Eleos Arete Citrini comments on The case against degrowth

[Eleos Arete Citrini]

I really liked your clear outline on your position, and this definitely contained some food for thought that I found to be nicely presented. That being said, I am still much more agnostic re which position to take (esp. after reading some of the comments here) than you seem to be. You wrote:

Third, degrowthers argue that technological innovations do not allow for a sufficient decoupling between GDP and environmental impacts. But they neglect that a decoupling between economic wealth (GDP) and well-being is less realistic.

Maybe this is misguided, but why not attempt to pursue both in a twin strategy?
What if both decouplings are insufficient on their own but sufficient when combined?
This also ties in to a concept I’ve come across recently: agrowth.
Quoted from The new theory of economic ‘agrowth’ contributes to the viability of climate policies:

“One can be concerned or critical about economic growth without resorting to an anti-growth position,” states the author [Jeroen van den Bergh]. He goes on to highlight that an “agrowth” strategy will allow us to scan a wider space for policies that improve welfare and environmental conditions. Policy selection will not be constrained by the goal of economic growth. “One does not need to assume that unemployment, inequity and environmental challenges are solved by unconditional pro- or zero/​negative growth. Social and environmental policies sometimes restrain and at other times stimulate growth, depending on contextual factors. An “agrowth” strategy is precautionary as it makes society less sensitive to potential scenarios in which climate policy constrains economic growth. Hence, it will reduce resistance to such policy,” he indicates.

In a practical sense, van den Bergh states that it is necessary to combat the social belief—widespread among policy circles and politics—that growth has to be prioritized, and stresses the need for a debate in politics and wider society about stepping outside the futile framing of pro- versus anti-growth. “Realizing there is a third way can help to overcome current polarization and weaken political resistance against a serious climate policy.”