Capitalism and Degrowth: Dialectic of Opposing Fantasies

Marina Aristova

Marina Aristova Stasis Center for Practical Philosophy

Keywords: Dialectics, fantasy, entropy, degrowth, capitalism, Georgescu-Roegen

Abstract

The Entropy Law, the theoretical inspiration for the ecological movement known as degrowth, describes an irreversible transition from a state of heat to a state of cold associated with energy dispersal. However, it is not entropy that interests us here, but rather the phantasmagorical images associated with it, such as the heat death of the universe, time’s arrow, and cold decay, that could explicate the fantasies behind two opposing economic principles: capitalism and degrowth. As Slavoj Žižek suggests, fantasy is the means of escaping the unbearable Real. In this article, the capitalist compulsion to burn is posited as a response to the traumatic encounter with the Real, the imagery of cold decay, or, in its ultimate form, the heat death of the universe. The capitalist fantasy of escaping cold decay by burning fossil fuels is opposed to the degrowth fantasy of extinguishing global fire. These two opposing fantasies intertwine and reflect each other, producing the dialectic of fantasies.

Author Biography

Marina Aristova , Stasis Center for Practical Philosophy

MA in Philosophy;

Stasis Center for Practical Philosophy,

European University at St. Petersburg, Gagarinskaya st. 6/1A,

St. Petersburg, Russia;

E-mail: [email protected]

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