According to Herman Daly, one of the leading ecological economists, the term sustainable growth is an oxymoron, as GDP-growth and sustainable development cannot be reconciled. Therefore, if growth and sustainable development cannot be fully reconciled, the following topics should be discussed seriously:
Can modern economies function without growth and is a non-growing economy a feasible option in the long-run? Or is there a growth imperative meaning that a minimal growth rate is necessary for the proper functioning of an economy?
What does the term sustainable growth really imply? Does it mean that we should still have growth rates as high as possible or should we take care of the trade-off between growth and sustainability and sacrifice some growth (and how much?) for more sustainability?
Can we escape the growth imperative (if it exists) by reforming our current economies?
This workshop is supposed to be an attempt to find answers to these questions, which have been largely ignored in the ongoing sustainability debates.

Input Statements:

Dr. Fritz Hinterberger, Sustainable Europe Research Institute (SERI), Vienna
PD Dr. Niko Paech, University of Oldenburg
Dr. Guido Beltrani, Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC/DEZA), Bern

Macroeconomics Perspective

Fritz Hinterberger

Roland Zech

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