TY - JOUR
T1 - Beyond the urban shift
T2 - towards a relational degrowth spatial politics
AU - Varvarousis, A.
AU - Kallis, G.
AU - Catanneo, C.
AU - Sekulova, F.
AU - Tsagkari, M.
AU - Slamersak, A.
AU - Conde, M.
AU - Dalisa, G.
AU - Hanacek, K.
AU - Roy, B.
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2024.
PY - 2024/12/12
Y1 - 2024/12/12
N2 - Degrowth is coming of age, and its analysis of what can be called degrowth spatial politics is advancing rapidly. In this article, we attempt to unravel the history of spatial thought in the degrowth literature to reveal its tendencies, tipping points, and blank spots. We argue that the more recent degrowth spatial literature overly focuses on the big urban scale by reversing what has purportedly been one of the weak spots of degrowth scholarship: its focus and preference for small-scale, relocalization, and decentralized communities. While we see the merit of this shift, first, we try to contextualize it in the broader sustainability discourse, and second, we contend that it has not been without problems and omissions. We see three predicaments stemming from it: first, a deficit of the degrowth spatial literature in recognizing and engaging with unsustainable rural transformations such as rural depopulation and shrinkage, as well as rural dispossession and depeasantisation. Second, a difficulty to account for urban and rural interconnectedness and engage with new epistemological frames that emerge in urban studies, such as planetary urbanization. Third, the urban shift may affect the capacity of degrowth to remain pluriversal, anti-colonial, and grassroots-fueled, or what Chertkovskaya et al. (Towards a political economy of degrowth. Rowman & Littlefield, 2019. https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=PuXaDwAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PP1&dq=info:c45bQLgYCfYJ:scholar.google.com&ots=5LsDF9Y_Er&sig=buZn4ogpUN4octi3_WFJf1mO9Lg) called nomadic utopianism. Finally, in the concluding part, we set the stepstones for a relational degrowth spatial politics, focusing on a solidary connection of space and place across the urban and rural and in multiple scales. This approach avoids the pitfalls of both degrowth proposals for relocalization and those who put excessive trust in urban transformations alone.
AB - Degrowth is coming of age, and its analysis of what can be called degrowth spatial politics is advancing rapidly. In this article, we attempt to unravel the history of spatial thought in the degrowth literature to reveal its tendencies, tipping points, and blank spots. We argue that the more recent degrowth spatial literature overly focuses on the big urban scale by reversing what has purportedly been one of the weak spots of degrowth scholarship: its focus and preference for small-scale, relocalization, and decentralized communities. While we see the merit of this shift, first, we try to contextualize it in the broader sustainability discourse, and second, we contend that it has not been without problems and omissions. We see three predicaments stemming from it: first, a deficit of the degrowth spatial literature in recognizing and engaging with unsustainable rural transformations such as rural depopulation and shrinkage, as well as rural dispossession and depeasantisation. Second, a difficulty to account for urban and rural interconnectedness and engage with new epistemological frames that emerge in urban studies, such as planetary urbanization. Third, the urban shift may affect the capacity of degrowth to remain pluriversal, anti-colonial, and grassroots-fueled, or what Chertkovskaya et al. (Towards a political economy of degrowth. Rowman & Littlefield, 2019. https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=PuXaDwAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PP1&dq=info:c45bQLgYCfYJ:scholar.google.com&ots=5LsDF9Y_Er&sig=buZn4ogpUN4octi3_WFJf1mO9Lg) called nomadic utopianism. Finally, in the concluding part, we set the stepstones for a relational degrowth spatial politics, focusing on a solidary connection of space and place across the urban and rural and in multiple scales. This approach avoids the pitfalls of both degrowth proposals for relocalization and those who put excessive trust in urban transformations alone.
KW - Degrowth
KW - Depopulation
KW - Planetary urbanization
KW - Post-growth planning
KW - Urban studies
KW - Urbanization
KW - Urban–rural relations
KW - Utopianism
KW - Degrowth
KW - Depopulation
KW - Planetary urbanization
KW - Post-growth planning
KW - Urban studies
KW - Urbanization
KW - Urban–rural relations
KW - Utopianism
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85211772868&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - https://www.mendeley.com/catalogue/c1947ac2-be7e-303c-a7d8-58bc0b3dc065/
UR - https://portalrecerca.uab.cat/en/publications/58173060-beff-485e-aa60-1989fe1016ed
U2 - 10.1007/s11625-024-01590-7
DO - 10.1007/s11625-024-01590-7
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85211772868
SN - 1862-4065
JO - Sustainability Science
JF - Sustainability Science
M1 - 106824
ER -