Beyond growth platform

Who We Are

The Beyond Growth Platform (BGP) is a working group within FYEG. Since its formal creation in 2023, the BGP has connected young greens and activists across Europe in their critique of the current growth and profit-based economic system and their advocacy for pathways to post-growth. We work on expanding and strengthening FYEG’s political platform on degrowth and post-growth with the aim of impacting discourse and decision-making at all levels in Europe.

It is becoming increasingly clear that the current economic system is failing us. The ecological crisis and escalating global and local inequalities confronting us today have brought into focus the destructive nature of limitless economic growth, which is a necessary mechanism for accumulation in capitalist economies.

In addition, the economic expansion of high income countries comes at the cost of environmental degradation and exacerbated inequalities between the Global North and South, perpetuating a colonial system based on resource extraction and human exploitation. This highlights the urgent need to transform our current socioeconomic system into one that prioritises the people, non-human species, and environmental wellbeing.

While the prevailing growth paradigm remains largely unchallenged by political institutions at European and national levels, numerous collectives and people from different generations are beginning to envision and work on alternative practices and narratives, systems, and ways of organizing. Degrowth and post-growth allow us to collectively build and imagine exciting and hopeful futures in which we will live better and our communities will be stronger.

Creating an inclusive and alternative future requires the active participation of people from different backgrounds. Voices of those who have been historically excluded based on gender, social class, sexual orientation, Indigenous identity, Black identity, disabilities, and more, are fundamental. With all these experiences, we can build our degrowth society and post-growth policies – a future society that will live within planetary boundaries respecting and caring for every living being on the planet.

  • Beyond growth is an umbrella term that encompasses theories, ideologies, and research studies critiquing the current growth-centric model while proposing alternative ideas and frameworks. Its aim is to bring together human and environmental needs and wellbeing, equitably and globally.

  • Degrowth refers to a downscaling of production and consumption to reduce ecological footprints, which is democratically planned in a way that is equitable while securing wellbeing for all. Degrowth should not be interpreted as a specific final objective, but rather as a realm of possibilities, an overarching framework that connects various ideas, concepts, and proposals.

  • Post-growth refers to a paradigm that shifts away from prioritizing economic growth towards satisfying needs for all and achieving social objectives while maintaining material throughput within planetary boundaries. This view defends that the economy should be designed to achieve environmental and social goals regardless of whether it entails economic growth.

  • There are several proposals to enact degrowth in public policy and in everyday life. The downscaling of production and consumption is accompanied and strengthened by social security policies, and vice versa. For example, the implementation of universal public services coupled with a universal basic income could create the conditions for the flourishing of the commons, which are products and services we don’t have to own, but that we can share. In turn, thriving community-based initiatives can increase the support for systems of governance and policies that put care at the centre and liberate time and energy for meaningful modes of living. This can give us the chance to free ourselves from the exploiting and expropriating capitalism.

Our work

  • At FYEG’s General Assembly in Dublin in 2024, young greens adopted our resolution “A Degrowth Transition Towards Post-Growth Economies”

  • We are featured in the Ecosprinter, FYEG’s online publication. Read our article “Beyond Growth Platform for a Beyond Growth Europe”

  • We will be at the International Degrowth Conference in Oslo:

    The session organised by BGP members is called “Youth political organising for degrowth: Pathways for a politics of transformation through the present institutions” and explores the following question: How can a young generation of ecosocial politicians and activists contribute to the degrowth transition under an internationalist and decolonial perspective? 

    For this session, we invite both academic and non-academic contributions, especially touching on direct experiences in political organising and youth movements. In general, knowledge and interest in degrowth policies and politics from a young intersectional lens is highly appreciated.

    We especially welcome contributors from the Global Majority, from the understanding that a degrowth transition in the North is a path to effective decolonization and is strongly connected with struggles for social and ecological justice in the Global South. The expected abstract format is free, so it can take any form that is meaningful for the contributor: conventional presentation, activist contribution, practice-based contribution, policy contribution, artistic contribution, or a short movie or video format, among others. 

    The full description can be found at the following link and the call for abstracts here. Once you enter the submission process you can scroll down to select the session SS195 under the title of Special Sessions. The call for abstracts is open until 20 January. 

  • Keep an eye out for a new Call for Members in January 2025