Making the great turnaround work

This paper critically examines whether the European fiscal framework will be sufficient to stabilise the macro economy in the aftermath of the multiple crises, let alone achieve the goals of a green transition that leads to full capacity utilisation of the economy. The  reader will come to understand that private finance alone is neither sufficient nor desirable to achieve the goals of a socially just green transition.

This paper links two things that are often dealt with separately when discussing what we mean by the word “just” in the notion of a “just transition”. On the one hand, activists and reformers see this as an opportunity to empower marginalised populations and redistribute wealth-generating assets using the state in the form of green industrial policy. On the other hand lies private finance, especially in the form of asset managers, who own huge swathes of global companies. These competing notions of “just” are used as a way to discuss how to have a transition that leverages the investments of the private sector without once again simply giving capital everything it wants at the expense of everyone else.