The Growth Malaise
Mussoorie - Photo: Karan Madhok
Extreme climate change and the environmental catastrophe in towns like Joshimath are another reminder for the need of a sustainable, tenable, and all-inclusive model of growth.
The cracks first began to appear early in the earliest days of 2023, like a dire warning of the year to come for the residents of Joshimath, a Himalayan town in the Chamoli district of Uttarakhand. The cracks spread across the town, which soon began to ‘sink’ under its own weight. Around 25 percent of Joshimath has been affected by land subsidence, and hundreds of residents have been evacuated. And the disaster may now be spreading to other towns and villages perched in the Himalaya, too.
The environmental catastrophe faced by Joshimath is a direct outcome for the quest of rapid economic growth that our nation is seeking, like the holy grail of progress. From Tehri and Karanaprayag to Mussoorie and Atali, towns and villages in the region are sinking on account of what experts believe is the large number of ill-advised construction projects coming up in the area, with the express purpose of fueling growth and development further afield in the plains.
The insatiable quest to exploit these regions for economic opportunity has caused alarm in the ecologically-unique and extremely-fragile Ladakh Himalaya, too. Local resident and social reformer Sonam Wangchuk, of 3 Idiots fame, recently went on fast to highlight the dangers posed to the life-sustaining glaciers in the region, a threat from unchecked and unregulated industrial growth in the region.
Given that economies do need to grow to sustain the people of a nation, is there a way out of this growth malaise? In his seminal essay, “In Praise of Idleness,” the great 20th-century philosopher Bertrand Russell held forth his view that work was accorded way too much importance by industrialized society, and that one required leisure time in which to pursue one’s interests. This, he felt, was the key to a civilized way of life.
There is no denying the fact that India needs to pursue economic growth to address the many problems that exist in the nation. That being said, it is equally important that the growth model being pursued should be a sustainable one, even if it somewhat crimps the economic growth rate.
Compare this thought to the mindless pursuit of growth advocated by the mandarins of the contemporary world. At a time when the world still hasn’t fully recovered from the millions of deaths that the Covid-19 pandemic caused over the past few years, this ‘growth malaise’ reeks of a significantly misplaced priority.
Much of the global narrative focuses on bemoaning a possible short-term recession—which might assail the world economy in early 2023—rather than shifting our attention to debate on the causes of the devastating pandemic, and why freak weather and regular environmental catastrophes have almost become mainstream. Experts hold that, unless the Gross National Product [GDP] of a nation rises on a regular and consistent basis, there will be a decline in standards of living and other kinds of progress, which may lead to social problems like fewer jobs for the youth.
But is that really true? Not according to eminent economist Herman Daly, who believes that it is better to adopt a steady-state economy, one which abjures our environment-destroying nature of the pursuit of growth—a pursuit that is blind to the finite nature of natural resources available on Earth. Daly, instead, recommends an economic model that is in harmony with the ecology.
Does GDP growth have a direct correlation with happiness? This would be a no-brainer to most, as higher GDP translates to better nutrition and higher longevity, and consequently more ‘happiness’. That would certainly be true in the sense that a nation suffering from grinding poverty needs to grow economically to be able to feed its people. But the unrestrained models of growth being pursued by the already wealthy countries does not add much to the happiness of their own people, while almost ruining the already-marginalized countries that bear the brunt of the damage to the ecology caused by the wealthiest nations.
According to United Nation figures, Costa Rica is the 13th happiest country in the world with, a GDP of $12,472, compared to the 18th position of the USA, with a GDP per capita of $63,413. Drawing a parallel with the human body—where there is a growth of human cells to regenerate aging cells and any abnormal growth of such cells turns cancerous—our planet and the life on it can get negatively impacted on account of unchecked economic growth.
In 1974, Richard Easterlin, professor of economics at the University of Pennsylvania proposed what came to be known as the Easterlin paradox. He suggested that while there may be a direct correlation between income and happiness both within and among nations, this trend does not hold good over the long run, with happiness not continuing to grow alongside income. If we assume that there is truth in this, does this unplanned pursuit of growth—growth at any cost—make much sense?
While it is true that developing nations like India need to grow their economies substantially to raise the general standard of living of the people to an acceptable level, care has to be taken to ensure that the growth does not come at a heavy environmental price. Our coal-fired power plants are not helping the pollution situation in the country, and the infrastructure projects in the Himalayan region too are fraught with environmental risks.
There is no denying the fact that India needs to pursue economic growth to address the many problems that exist in the nation, the least of which is the high rate of unemployment amongst the nation’s youth. That being said, it is equally important that the growth model being pursued should be a sustainable one, even if it somewhat crimps the economic growth rate.
Throwing caution to the winds and plundering natural resources will wreak havoc in the not-so-distant future. Incidents like the mass felling of rainforests in Brazil and Southeast Asia will lead to grave environmental instability, for which the world will undoubtedly pay a heavy price in the years ahead, unless there are drastic interventions made. The industrialized West—which was long the trailblazer in achieving dizzying growth, without giving any thought to the environmental damage it caused in the process—owes it to the rest of the world to lead the way in heralding a sustainable model of growth, which may be slower, but more tenable and all inclusive.
At present, the West looks at the whole world from a geopolitical perspective, where containing the influence of regional power centres takes precedence over finding a way to provide equitable growth to the entire world that does not decimate the environment. The US and NATO have their hands full with trying to contain the Russian bear and the Chinese dragon, even while the planet hurtles towards environmental Armageddon. While the current geo-political issues are surely necessary, nothing compares to the grave future that the world faces.
Humanity has made much vaunted technological progress, which have fulfilled a number of our daily challenges with the ease of a command. With our potential for innovation, why can’t we also come up with different models of human survival, rather than the dastardly one of unchecked and unthinking growth? We found a way to fight the pandemic, didn’t we? Look at the record time in which the Covid-19 vaccines were created and distributed. When the United States decided that they wanted to put a man on the moon, they did. Elon Musk may yet succeed in setting up a human settlement on Mars in his lifetime, but we have greater tasks to achieve back on the blue planet—that of its survival.
This is a bigger fight on our hands, and the future of our species rests on our chances of winning it. At home in India, let’s begin by leaving the Himalayas alone to breathe and regenerate. They are India’s greatest wealth and crucial to our survival and need to be nurtured back to their pristine glory while they can. The future generations will thank us for that.
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Vipin Labroo is a content creator, author and PR consultant. A member of the Nonfiction Authors Association, he has years of corporate experience working with an eclectic range of clients, writing press releases, articles, blogs, white papers, research reports, website content, eBooks and so on across segments like technology, business & marketing, internet marketing, healthcare, fashion, real estate, travel and so on. You can find him on Twitter: @labroovipin and Instagram: @vipin_labroo.
