The Premise of Infinite Growth

Thomas Homer-Dixon articulates a contradiction in belief: that states (and the world economy overall) must always economically grow, but that this economic growth inherently requires a greater consumption of resources to sustain and propel itself. Elementary logic provides the dilemma: how can a planet with finite resources sustain continual (let alone exponential) growth?

Homer-Dixon entitles the notion that economies must grow "conventional", which most would agree with. But where does this notion come from? Why must economies continually grow?

Obviously the world functions within a capitalist system. Capitalism denotes that the total value of a state, its capital, can increase. Those Clapp and Dauvergne title "market liberals" believe that the free market, necessitated by laissez faire policies of the state, allow private industry to be more efficient and thus maximize the capital of a state. Similarly, "market liberals" believe that capital gains and corporate profits serve as incentives for innovation and entrepreneurship, allowing individual citizens of the state to enhance the total capital of the state through the accumulation of their own capital, or value.

So, in essence, each state seeks for its citizens to maximize their own capital and thus the state's total capital - the state seeks growth. But capital is a bit of an abstract term. It stands for value, but what exactly is that? Its really whatever we want it to be! Anything from hospitals to tanks, from land to transportation. So really value is power in all its forms. The power to impose one's will and shape the world and one's life to one's desires. But if a state already has sufficient value, already provides what its citizens deem necessary and the people (theoretically the essence of the state) are content, why must a state enhance its value? Only two answers come to mind: more people will be in the future than currently exist (population growth), or the state must compete with other states' values to maximize its effect on the geopolitical landscape (realist competition).

We see in Japan that population growth has stopped and that, for some years, Japan has had a population decline. Yet its economy still grows; moreover the prospect of a stagnated economy still disturbs onlookers. It remains that competition fuels this anxiety.

Back to the original dilemma: the conventional wisdom of "infinite growth" versus the stark reality of limited resources. As any dilemma must be resolved, one might ask: which of these will give way first? I contend that the notion of state competition must give way. The "social greens" Clapp and Dauvergne discuss desire equity of resources and opportunities among those countries currently considered "developed" and those considered "developing". But so long as states project a realist, Machiavellian image of the world in which they must fight for their slice of the pie rather than increasing the entirety of the pie, the myth of essential growth will pervade, and humanity will continue to believe a foolish notion that sustained growth is paramount over finite resources.