Abstract

Sufficiency approaches to just and equitable environmental and climate policies have gained significant traction in both public and scholarly debates in recent years. These approaches focus on avoiding and reducing the demand for energy, materials and other natural resources while delivering wellbeing for all within planetary boundaries. The concept of “sufficiency corridors” captures this dual imperative: establishing a lower threshold of resource consumption necessary for human flourishing, alongside an upper threshold defined by planetary boundaries, with the aim of fostering equity across countries and generations.

In OECD countries, a number of sufficiency-oriented policies have been developed and implemented. Examples include fare-free public transport schemes, emission-differentiated road traffic taxes, levies on high-carbon luxury goods, and the integration of sufficiency into France’s 2015 Energy Transition Law. Yet, research and policy debates on sufficiency remain disproportionately focused on the Global North, while experiences from other regions have received comparatively less attention.

Emerging economies, however, are crucial sites of sufficiency-related innovation. These contexts face the dual challenge of curbing excessive consumption among expanding middle classes while ensuring the provision of essential services that meet the lower threshold of sufficiency corridors. Although not always explicitly framed as “sufficiency,” relevant measures are already in place. For example, fare-free bus programs have been introduced for senior citizens in Brazilian and Chinese cities, and for women in the Indian states of Tamil Nadu and Delhi.

This workshop offers a forum for advancing scholarly and practical engagement with sufficiency across diverse contexts. It convenes an international panel of researchers and practitioners to critically examine sufficiency policies, drawing on comparative insights and fostering cross-cultural and interdisciplinary dialogue.

The program includes talks by confirmed speakers as well as paper sessions with contributing participants (program details will be announced soon), all within an intimate and interactive setting. Participation is limited to around 30 people, and the working language of the event will be English. Non-presenting participants are warmly invited to register, join the discussions, and engage in this collective exploration of sufficiency as a pathway toward just and equitable climate and environmental policies.

This event is hosted by LIEPP and organized by Mallory Zhan, Manisha Anantharaman and Yamina Saheb.