ROUTLEDGE HANDBOOK OF DEGROWTH

The Routledge Handbook of Degrowth
is due for release 25 June 2025

“The pluriverse of degrowth is beautifully synthesized in this book. A must-have.” — Kohei Saito, Professor of Philosophy, University of Tokyo, and author of the bestseller Slow Down: How Degrowth Communism Can Save the Earth (2024)

This handbook takes stock of ‘degrowth’, a concept and movement that has gained increasing visibility in the 2020s. Contributors explain the social and ecological contexts for degrowth’s significance. They elaborate its diverse history and detail its unique approaches and practices. The final section explores degrowth’s challenges and opportunities for the future. See Routledge page and European tour.

 

Contents

List of figures, tables and boxes

Contributors

Acknowledgements

List of acronyms, symbols and abbreviations

Part I The current growth conjuncture

1 Degrowth has come of age

Anitra Nelson and Vincent Liegey

2 Fossilised metabolism: the social ecology of capitalist growth

Éric Pineault

3 Unequal uses of earth

Timothée Parrique

4 Capitalist crisis and affective alternatives

Marina Sitrin

Part II Degrowth: origins and steppingstones

5 The French origins and pillars of degrowth

François Jarrige and Vincent Liegey

6 Degrowth in Italy: early beginnings, political disputes and a plural social movement

Karl Krӓhmer, Margherita Forgione, Michel Cardito and Mauro Bonaiuti

7 Postwachstum: German roots and currents of degrowth

Matthias Schmelzer, and Barbara Muraca

8 A Catalan way towards degrowth

Borja Nogué-Algueró and Giacomo D’Alisa

9 Accidental degrowth practices: illustrations from Czechia

Slavomíra Ferenčuhová, Eva Fraňková, Tomáš Hoření Samec, and Jan Malý Blažek

10 Greece: real-existing degrowth and its challenges

Marula Tsagkari, Chris Vrettos, and Agisilaos Koulouris

11 ‘Degrowth’ and the implications of English language hegemony

Nick Fitzpatrick

12 Latin American indigenous perspectives meet degrowth

David Barkin

13 Degrowth in an African periphery: from necrocapitalism to a pluriverse of nowtopias

Roland Ngam

Part III Degrowth practices: concepts in action

14 Conviviality and commoning

Andrea Vetter and Matthias Fersterer

15 Autonomy and freedom in individual to societal transformation

Clive L. Spash

16 The degrowth doughnut

Mladen Domazet

17 Frugal abundance: meaning in practice in an Icelandic village

Adrien Plomteux

18 Defining de-Fashion: a manifesto for degrowth

Sandra Niessen

19 Degrowth: health and healthcare

Martin Hensher and Jean-Louis Aillon

20 Holistic care economies: degrowth ways of provisioning and the Global East

Lilian Pungas and Jana Gebauer

21 The pedagogy of degrowth and the political ecology of technology

Luis I. Prádanos

22 Mapping the spectrum of degrowth work

Eeva Houtbeckers

23 Reimagining collaboration: degrowth practitioners, scholars and activists

Orsolya Lazányi, Vincent Liegey, François Schneider and Logan Strenchock

Part IV Degrowth futures: perspectives and strategies

24 Twenty years of degrowth: what has been achieved?

Serge Latouche with Vincent Liegey

25 Roles of utopian thought in a degrowth transformation

Alexandra Köves

26 Growth, degrowth and poverty reduction

Olivier De Schutter

27 Imperial and solidary modes of living: alternatives to eco-imperialism

Ulrich Brand and Markus Wissen

28 Prefigurative degrowth politics: decolonisation and the non-aligned movement

Paul Stubbs

29 Ecofeminist and decolonial feminist degrowth futures

Susan Paulson, Anna Saave and Sourayan Mookerjea

30 Fostering degrowth in men: beyond masculinity and the gender binary

Bob Pease

31 Degrowth, urbanisation and spatial planning

Federico Savini

32 Degrowth-aligned commoning organisations

Ben Robra, Sabrina Chakori and Chris Giotitsas

33 Ecosocialism and degrowth

Gareth Dale

34 Beyond growth: beyond divisions

Anuna De Wever (Van Der Heyden) and Lena Hartog

35 Degrowth: future research directions

Anitra Nelson and Vincent Liegey

Index