De-growth — the idea that a finite planet cannot sustain ever-increasing consumption — is about the closest you can get to a heresy in economics, where growth is widely held as the best route to prosperity.
But, as climate change accelerates and supply chain disruptions offer rich-world consumers an unaccustomed taste of scarcity, the theory is becoming less taboo, and some have started to ponder what a de-growth world might look like.
After the U.N. climate science agency this year called for cuts in consumer demand — a core de-growth premise — the think tank that runs the Davos forum published a de-growth primer in June, and the issue has even begun to crop up in investment notes.