Rejecting the primary valuation of growth for growth sake allows alternative economic arrangements that better maximize human well being

(Sarah, GlobalDevelopment@NewSouthWales, Naila, Gender&Development@LSE, From economic growth to a wellbeing economy: notes for a feminist foreign policy chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://iwda.org.au/assets/files/Wellbeing-and-Feminist-Foreign-Policy-AFFPC-Issue-Paper-11-1-1.pdf)

[N]ow is the time to correct a glaring blind spot in how we measure economic prosperity and progress. When profits come at the expense of people and our planet, we are left with an incomplete picture of the true cost of economic growth. Our Common Agenda: Report of the UN SecretaryGeneral, 2021 It will be evident from this overview that for most governments and mainstream international institutions, growth remains front and centre of the policy agenda, even if prefaced by various aspirational adjectives that seek to incorporate concerns and critiques. The SDGs incorporated many concerns and critiques of earlier development approaches, but ‘sustained’ growth – albeit qualified by adjectives of ‘inclusive and sustainable’ – has remained prominent as a goal and key driver of development (Goal 8). The commitment to markets as the main driver of growth is evident in the continued commitment to working with the private sector to generate the resources that will translate these goals into concrete achievements. Nonetheless, in so far as challenges to the existing growth model are acknowledged in other goals, they have created space for wider debate, including about whether any level of growth as currently conceived and measured can be ‘sustainable’. Clustered at one end of the debate are proponents of the ‘green growth’ agenda. One version of this agenda envisages a reduction in resource, energy and material inputs through technological improvements and increasing production efficiency, while correcting market failures and using market instruments to hold other forms of degradation in check. Others argue that technology and markets cannot be the mechanisms to drive transformation to sustainability, which will require stronger action from government and society to build clean energy infrastructure. Both groups see continued growth as compatible with preserving the natural resources and ecological services on which future growth depends. The radical critique of growth takes issue with this assumption: it argues that the absolute decline in the use of energy and material inputs that is needed to reverse the climate crisis is unlikely to be achieved with the expansion of the economy as it is currently measured. This critique underpins the argument for ‘degrowth’, the move away from the growth imperative altogether in the interests of a good life for all within planetary boundaries. However, the concept has not been widely embraced by social movement activists, including those in the environmental justice movement, in the Global South. Many of these activists live in countries that continue to suffer from poverty and deprivation in the most basic of needs, and countries that have gone through ‘forced degrowth’ as a result of austerity policies. They consider some ‘growth’ to be necessary to achieve security of basic needs and some minimum level of wellbeing in these countrieslviii. Many also point to the ecological debt between the Global North and Global South. They argue that in any transition to a low-carbon or a degrowth economy, the main burden must fall on those that have historically contributed most to the ecological crisis we face today and that continue to have the largest ‘material footprint’. This will allow the redistribution of resources to meet social needs and build the beneficial infrastructure of modernization, such as electricity, water systems and the internet, for those that have contributed least to the crisis and have the smallest material footprintlix. We are now past the mid-point of the SDG timeline (20152030) and consideration is being given to how metrics of progress can continue to improve and evolve. As the opening quote in this section indicates, the UN Secretary General has declared his determination to address the blind spots in current metrics. In order to address the drivers of multiple, complex and ongoing global crises, whatever measures are adopted must look ‘Beyond GDP’. It is imperative that those who would like to see a feminist vision of the wellbeing economy inform and be incorporated into any new measures mobilize to make this a reality. Building links and common ground with other movements and constituencies that are pushing for a ‘beyond GDP’ agenda is also vital. Feminist foreign policy makers around the world have a critical role to play in shaping and sharing ideas, discourses and debates that question growth and provide alternatives, in the development of measures and data collection efforts that would feed into this process and in supporting these broader movements for change. We conclude by noting key features of a feminist approach to the wellbeing economy that resonate with the call to go beyond the GDP and the growth-led agenda. Feminist approaches vary in some respects but share certain core principles, which are shared by other movements for social justice. Central to a feminist vision is the answer to the question posed earlier regarding the purpose of growth. Growth is not an end in itself, with market forces determining what has value, what is produced for exchange and who consumes it; rather growth is a means to achieve ends that have intrinsic value. This would generally include care of family members, thriving communities, an absence of extreme inequalities, and a healthy environment. A radically different approach requires abandoning the overall pursuit of market-led growth as the primary objective of development. It recognizes the need for growth in key sectors that are fundamental to human and planetary sustainability, with the transition to an economy ‘that is organized around human flourishing and ecological sustainability rather than the constant accumulation of capital’lx. It recognizes also that continued growth is needed in poorer parts of the world and that their transition to a human-centred, low-carbon economy can be made possible through acknowledgement of the ecological debt. These ideas resonate with feminist principles as nicely spelt out in the following quote from UN Women: The alternative vision would not prioritize economic growth as an end in and of itself. Instead, it starts with basic questions about what the economy is for. If the main purpose of the economy is to support “the flourishing and survival of life”—as feminist economists have long argued—economic policies need to align with these goals. It would ensure sustainable livelihoods for all and would stop treating unpaid care work and the environment as limitless resources that can be used for free and depleted without cost or consequence. Instead, it would put economic policies at the service of sustainability, gender equality and social justicelxi.