Ivan Savin, Jeroen van den Bergh,
Reviewing studies of degrowth: Are claims matched by data, methods and policy analysis?
Ecological Economics, Volume 226.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921800924002210
“Abstract: In the last decade many publications have appeared on degrowth as a strategy to confront environmental and social problems. We undertake a systematic review of their content, data and methods. This involves the use of computational linguistics to identify main topics investigated. Based on a sample of 561 studies we conclude that:
(1) content covers 11 main topics;
(2) the large majority (almost 90%) of studies are opinions rather than analysis;
(3) few studies use quantitative or qualitative data, and even fewer ones use formal modelling; (4) the first and second type tend to include small samples or focus on non-representative cases;
(5) most studies offer ad hoc and subjective policy advice, lacking policy evaluation and integration with insights from the literature on environmental/climate policies;
(6) of the few studies on public support, a majority concludes that degrowth strategies and policies are socially-politically infeasible;
(7) various studies represent a “reverse causality” confusion, i.e. use the term degrowth not for a deliberate strategy but to denote economic decline (in GDP terms) resulting from exogenous factors or public policies;
(8) few studies adopt a system-wide perspective – instead most focus on small, local cases without a clear implication for the economy as a whole. We illustrate each of these findings for concrete studies.”