'Degrowth has spent two decades arguing with itself in the same handful of European cities, and its critics in the global South have asked a fair question: who is this for? Julien-François Gerber, at last, offers an answer. Degrowth: Revitalizing Critical Development Studies puts the Northern critique of the growth imperative into serious conversation with peasant studies, post-development, and ecofeminism. From the imperial mode of living to the long arc of structural adjustment, Gerber writes the book the field has needed for a decade: a development studies that has finally stopped pretending growth was ever the cure, and a degrowth that has finally stopped pretending the Global South had nothing to teach.'Raj Patel, co-author of 'A History of the World in Seven Cheap Things''In these times, Degrowth is essential: both the book and the idea. With clarity and elegance, this book shows how we can make degrowth happen.'Anna Tsing, co-author of Field Guide to the Patchy Anthropocene'Degrowth is often derided as a fantasy originating in the work of some scholars working in the global North, where the negative impacts of growth have long outweighed the benefits. This volume shows, however, that cosmovisions from the global South also help to shape a discourse sceptic about dominant versions of growth, and that social movements in developing countries have long been denouncing the confusion between growth (as measured by the increase of GDP) and well-being. It provides a powerful indictment of classic understandings of "development", and it shows that social progress can be achieved without necessarily increasing the total output of the economy.

' Olivier De Schutter, former UN Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights.