Localism vs Globalism
By Dr Arvind Kumar
The recently concluded three-day international conference on environmental issues held in the French city of Lyon under the aegis of Sustainable Planet Forum, has called for: “Stop economic growth in its tracks, start living locally, at a slower pace.” The radical French thinker Paul Ariès’ idea of economic growth, or rather degrowth, set the debates going with a bang. The French thinker is not just opposed to economic growth, but actively wants to stop it, seeing it as the root of all our evils. In fact, he is opposed to sustainable development, and for him, the development bit cancels out the worth of the sustainable bit. According to Ariès, economic growth inevitably leads to social inequality and he wants a new sort of society, organised locally, at a slower pace, based on sharing rather than exploitation, and if you take his thought to its logical conclusion, virtually shrinking.
On the other hand, Peter Ainsworth, a Conservative, while calling Paul Ariès a dreamer, launched a full-frontal assault on his opponent’s degrowth idea, said that degrowth was not the answer. The only solution was to grow in a different way – that was what sustainable development meant – and the only institutions who could enable us to do that were major companies, with innovations.
