Seeking solutions Beyond Growth in 2023

The Beyond Growth 2023 conference is an initiative of 20 MEPs, supported by the President of the European Parliament, Roberta Metsola.

The event, which took place on 15, 16 and 17 May, aimed to discuss and co-create policies for sustainable prosperity in Europe, based on a systemic and transformative approach to economic, social and environmental sustainability and its inclusive governance framework.

Euronews organised a debate with four of the participants: Marie Toussaint, French MEP and vice-president of the Greens/EFA group, Timothée Parrique, French social scientist and writer, Anuna De Wever, Belgian climate activist and the face of the Friday for Futures movement in Belgium, and Ludovic Voet, confederal secretary of the European Trade Union Confederation.

Marie Toussaint : We speak a lot about climate change, but also about biodiversity, about toxic substances or about water. And we really need to act. And what drove this crossing of the planetary boundaries? Well, it's the race for profits, this dogma of growth that is supposed to bring all the happiness in the world. What we've been told for ages is it's supposed to bring us a redistribution of wealth. So, social equality. It's also supposed to bring us to technologies that would save the environment that we are destroying. And it's supposed to solve all our problems. So everyone is just running after growth. Whether it be private companies wanting to chase profits they need as growth, and political leaders that also pretend that chasing this growth is going to solve all the issues that we have. And we can definitely see that this is not working, that we are crossing these planetary boundaries, putting at risk the survival of humanity and of many other species and