Reimagining growth futures: Overcoming the false binary between green growth and degrowth

Moving beyond green growth and degrowth as competing paradigms. 

When imagining how a green transition can take place, the relationship between economic growth and environmental sustainability is commonly viewed in two ways: As ‘green growth,’ where the two can be mutually supporting, and as ‘degrowth,’ where they cannot. The two are considered mutually exclusive, internally coherent, and competing eco-political paradigms. This article conceptually analyses the literature and maps standpoints within the two positions along nine dimensions covering national institutions, world order, and scientific cosmology. The authors find that there are substantial disagreements within as well as agreements between green growth and degrowth. In consequence, the authors argue that the literature is caught in a false binary. To constructively move the debate forward, it is proposed to give up the paradigmatic and polarised approach and instead embrace a multidimensional plurality of imagined growth futures.

Jacob Hasselbalch, Mathias Larsen, Reimagining growth futures: Overcoming the false binary between green growth and degrowth, Ecological Economics, Volume 240, 2026, 108823, ISSN 0921-8009,
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolecon.2025.108823.