 Conversely, the risks associated with ever more radiative forcing as we avoid adequately reducing emissions include transitions of the Earth system to inhospitable states that may not be reversible on the time scales of civilisations (centuries to millennia) (Lenton et al., 2019; Steffen et al., 2018). The growing literature on tipping dynamics in socioeconomic systems may offer reasons for optimism about societies’ potentials for a timely rise to the challenge of systemic transformation (Otto et al., 2020; Lenton, 2020).