An Infrastructural Pathway to Degrowth

Abstract

Abstract We argue for consideration of deliberative democratic pathways to governing infrastructure systems to enable a planned reduction in economic activity. Given the dominant perspective is “infrastructure facilitates growth”, we first consider contemporary criticisms of growth. We critique the large-scale, complex infrastructures implied, and the forms of democratic governance envisaged. Such infrastructures drive forms of economic activity that advocates of degrowth demonstrate are incompatible with attempts to reduce resources consumed by contemporary economies and their emissions. We argue any deliberation on infrastructures must acknowledge they are not simply physical objects but rather bundles of relationships. With dominant economic relationships challenged by the view that infrastructures ought to be managed as commons we argue that the relational perspective sets the stage for deliberation over physical, social, and environmental infrastructure that escapes what are incorrectly assumed to be insurmountable path dependencies.