Grounding Economic Sustainability in Ecosocial Work: The Contribution of Degrowth

This article explores the contribution of degrowth to ecosocial work, arguing that degrowth offers the discipline a coherent economic framework for confronting the structural drivers of polycrises. While ecosocial work has gained visibility in recent years, its engagement with the economic dimensions of sustainability remains underdeveloped, and degrowth has yet to be systematically integrated into the field. Through conceptual analysis, we identify four dimensions of degrowth’s contribution to ecosocial work: it grounds the critique of growth as the material foundation of welfare systems; it specifies the structural mechanisms of extractive and colonial political economies; it clarifies the roots of managerial rationalities as obstacles to ecological transformation; and it extends the repositioning of care as a central principle of economic organisation. Two challenges in integrating this lens are also identified: the gap between normative reorientation and macro-institutional transformation, and the difficulty of translating degrowth principles into everyday professional practice within growth-dependent welfare organisations. The analysis concludes that integrating degrowth as a lens for ecosocial work requires moving beyond critique towards transformative alternatives at all institutional levels, from everyday practices to welfare system restructuring.