• Roser Dominic

Should there be more or less economic growth? This course covers normative arguments and empirical evidence which are useful for answering this question. In the 1970s, the Club of Rome prompted a large public discussion about the desirability of economic growth. Since then, the debate has subsided or turned into a one-sided debate with the economics and policy mainstream taking support for economic growth for granted and thus constituting a “silent majority”. The issue has recently gained steam with post-growth scholars on the one hand and progress studies scholars on the other hand taking more deliberate and vocal stances against and for growth, respectively. This course equips students to take a clear position themselves by examining and philosophically assessing the relationship of economic growth to goals such as development, equality, happiness, liberalism, animal welfare, environment, or extinction risks.

The course has two goals:

1. Understanding the causes and consequences of economic growth. The goal is breadth: examining a wide range of aspects from a wide range of theoretical perspectives.

2. Strengthening philosophical reasoning skills by learning about ethical theories and applying them to the practical question whether there should be more or less economic growth.
 

Ashraf, Q. H., & Weil, D. N. (2024). Economic Growth. Taylor & Francis.

Cowen, T. (2018). Stubborn Attachments. Stripe Press.

Friedman, Benjamin M. The Moral Consequences of Economic Growth. Vintage, 2010.

Jackson, T. (2016). Prosperity without Growth: Foundations for the Economy of Tomorrow. Routledge.

Jones, Charles I., Vollrath, Dietrich. (2013). Introduction to Economic Growth (Fourth Edition). New York: W.W. Norton & Company.

Jones, C. I. (2024). “The AI Dilemma: Growth versus Existential Risk.” American Economic Review, 6(4), 575-590.

Kallis, G., Paulson, S., D'Alisa, G., & Demaria, F. (2020). The Case for Degrowth. John Wiley & Sons.

Metz, Th. (2020). "Replacing Development: An Afro-communal Approach to Global Justice." African Philosophy and Global Justice. Routledge. 109-135.

Raworth, K. (2018). Doughnut Economics. Chelsea Green Publishing.

Terzi, A. (2022). Growth for Good: Reshaping Capitalism to Save Humanity from Climate Catastrophe. Harvard University Press.

Continuous evaluation 50% written exam 50%
Written exam 90 minutes.

Course with continuous assessment: after the registration period, you can no longer withdraw from the registration (see session calendar on the faculty website).

A repeat examination is scheduled in the repeat session. In this session,  only candidates who did not pass the semester and/or the end-of-semester examination will be examined. It is not possible to take a repeat examination as a first attempt.

Written exam 90 minutes

Only as a retake exam