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41 " Growthism is little more than ideology – an ideology that benefits a few at the expense of our collective future. We’re all pushed to step on the accelerator of growth, with deadly consequences for our living planet, all so that a rich elite can get even richer. From the perspective of human life, this is clearly an injustice. And indeed we have been aware of this problem for some time. But from the perspective of ecology, it is even worse – it is a kind of madness. "
― Jason Hickel , Less is More: How Degrowth Will Save the World
42 " Those who insist that aggregate growth is necessary to improve people’s lives force us into a horrible double-bind. We are made to choose between human welfare or ecological stability – an impossible choice that nobody wants to face. But when we understand how inequality works, suddenly the choice becomes much easier: between living in a more equitable society, on the one hand, and risking ecological catastrophe on the other. "
43 " Once we grasp the scale of national and global inequalities, then the narrative that seeks to cast GDP growth as a proxy for human progress begins to seem a bit tendentious – perhaps even a bit ideological. And by ideology I mean in the technical sense: a set of ideas promoted by the dominant class, which serves their material interests, and which everybody else has internalised to such an extent that they are willing to go along with a system they might otherwise reject as unjust. The Italian philosopher Antonio Gramsci has called this ‘cultural hegemony’: when an ideology becomes so normalised that it is difficult or even impossible to reflect on it. "
44 " All of this upends the usual story that we’re told about the rise of capitalism. This was hardly a natural and inevitable process. There was no gradual ‘transition’, as people like to assume, and it certainly wasn’t peaceful. Capitalism rose on the back of organised violence, mass impoverishment, and the systematic destruction of self-sufficient subsistence economies. It did not put an end to serfdom; rather, it put an end to the progressive revolution that had ended serfdom. Indeed, by securing virtually total control over the means of production, and rendering peasants and workers dependent on them for survival, capitalists took the principles of serfdom to new extremes. "
45 " Societies with unequal income distribution tend to be less happy. There are a number of reasons for this. Inequality creates a sense of unfairness; it erodes social trust, cohesion and solidarity. It’s also linked to poorer health, higher levels of crime and less social mobility. People who live in unequal societies tend to be more frustrated, anxious, insecure and discontent with their lives. They have higher rates of depression and addiction. "
46 " All living organisms grow. But in nature there is a self-limiting logic to growth: organisms grow to a point of maturity, and then maintain a state of healthy equilibrium. When growth fails to stop – when cells keep replicating just for the sake of it – it’s because of a coding error, like what happens with cancer. This kind of growth quickly becomes deadly. "
47 " There is nothing natural or innate about the productivist behaviours we associate with homo economicus. That creature is the product of five centuries of cultural re-programming. "
48 " But Kuznets was careful to emphasise that GDP is flawed. It tallies up monetised economic activity, but it doesn’t care whether that activity is useful or destructive. If you cut down a forest for timber, GDP goes up. If you extend the working day and push back the retirement age, GDP goes up. If pollution causes hospital visits to rise, GDP goes up. "
49 " This is the core principle of capitalism: that the world is not really alive, and it is certainly not our kin, but rather just stuff to be extracted and discarded – and that includes most of the human beings living here too. From its very first principles, capitalism has set itself at war against life itself. "
50 " Under capitalism, "private property" is not about the right to have your own home and belongings. It is about the right of elites to enclose and appropriate commons: forests, subsurface minerals, water, the atmosphere, public goods, even knowledge itself. "
― Jason Hickel
51 " GDP growth is, ultimately, an indicator of the welfare of capitalism. That we have all come to see it as a proxy for the welfare of humans represents an extraordinary ideological coup "
52 " it also leaves out much of what is good: it doesn’t count non-monetised economic activities, even when they are essential to human life and well-being. If you grow your own food, clean your own house or care for your ageing parents, GDP says nothing. It only counts if you pay companies to do these things for you. "
53 " For the vast majority of the history of capitalism, growth didn’t deliver welfare improvements in the lives of ordinary people; in fact, it did exactly the opposite. "
54 " The climate crisis reveals that our civilization has never really been organized around science, contrary to the usual Enlightenment narrative. It is organized around capital. Science is embraced when it serves the interests of capital, and is often ignored when it does not. "
55 " We in this society are inclined to always imagine more technological innovations as the way to solve our problems. "
56 " Reducing resource use removes pressure from ecosystems and gives the web of life a chance to knit itself back together, while reducing energy use makes it much easier for us to accomplish a rapid transition to renewables before dangerous tipping points begin to cascade. This is called ‘degrowth’ – a planned downscaling of energy and resource use to bring the economy back into balance with the living world in a safe, just and equitable way. "
57 " The notion that one’s income reflects their productivity, or the value they contribute to society, is one of the most pernicious fallacies of neoclassical economics "
58 " you can provoke people to consume far beyond their needs simply by manipulating their psychology. You can seed anxiety in people’s minds, and then present your product as a solution to that anxiety. Or you can sell things on the promise that they will provide social acceptance, or class distinction, or sexual prowess. This kind of advertising quickly became indispensable to American companies desperate to generate growing demand. "
59 " 90% of American CEOs believed it would be impossible to sell a new product without an advertising campaign; 85% admitted that advertising ‘often’ persuaded people to buy things they did not need; and 51% said that advertising persuaded people to buy things they didn’t actually want.8 These are extraordinary figures. "
60 " Poverty was recast not as the consequence of dispossession, but as the sign of personal moral failing. "