A Post Growth Deal

ongoing

How can we sustain human well-being within planetary boundaries? What policies and provisioning systems could enable societies to prosper without growth? What politics and alliances are necessary for seeing post-growth policies through, and how can the public be engaged in them? What new scientific paradigm could answer such questions? Societies face multiple intertwined crises. Bold alternatives are sorely needed. This project develops frameworks for ‘Post-Growth Deals’, from empirical research through to practical applications. First, we develop equitable North-South convergence scenarios, modelling human well-being achievement in all countries within planetary boundaries. Second, we articulate post-growth policy packages for the Global North and South, assessing their political acceptability and modelling their effects. Third, we develop models of provisioning systems to ensure future populations have adequate energy, food, shelter, health and social security. Fourth, we learn from political movements, studying politics and alliances that could bring post-growth transitions forward. Fifth, we identify practical steps to bring Post-Growth Deals to life, working with four representative communities to co-produce knowledge and action on the ground. The potential gains of this research are immense: post-growth transitions may unlock a far more ecologically stable and socially prosperous future than current trajectories lead to. REAL brings a paradigm shift moving post-growth science from economics to sustainability studies. We propose a new trans-disciplinary ‘5Ps of post-growth’ science, grounded in resource/energy modelling, political-economy and socio-political analysis – a skill-set that no single researcher or team presently possesses. The PIs are leaders in their fields and bring complementary expertise in: modelling of provisioning systems (JST), political economy and North-South relations (JΗ), and the politics of socio-environmental transformations (GK).