Navigating Degrowth Sentiments in Europe's Semiperiphery: Polarization and the Prospects for Ecological Transformation

Mladen Domazet, PhD and Marija Brajdić Vuković, PhD are the authors of the scientific paper “Navigating Degrowth Sentiments in Europe's Semiperiphery: Polarization and the Prospects for Ecological Transformation”. The paper is published in “Socijalna ekologija”, 35 (1).

Abstract: This study examines the potential for a democratic endorsement of degrowth-oriented policies within the European semiperiphery, with a focus on Croatia. Degrowth, as an ideological complex, combines environmental crisis awareness, social justice concerns, and a commitment to collective throughput reduction and sufficiency; offering a foundation for a paradigm shift towards social organisation that respects planetary boundaries and global environmental justice. Socio-ecological research increasingly invokes substantive societal transformations consistent with degrowth in the Global North as a reaction of sober realism about the impeding environmental collapse. Eastern Europe and European semiperiphery are usually seen as laggards in green policies and staunch adherents of catch-up growth ideology, despite a historic Global North integration. We explore the potential for Europe's semiperiphery to democratically support the tenets of a radically transformative policy for sustainability. Despite recent visibility of degrowth in the political sphere and Zagreb’s hosting of the international degrowth movement assembly, the diversity of semiperipheral contexts beyond the North-South dichotomy often end up overlooked. This research contributes to the literature on degrowth-compatible attitudes and sentiments within various populations, the prevalence of support for degrowth-compatible attitudes in the European semiperiphery (within a decade-long social research stream), and an analysis of degrowth ideological complex’s potential for a shift in policy paradigm. The analyses are based on the Croatian data from International Social Survey Programme (ISSP) module Environment (2021). Contrary to historical trends of dominant indolence on radical socio-ecological action, by 2021 we find a stark polarisation between supporters and opponents of degrowth-transformation. We proffer tentative steps for environmentally minded degrowthers to win over some of their avowed opponents, thereby helping to shift the policy paradigm towards conservation and sufficiency in the face of environmental collapse.

The paper is available here.