The world faces a convergence of social, environmental, and economic crises, which have a common cause: our addiction to an outdated development paradigm based on fossil-fuelled GDP growth at all costs. A different development approach is needed based on achieving the wellbeing of the entire integrated system of humans embedded in the rest of nature.
The solution will require a credible system to replace reliance on GDP growth with a more comprehensive, dynamic understanding of the links among the many contributors to sustainable and inclusive human wellbeing and the wellbeing of the rest of nature. It also requires acknowledging the extent of lock-in or addiction to the current system and the appropriate strategies, interventions, and therapies needed to allow the transition to a sustainable and inclusive wellbeing economy and society.
In this report, we synthesize and integrate the emerging metrics, models, and policies that are being developed and discussed as part of a range of Horizon Europe funded projects around the goal of sustainable and inclusive wellbeing (SIW). We then investigate what would be needed to transform the current system into one that is focused on and can achieve SIW. We argue that the current system is being held in place through the interaction of GDP-based metrics and models (i.e. the System of National Accounts and macroeconomic models) around the narrow goal of GDP growth and the policies, institutions, rules, and norms that support that system. To transform that system will require not just new metrics or new models or new policies independently. It will require a new integrated system of metrics, models, and policies all aimed at achieving the new goal of SIW rather than merely GDP growth.
An integrated system linking together the metrics, models, and policies toward the SIW goal is presented. We then describe how it differs from the current system and the potential ‘theories of change’ or strategies for transitioning from the current system to the new system. Communicating the need for and the characteristics of the new system is necessary, but not sufficient to overcome the vested interests maintaining the current system. Broad support for the new SIW will also be necessary and this will require describing its features in detail via scenarios and other means that can engage the full range of stakeholders, including the public, and the creation of a Movement of Movements (MOM) to enable the transition.
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Authors:
| Robert Costanza, University College London Rutger Hoekstra, Leiden University Joseph Eastoe, University College London Irlan Rum, Leiden University Ida Kubiszewski, University College London Dan O’Neill, University of Barcelona Mario Biggeri, University of Florence Tuuli Hirvilammi, Tampere University Chiara Pollio, UNIFE Nicole Kormann da Silva, ZOE Institute Maria Zinutti, WeAll |
