These articles are a result of House of Futures pre-analysis of the project In100Y and describes/discusses topics such as growth, progress and sustainability in the long run, societal transformations during the last 200 years, the purpose of growth and happiness research, the relationship between mankind and nature seen through the eyes of artists from 1812 to 2112, approaches and process design for the In100Y-project etc.
Measuring Growth
This is not economic growth
Economic growth as a concept is deeply riddled with problems. The word growth implies that there is a thing getting bigger, but the economy is not a thing – it’s a complex network, untold numbers of products and services, some of which will expand while others decline, some emerge and some fades.
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Do also read the article summing up the critique of GNP from the French Commission “GNP is not happiness”
Concepts of sustainability
Sustainability versus growth
The Brundtland commission kicked off the global agenda of sustainability (1978), and therefore we base our concept in their definition of sustainability, which is: “Development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” This is of course a general and unspecified approach – what are the needs of the present? How far do future generations reach?
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What is consciousness?
The future is in your mind
Coming soon
From Malthus to Brundtland and Beyond
Growth, progress and sustainability in the long run
Can growth continue? 200 years ago, Malthus answer was a resounding no. With limited land to sustain the population growth brought about by higher living standards, Malthus predicted that growth would stall as higher populations would result in lower living standards. Since then population growth has not only continued, but also surpassed by the economic growth.
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The next Transformations
The imperative of transforming economy, society and lifestyles isn’t a unique challenge for our time – it’s a condition of existence. It’s not a question of if, but how our society will change, and how we want it to change. We have to accept major changes in the next 100 years, but know that the last 100 years had an equally massive transformation – as did the 100 years before that.
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Economic Growth: Good, bad or ugly?
The purpose of growth and happiness research and normative positions on econmic growth
Economic activity is a question of attaining outputs by means of input. What is regarded as input and output is not only a technical consideration, but also a moral one. The way, however, that input is transformed to output can be classified in four categories, some of which are more compatible with sustainability than others. This classification divides growth into extensive versus intensive growth and material versus immaterial growth.
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Art and consiousness
The relationship between humans and nature from 1812 to 2112
Consciousness is an elusive concept, and as such, most attempts to define it do so in relation to something else. In this article the object in relation to which consciousness is defined is Arts and cultural history, and so this article will present art in a baseline scenario from 1812 to 2112 in order to extract an understanding of the changes in consciousness underlying or entwined in the cultural evolution. Furthermore, changes within the art world points at changes of importance with regard to our conception of nature and body. This is specifically relevant in relation to our investigation of sustainability and growth in the In100Years-project.
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Approaches and methodology
How we use Futures Studies methods
Keywords: Project elements, knowledge development, futures studies, scenarios, the seminars.
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