A healthy economy should be designed to thrive

A healthy economy should be designed to thrive, not grow

Have you ever watched a baby learning to crawl? Because as any parent knows it’s

gripping扣人心弦的；引人注意的；令人全神贯注的;握紧. 1st, they wiggle about on the floor,

usually backwards. But then they drag themselves forwards. And they pull themselves up

to stand. And we all clap. And that simple motion of forwards and upwards. It’s the most

basic direction of progress we humans recognize. We tell it in our story of evolution as

well. From our lolloping懒散地闲荡；摇晃着走；笨拙地跳动 ancestors to Homo erectus直立人 finally upright, to homo sapiens智人，depicted描述，always a man，always mid

stride. So no wonder, we so readily believe that economic progress would take this very

same shape. This ever rising line of growth. It’s time to think again. To reimagine the

shape of progress. Because today, we have economies that need to grow whether or not

they make us thrive. And what we need, especially in the richest countries, our economies

that make us thrive whether or not they grow. Yes it is a little flippant轻率的；嘴碎的；没礼貌的 word hiding a profound shift in mind set, but I believe this is the shift we need to

make if we humanity are gonna thrive here together this century. So where did this

obsession痴迷；困扰；[内科][心理] 强迫观念 with growth come from. Well， GDP， gross

domestic product，it’s just the total cost of goods and services sold in an economy in a

year. It was invented in 1930s, but it very soon became the overriding goal of policy

making. So much so, even today, in the richest of countries, governments think the

solution to their economic problems lies in more growth. Just how that happened is best

told through the 1960 classic by WW Rostow. I love it so much, I have the 1st edition copy.

The stages of economic growth (a non-communist manifesto宣言；声明；告示). You can

just smell the politics huh. And Rostow tells us all economics need to pass through 5

stages of growth.

1st, traditional society where a nation’s output is limited by its technology, institutions制度；建立；（社会或宗教等）公共机构；习俗, and mind set. But then the preconditions for take

off. When we get the beginning of banking industry, the mechanization of work, and the

belief that growth is necessary for sth beyond itself, like national dignity, or a better life for

the children. Then take off, where compound interest is built into the economy’s

institutions, and growth becomes the normal condition. 4th is the drive to maturity where

you can have any industry you want no matter your natural resource base. And the 5th and

the final stage, the age of high mass consumption where people can buy all the consumer

goods they want like bicycles and sewing machines. This was 1969 remember. You can

hear the implicit airplane metaphor暗喻，隐喻；比喻说法 in this story. But this plane, is like

no other. Because it can never be allowed to land. Rostow left us flying into the sunset of

mass consumerism大众消费主义. And he knew it. As he wrote, and then, the question

beyond, where history offers us only fragments, what to do when the increase and real

income itself loses its charm? He asked that question, but he never answered it. And

here’s why. The year was 1960, he was an advisor to the presidential candidate John F

Kennedy, who was running for election, on the promise of 5% growth. So Rostow’s job is

to keep that plane flying not to ask if, how, or when it could ever be allowed to land. So

here we are, flying into the sunshine of mass consumerism, over a half a century on, with

economies that have come to expect, demand, and depend upon unending growth,

because we financially, politically, and socially addicted to it.

We financially addicted to growth because today’s financial system is designed to pursue

the highest rate of monetary return. Putting publicly traded companies under constant

pressure to deliver growing sales, growing market shares, and growing profits. And

because banks create money as debt bearing interest, which must be repaid with more.

We are politically addicted to growth, because politicians want to raise tax revenue without

raising taxes. And a growing GDP seems a sure way to do that. And no politicians wants

to lose their place in the G20 family photo. But if their economy stops growing, while the

rest keep going, well, they’ll be booted out解雇；撵走；逐出 by the next emergingadj. 新兴的；出现的；形成的v. 形成；浮现；显露（emerge的ing形式）；由…中脱出

power house. And we are socially addicted to growth because thanks to a century of

consumer propaganda宣传；传道总会, which fascinatingly was created by Edward, the

nephew of Sigman Floid, who realized his uncle’s psychotherapy could be turned into very

lucrative 有利可图的，赚钱的；合算的retail therapy. If we could be convinced to believe

that we transform ourselves, every time we buy sth more. None of these addictions are

insurmountable不能克服的；不能超越的；难以对付的, but they all deserve far more

attention than they currently get. Because look where this Journey has been taken us,

global GDP is 10 times bigger than it was in 1950, and that increase has brought

prosperity 繁荣，成功to billions of people. But the global economy has also become

incredibly divisive with a vast share of returns to wealth now accruing vi. 产生；自然增长或利益增加

vt. 获得；积累to归于a fraction 分数；部分；小部分；稍微 of the global 1%. And the

economy has become incredibly degenerative退化的；变质的；退步的, rapidly

destabilizing 使动摇this delicately微妙地；精致地；优美地 balanced planet on which all

our lives depend. Our politicians know it, and so they offer new destinations for growth.

You can have green growth, inclusive growth, smart, resilient adj. 弹回的，有弹力的adj.

能复原的；有复原力的balanced growth, choose any future you want. So long as you

choose growth.



I think it’s a time to choose a higher ambition, a far bigger one. Because humanity’s 21st

century challenge is clear, to meet the needs of all people within the means of this

extraordinary, unique, living planet. So that we, and the rest of nature can thrive. Progress

on his goal is not going to be measured with the metric of money, we need a dashboard of

indicators. And when I sit down to try and draw the picture what that might look like,

strange though this is going to sound, it came out looking like a donut. I know I’m sorry,

but let me introduce you to the one donut that might actually turn out to be good for us. So

imagine humanity’s resources use radiating out from the middle, that hole in the middle is

a place where people are falling short on life’s essentials, they don’t have the food, health

care, education, political voice, housing, that every person needs for a life of dignity and

opportunity. We want to get everybody out of the hole over the social foundation into that

green donut itself. But, and it’s a big but, we cannot let our collective resource use

overshoot vt. 超越；打过头；把…做过头vi. 射击越标；（飞机）滑出跑道；行动过火n. 超越目标；行动过火that outer circle, the ecological ceiling. Because there we put so much

pressure, on this extraordinary planet that we begin to kick it out of kilter平衡；顺利；良好状态. We cause climate breakdown, we acidify使变酸 the oceans, a hole in the ozone

layer, pushing ourselves beyond the planet boundaries of the life supporting systems that

have the last 11 thousand years, made earth such a benevolent仁慈的；慈善的；亲切的

home to humanity. So this double sided challenge to meet the needs of all within the

means of the planet, it invites a new shape of progress. No longer this ever rising line of

growth, but a sweet spot for humanity. Thriving a dynamic balance between the

foundation and ceiling. And I was really struck, once I’d drawn this pic to realize that the

symbol of wellbeing in many ancient cultures reflects this very same sense of this dynamic

balance. From the maori takarangi, to the Taoist yin yang, the Buddhist endless knot, the

celtic double spiral. So can we find this dynamic balance in the 21st century? Well that’s a

key question. Because as these red wedges 楔柱show, right now we are far from

balance. Falling short and overshooting at the same time. Looking in that hole, you can

see that millions or billions of people worldwide still fall short on their most basic of needs.

And yet we’ve already overshot at least four of these planetary boundaries. Risking

irreversible不可逆的；不能取消的；不能翻转的 impact of climate breakdown and

ecosystem collapse. This is the state of humanity and our planetary home. We, the people

of early 21st century, this is our selfie. No economist from last century saw this picture, so

why would we imagine that their theories would be up for taking on its challenges. We

need ideas of our own cuz we are the 1st generation to see this, and probably the last with

a real chance of turning this story around. You see, 20th century economies assured us

that if growth creates inequality, don’t try to redistribute, because more growth will even

things up again. If growth creates pollution, don’t try to regulate, because more growth will

clean things up again. Except it turns out. It doesn’t. and it won’t. we need to create

economies that tackle n. 滑车；装备；用具；扭倒vt. 处理；抓住；固定；与…交涉vi. 扭倒；拦截抢球the shortfall差额，缺少 and overshoot together by design. We need

economies that are regenerative and distributive by design. You see, we’ve inherited遗传的；继承权的；通过继承得到的 degenerative industries, we take earth’s materials, make

then into stuff we want. Use it for a while, often only once, and then throw it away. And that

is pushing us over planetary boundaries. So we need to bend 弯曲，使屈服those arrows

around. Create the economies that work with and within the cycles of living world. So the

resources are never used up but used again and again. Economies that run on sunlight

where waste from one process is food for the next. And this kind of regenerative design is

popping up every where. Over hundreds cities worldwide, from okyto to ozlo, from Harari

to hoba, already generate more than 70% of their electricity from sun, wind, and waves.

Cities like London, glazgo, Amsterdam are pioneering n. 先锋；拓荒者vt. 开辟；倡导；提倡vi. 作先驱

circular city design, finding ways to turn the waste from one urban process into food for

the next. To Queensland, Australia, farmers and foresters are regenerating once-barren

不毛之地landscapes so it teems with富于充满 life again. But as well as being

regenerative by design, our economy must be distributive design. And we’ve got

unprecedented 空前的opportunities for making that happen. Because 20th century

centralized technologies, institutions concentrated wealth, knowledge, and power in few

hands. This century, we can design our technologies and institutions to distribute wealth,

knowledge, and empowerment to many. Instead of fossil fuel energy and large scale

manufacturing, we’ve got renewable energy networks, digital platforms in 3d printing. 200

years of corporate control of intellectual property is being upended倒放，颠倒 by the

bottom-up, open source, peer to peer knowledge commons. And corporations that still

pursue maximum rate of returns for their shareholders, well they suddenly look rather out

of date. Next to social enterprises that are designed to generate multiple forms of value

and share it with those throughout their networks. If we can harness today’s technology

from AI, to blockchain区块链, to the internet things, to material science. If we can harness

vt. 治理；套；驾驭；披上甲胄；利用n. 马具；甲胄；挽具状带子；降落伞背带；日常工作

these in service of distributive design, we can ensure that healthcare, edu, finance,

energy, political voice, reaches and empowers those people who need it most. You see,

regenerative and distributive design create extraordinary opportunities for the 21st century

economy. So why does this leave Rostow’s airplane ride. For some it still carries the hope

of endless green growth. The idea that thanks to dematerialization 非物质化；湮没现象,

exponential指数（的） GDP growth can go on forever while resource use keeps falling. But

look at the data, this is a flight of fancy. Yes we need to dematerialize our economies, but

this dependency on unending growth cannot be decoupled from resource use on anything

like the scale required to bring our safely back within the planetary boundaries. I know this

way of thinking about growth is unfamiliar, because growth is good，no？. We want our

children to grow, our gardens to grow. Yes look to nature, growth is a wonderful health

source of life. It’s a phase. But many economies are growing at 7% a year. But look again

to nature, because from your children’s feet, to the amazon forest, nothing in nature grows

forever. Things grow, and they grow up, and they mature, and it’s only by doing so they

can thrive for a very long time. We already know this. If I told you my friend went to the

doctor who told her she had a growth, that feels very different, because we intuitively 直观地，直觉地understand when sth tries to grow forever within a living, healthy, thriving

system, it’s a threat to the health of the whole. So why would we imagine that our

economies would be the one system that could buck this trend反潮流 and succeed by

growing forever. We urgently need financial, political, and social innovations that enable

us to overcome the structural dependency on growth, so that we can instead focus on

thriving and balance within the social and ecological boundaries of the donut. If the mere

idea of boundary makes you feel bounded, think again, because the world’s most genius

people turn boundaries into the source of their creativity. From Mozart on his 5-octave

piano, Jimi Hendrix on his 6-string guitar, Serena William on a tennis court, It’s boundary

that unleash our potential. And the donut‘s boundaries unleash the potential for humanity

to thrive with boundless creativity, participation, belonging, and meaning. It’s gonna take

all the ingenuity心灵手巧，独创性；精巧；精巧的装置 we have got together, so bring it on.