progress in a steady-state society

On Mon, 5 Jun 2000 John_Groves@ferris.edu wrote:

> Gert Kohler raises the interesting issue of ceaseless accumulation in his
> discussion of Heilbronner. In the 60's there was a whole "small is
> beautiful" movement based around the works of Schumacher's book of the 
>same
> name. The idea is that there is an optimal size of a just and ecological
> economy. It was clear that it involved a smaller population. Such an
> economy would certainly be more eco-friendly. The hard part, it seems to
> me, is to maintain technological progress in an economic steady state. 


The clearest thing I've run across on this, although it's not totally 
original, is by Fred Block:

Postindustrial Possibilities (U. of California Press/1990).

He proposes the category "Qualitative Growth" as an alternative to
quantitive growth, which would still entail technogical development and
improvement in quality of life, but without increasing use of resources.

I've taken this idea a step further and used Block's QG as a *transition*
to a steady-state, a la Herman Daly, as part of a red/green strategy.
Developing new technologies to make a steady-state society possible in the
first place (having phased out oil, for instance) would be crucial.

As for technological progress *in* a steady-state society, I see no reason
to think that it would be desirable to continue the sort of "progress" we
enjoy under capitalism, with nuclear power, genetic engineering,
synthetic chemicals in abundance, and so forth.

RH