As our world teeters on the edge of an increasingly perilous environmental future—extending beyond climate change—we must ask: what does true sustainability entail? How far are we from it, what are the root causes of our current trajectory, and what paths could lead us there?

Rod Taylor (author, columnist, radio host) asks these very questions to eleven esteemed Australian scientists and thinkers in a brand-new radio documentary. PGAP is proud to be the first platform to share this thought-provoking documentary, which explores ecological economics, planned Degrowth and Modern Monetary Theory.

Rod Taylor is author of “Ten Journeys on a Fragile Planet”, co-author with Mark Diesendorf of “The Path to a Sustainable Civilisation” and co-editor with Stephen Williams, of the groundbreaking book, “Sustainability and the New Economics”. Rod is also host of the ‘Fuzzy Logic Science Show.” Rod was a previous guest on PGAP (Fuzzy Logic on a Fragile Planet with Rod Taylor). Stephen Williams and Mark Disendorf were also past guests on PGAP. You can listen to their episodes HERE and HERE.

The impressive list of guests on the documentary ‘Rethinking Sustainability' include (in order of appearance):

• Prof David Lindenmayer
• Prof Will Steffen
• Prof Clive Hamilton
• Dr Kerryn Higgs
• Prof Philip Lawn
• Dr Mark Diesendorf
• Prof Steve Keen
• Ian Dunlop
• Prof Steven Hail
• High Court Justice Michael Kirby
• Prof Ian Lowe

Last but not least, a shout out to environmental scientist David Tiller, who provided production assistance in the making of this documentary.

This episode of PGAP was produced just before the disastrous election results in the USA. As such your co-hosts Michael Bayliss and Mark Allen come across as merely VERY pessimistic at the state of the world, instead of EXTREMELY. Stay tuned for our upcoming episode, where we’ll address these events in more depth and discuss the underlying systemic issues that shape our society. In the meantime, you can explore these ideas further through Mark’s Holistic Activism movement.

Now more than ever, it is important that progressive podcasts are supported, as some panacea to the extreme right leaning media that are dominating the airwaves. Please consider supporting PGAP by sharing this and other episodes with your networks, leaving a review on Apple Podcast and contacting us with your thoughts and feedback.

This episode of Post-Growth Australia Podcast was made possible with the kind support of Sustainable Population Australia.

Special Guest: Rod Taylor.

(Australian Poster)

During this revealing interview, Maren discusses the importance of MMT and the journey that making a feature length documentary on this important topic has taken her on. The conversation also explores why it is crucial that MMT goes hand in hand with post growth narratives and why it is important to combine the two in order to create an economic system that works within limits to growth.

(Maren Poitras)

‘Finding The Money’ was filmed and produced in the USA with a focus around Stephanie Kelton’s advocacy in that country. However, Australia is the first country in the world to host screenings in advance of the documentary’s official release in the USA later this year. This is testament to the growing popularity of MMT in Australia and its many homegrown advocates of economic reform. These include institutions such as Modern Money Lab and Economic Reform Australia as well as author Steve Williams - all have been previous guests on PGAP.

You can find the dates of the Australian screening tour below and if you are in the right place at the right time, we strongly encourage that you go and see it. Not only is it a brilliant documentary but you will also have the opportunity to meet and greet Stephanie Kelton and Maren Poitras. CLICK HERE to book your tickets.

Post-Growth Australia Podcast is made with the kind support of Sustainable Population Australia. We refer to SPA’s discussion paper in this interview: "Silver Tsunami or Silver Lining: Why We Should Not Fear an Ageing Population". Any views, opinions or legacy of our guests do not necessarily reflect those of PGAP or SPA.

Your PGAP co-hosts Michael Bayliss and Mark Allen are very pleased and humbled by the excellent response to the podcasts that we have made so far this year. We have had more listens than ever before, so a big thank you to our ever-growing community! We truly believe that "Finding the Money" and the conversations in this episode are very important and worth supporting, so we would be very grateful if you could share this episode within your networks. Also, please feel free to contact us at any time with your feedback and thoughts.

You can find out more about your hosts here and here.

Special Guest: Maren Poitras.

Dr Mark Diesendorf is Honorary Associate Professor in the Environment & Society Group, School of Humanities & Languages at UNSW Sydney. He is also Senior Editor for Energy of the international journal Global Sustainability. Originally trained as a physicist, he became a Principal Research Scientist in CSIRO, and then broadened out into interdisciplinary energy and sustainability research. From 1996 to 2001 he was Professor of Environmental Science and Founding Director of the Institute for Sustainable Futures at University of Technology Sydney.

PGAP listeners will be familiar with many of the challenges and solutions raised by Mark, in this interview, that are expanded on within the very concise and easy to read pages of “The Path to a Sustainable Civilisation”. These include the mechanisms of state capture and how they undermine democracy, the critical role that population sustainability contributes toward any planned Degrowth transition and how planned Degrowth may be facilitated with the sensible application of Modern Monetary Theory (MMT).

MMT is a favourite topic on PGAP and we highly recommend listening to our episode: “MMT for Activism with Gabrielle Bond”. You may also recognise Mark's co-author, Rod Taylor, who also contributed to the book “Sustainability and the New Economics” with Steve Williams, whom PGAP interviewed last year. Rod Taylor was also interviewed on PGAP for his own book “10 Journeys on a Fragile Planet.” We are certainly well read on this podcast!

PGAP is supported by Sustainable Population Australia. All views and perspectives from our esteemed guests, including current and past legacies, are their own and do not always reflect the positions held by PGAP or SPA. Your PGAP co-hosts, Michael Bayliss and Mark Allen, have been very impressed by the amount of contact and feedback that we have been receiving from our listeners and supporters. Thank you so much! Let’s build this community. Rate and review this and other episodes of PGAP on Apple Podcast or your favourite platform and feel free to share among your networks. Contact us anytime with your feedback, thoughts and ideas.

As Mark Diesendorf is a very industrious generator of wisdom, we are honoured to share a large collection of his work below, followed by the time stamp for this episode. Happy further reading!

Mark’s website: https://research.unsw.edu.au/people/associate-professor-mark-diesendorf

Mark’s Interview with The Sustainable Hour Podcast.

Mark and co-host Rod Taylor spoke at an online Australia Earth Law Alliance online event for Earth Laws month. The presentation may be seen at the AELA YouTube channel here. Yin Paradies and John Seed, who also spoke during Earth Laws month, were discusssed during the introduction of this episode. These talks may be watched here and here.

Mark wrote for The Conversation: Saving humanity: here’s a radical approach to building a sustainable and just society

New book: Mark Diesendorf & Rod Taylor (2023). The Path to a Sustainable Civilisation: Technological, Socioeconomic and Political Change. Palgrave Macmillan. eBook ISBN 978-981-99-0663-5; print ISBN 978-981-99-0662-8. See https://sustainablecivilisation.com/.

Order from https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-981-99-0663-5

Latest papers

Mark Diesendorf & Steven Hail (2022). Funding of the energy transition by monetary sovereign countries. Energies, volume 15, paper number 5908. https://doi.org/10.3390/en15165908 (Can be downloaded free of charge)

Mark Diesendorf (2022). Scenarios for the rapid phase-out of fossil fuels in Australia in the absence of CO2 removal. Australasian Journal of Environmental Management https://doi.org/10.1080/14486563.2022.2108514

Mark Diesendorf (2022.) Scenarios for mitigating CO2 emissions from energy supply in the absence of CO2 removal. Climate Policy 22:882-896. https://doi.org/10.1080/14693062.2022.2061407
Mark Diesendorf, David Roser & Haydn Washington (2023). Analyzing the nuclear weapons proliferation risk posed by a mature fusion technology and economy. Energies 16:1123. https://doi.org/10.3390/en16031123 .

Time Stamp

0:00:00 - 0:11:18 Introduction
0:11:19 - 1:08:02 Interview with Mark Diesendorf
1:08:03 - 1:16:23 Outro

Special Guest: Dr Mark Diesendorf.

PGAP spoke with lead editor Stephen Williams to find out more about this impressive book, and why economics is front and foremost of the world’s problems and why things need to change.

Stephen Williams has a background in newspaper journalism and law. He began his journalism career at The Canberra Times in 2000 and subsequently specialised in environmental matters. His overarching interest is in designing sustainable societies. He believes mainstream economics can only provide a path to collapse. He is the co-editor of Sustainability and the New Economics: Synthesising Ecological Economics and Modern Monetary Theory (Springer, 2022).

Want to find out more about “Sustainability and the New Economics: Synthesising Ecological Economics and Modern Monetary Theory”, purchase your own copy or encourage your local library to stock up? Check out the link to the book here

Want to find out more about some of the topics that Stephen brought up in the interview?

Modern Money Lab (courses, info): https://modernmoneylab.org.au

Herman Daly essay (with top-10 policies): https://www.greattransition.org/publication/economics-for-a-full-world

Did you like the economic focus of this episode? You might also like season 2 finale episode with Economic Reform Australia or The Economics of Arrival with Katherine Trebeck. Season 1 has the budget special with unconventional economist Leith van Onselen, or reimagining an earth centred economy with Michelle Maloney.

SUPPORT PGAP! Rate and review us on Apple Podcast [here. Subscribe here. Contact us here.

See you next episode? You wouldn't miss it for the world!

PGAP is made possible with the kind support of Sustainable Population Australia.

If you would like to find out more about PGAP host Michael Bayliss, his website can be visited here

(All opinions, publications and positions held by PGAP guests do not necessarily reflect the positions held by PGAP).

Special Guest: Stephen Williams.