Slow Down: The Degrowth Manifesto
by Kohei Saito · 人新世の「資本論」
Assigned by 1 of the 9 reading lists
A Japanese bestseller of 2020 by a young philosopher, translated into English in 2024. Saito argues that endless economic growth is incompatible with a habitable climate, that green growth and technological fixes are illusions, and that the late Marx, in his notebooks on ecology and pre-capitalist communities, points toward the answer. He proposes degrowth communism, a democratically planned economy of shared commons, shorter working hours and production for use rather than for profit. The book's unexpected commercial success in Japan, where it sold over half a million copies, made ecological Marxism a mainstream topic of conversation there before it reached English-language readers at all.
We recommendSlow Down, translated by Brian BergstromAstra House, 2024The English translation of the Japanese bestseller, published in Britain by Weidenfeld and Nicolson.
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- Written
- 2020 (English translation 2024)
- Form
- Economics
- Language
- Japanese
- Length
- Medium · 290 pp120 to 300 pages
- Difficulty
- Moderate2 of 5 for a first-year reader
Why it's on the list
Saito's rejection of green growth and technological fixes as illusions directly challenges the mainstream environmental policy consensus that decoupling economic growth from emissions represents climate change's most politically viable solution, insisting this widely assumed compromise cannot actually deliver what it promises. His turn to the late Marx's notebooks on ecology and pre-capitalist communities recovers genuinely understudied material within Marx's own considerable corpus, using this scholarship to argue Marx himself moved toward ecological thinking scholars have too easily overlooked in favor of his more familiar political-economic writings. His proposal for degrowth communism, a democratically planned economy of shared commons, shorter working hours and production for use rather than profit, offers a specific programmatic alternative rather than only critique, distinguishing his position from degrowth arguments that remain primarily diagnostic without comparable institutional detail. The book's remarkable commercial success as a Japanese bestseller before its English translation demonstrates genuine popular appetite for radical economic alternatives to growth-oriented climate policy, reaching an audience considerably larger than academic ecological Marxism typically achieves through more conventional scholarly publication.
Key themes
- Nature and the cosmos
- Saito argues that endless economic growth is incompatible with a habitable climate, directly challenging the mainstream environmental policy consensus that decoupling growth from emissions represents climate change's most politically viable solution.
- Money and class
- Saito's proposal for degrowth communism, a democratically planned economy of shared commons, shorter working hours and production for use rather than profit, offers a specific programmatic alternative to growth-oriented economic organization.
- History and progress
- Saito's turn to the late Marx's notebooks on ecology and pre-capitalist communities recovers genuinely understudied material, arguing Marx himself moved toward ecological thinking scholars have too easily overlooked in his more familiar writings.
- Society and the state
- The book's remarkable commercial success as a Japanese bestseller before its English translation demonstrates genuine popular appetite for radical economic alternatives to growth-oriented climate policy, reaching an unusually large audience.
Which translation to read
Our pick
Slow Down, translated by Brian Bergstrom
Astra House, 2024
The English translation of the Japanese bestseller, published in Britain by Weidenfeld and Nicolson.
Amazon: the Brian Bergstrom translation, opens in a new tabBookshop.org: the Brian Bergstrom translation, opens in a new tab
Overview
About two hundred and ninety pages, a Japanese bestseller of 2020 by the young philosopher Kohei Saito, translated into English in 2024. Saito argues that endless economic growth is incompatible with a habitable climate, that green growth and technological fixes are illusions, and that the late Marx, in his notebooks on ecology and pre-capitalist communities, points toward the answer.
He proposes degrowth communism, a democratically planned economy of shared commons, shorter working hours and production for use rather than for profit.
What happens
Growth incompatible with climate. Saito opens by arguing that endless economic growth is fundamentally incompatible with maintaining a habitable climate, rejecting any framework that treats continued expansion as compatible with genuine environmental sustainability.
Rejecting green growth. Saito argues that green growth and technological fixes are illusions, directly challenging the mainstream environmental policy consensus that decoupling economic growth from emissions offers a viable path forward.
Turning to the late Marx. Saito turns to the late Marx, examining notebooks on ecology and pre-capitalist communities that Saito argues point toward the answer, recovering understudied material within Marx’s considerable broader corpus.
Ecology in Marx’s late thought. Saito argues Marx himself moved toward genuinely ecological thinking in his final years, thought scholars have too easily overlooked in favor of his more familiar political-economic writings on capital and labor.
Proposing degrowth communism. Saito proposes degrowth communism specifically, a democratically planned economy built around shared commons rather than private accumulation or centralized state control alone.
Shorter hours and production for use. This proposed system features shorter working hours and production organized for genuine use rather than for profit, offering a specific programmatic alternative rather than only diagnostic critique of growth-oriented economics.
How to read it
Read Saito’s rejection of green growth and technological fixes as illusions as directly challenging the mainstream environmental policy consensus that decoupling economic growth from emissions represents climate change’s most politically viable solution.
Pay close attention to how the turn to the late Marx’s notebooks on ecology and pre-capitalist communities recovers genuinely understudied material, using this scholarship to argue Marx himself moved toward ecological thinking too easily overlooked by subsequent readers.
Notice how the proposal for degrowth communism, a democratically planned economy of shared commons, shorter working hours and production for use, offers a specific programmatic alternative rather than only critique of growth-oriented economic organization.
Consider the book’s remarkable commercial success as a Japanese bestseller before its English translation, demonstrating genuine popular appetite for radical economic alternatives to growth-oriented climate policy well beyond typical academic ecological Marxism’s usual audience.
Read this book alongside Pollin’s own De-Growth vs. a Green New Deal to see two sharply opposed positions within contemporary climate economics, one defending continued growth through massive clean investment, the other rejecting growth as fundamentally incompatible with genuine sustainability.
Questions it raises
- Does Saito’s rejection of green growth and technological fixes as illusions successfully refute mainstream decoupling strategies, or does this dismissal underestimate genuine potential for emissions reduction alongside continued, differently structured economic activity?
- How persuasive is Saito’s recovery of ecological themes from Marx’s late notebooks? Does this understudied material genuinely support his broader argument, or does it risk projecting contemporary ecological concerns onto historical texts written for different purposes?
- What does proposing degrowth communism specifically, rather than degrowth alone, accomplish for Saito’s argument? Does this specific institutional proposal offer a genuinely workable alternative, or does it inherit unresolved problems from earlier communist economic planning experiments?
- How should a reader weigh this book’s remarkable commercial success in Japan against its more specialized scholarly content? Does bestseller status suggest genuine popular readiness for radical economic alternatives, or does it primarily reflect skillful popular exposition of complex ideas?
- Given that this book directly opposes Pollin’s Green New Deal approach within the broader climate economics debate, how should readers evaluate these competing visions? Does either position adequately address the political feasibility of its proposed economic transformation?
- What does Saito’s specific focus on shorter working hours and production for use rather than profit suggest about degrowth communism’s actual daily texture? Does this vision offer sufficient concrete detail to evaluate its practical viability against continued growth-oriented alternatives?
Highlights
Saito argues that endless economic growth is incompatible with a habitable climate, and that green growth and technological fixes are illusions, directly challenging the mainstream environmental policy consensus that decoupling growth from emissions offers a viable path.
Paraphrase of the book's central negative claim, rejecting mainstream decoupling strategies as inadequate to the climate crisis.
Saito turns to the late Marx, in his notebooks on ecology and pre-capitalist communities, arguing this understudied material points toward the answer, recovering ecological themes in Marx's own thought that scholars have too easily overlooked.
Paraphrase of the book's central scholarly recovery, understudied late Marx material used to ground the ecological argument.
Saito proposes degrowth communism, a democratically planned economy of shared commons, shorter working hours and production for use rather than for profit, offering a specific programmatic alternative rather than only diagnostic critique of growth-oriented economics.
Paraphrase of the book's positive proposal, a specific institutional alternative distinguishing it from purely diagnostic degrowth arguments.
