The dominant response to the climate crisis has been to argue that economic growth and environmental sustainability can be reconciled — that green technology, renewable energy, and circular economy principles can decouple prosperity from ecological destruction. This is the logic of green capitalism.

Critics argue that this position rests on a fundamental misunderstanding of ecological limits. Humanity is already in a state of ecological overshoot — consuming natural resources at a rate the planet cannot regenerate. Shifting to electric vehicles and renewable energy does not resolve this if the underlying imperative to grow, produce, and consume remains unchanged.

Degrowth theorists argue that wealthy nations must deliberately reduce their economic throughput — not as austerity, but as a planned transition towards a socio-ecological economy oriented around wellbeing rather than GDP. This is politically radical, but the mathematics of planetary boundaries may leave little alternative.

The question of carbon colonialism further complicates the picture. The nations most severely affected by climate change — low-lying Pacific islands, sub-Saharan Africa, South and Southeast Asia — have contributed least to historical emissions. Meanwhile, the extractivism that has powered Northern industrial development has frequently occurred in the Global South, generating ecological and social damage that remains largely unaccounted for.

Intergenerational equity adds a temporal dimension. The choices made by current generations and current economic institutions will determine the material conditions of those not yet born. This raises profound questions about political legitimacy: can a system designed around quarterly profit and electoral cycles make decisions on a geological timescale?