Urbanizing degrowth: Five steps towards a Radical Spatial Degrowth Agenda for planning in the face of climate emergency

Maria Kaika, Angelos Varvarousis, Federico Demaria and Hug March
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Maria Kaika: University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Angelos Varvarousis: Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Spain
Federico Demaria: Universitat de Barcelona, Spain
Hug March: Universitat Oberta de Catalunya, Spain

Urban Studies, 2023, vol. 60, issue 7, 1191-1211

Abstract: We call for coupling degrowth with urban studies and planning agendas as an academically salient and politically urgent endeavour. Our aim is threefold: to explore ways for ‘operationalising’ degrowth concepts into urban and regional everyday spatial practices; to sketch pathways for taking degrowth conceptually and methodologically beyond localised experiments and inform larger scale planning practices and international agendas; and to critically assess the multiple ways in which such a radical urban degrowth agenda will have to differ in the Global North and in the Global South. We outline five steps for such a programmatic, yet paradigmatic, urban degrowth agenda. These are: (1) grounding current degrowth debates within their historical–geographical context; (2) engaging (planning) institutions in linking degrowth practices to urbanisation policies; (3) examining how urban insurgent degrowth alliances can be scaled up without co-optation; (4) focusing on the role of experts and professionals in bringing degrowth principles into everyday urban practice; and (5) prefiguring how degrowth agendas can confront the diverse and unequal urban social relations and uneven outcomes in the Global North and South.

Keywords: degrowth; imaginaries; planning; postgrowth; urban political ecology; 去增长; 想象; 规划; å Žå¢žé•¿; åŸŽå¸‚æ”¿æ²»ç”Ÿæ€ å­¦ (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (9)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:urbstu:v:60:y:2023:i:7:p:1191-1211

DOI: 10.1177/00420980231162234

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