# Girona Postcreixentista (Post-growth Girona)
## Project Overview
- **World's first "post-growth municipality"** initiative in Girona, Catalonia
- **Established**: Early 2024 via formal memorandum of understanding
- **Core focus**: Reorienting municipal economy to prioritize planetary and human well-being over endless economic growth
- **Project websites**:
- https://degrowth.org/projects/girona/
- https://darkmatterlabs.org/feed/fostering-a-post-growth-municipality-in-girona
## Key Partners
- **Girona City Council**: Municipal government implementing the initiative
- **Research & Degrowth International Association**: Academic and advocacy support
- **Dark Matter Labs**: Design and implementation partner
- **LEQUIA (University of Girona)**: Research partner
## Implementation Approach
The initiative follows a multi-phase methodology:
1. Critical review of urban policies across all city departments from a growth-dependency angle
2. Development of outline proposals across sectors, districts, and scales
3. Collaborative refinement of proposals with citizens, businesses, and public sector (2024-2027)
4. Creation of a just, eco-social transition plan for Girona
## Vision for Post-growth Girona
The reimagined municipality aims to feature:
- **Relocalized production** using biomaterials and focusing on beneficial goods
- **Better distributed economic wealth** through wealth taxes coordinated with other municipalities
- **Resource flow awareness** connecting the city with its immediate hinterland and broader Catalonia
- **Shared profit and work** resulting in more jobs with fewer working hours
- **Collective luxury** valued over individual accumulation
- **Ecological economics education** based on embedding economy within environmental limits
## Bioregional Significance
Within Catalonia's bioregional context, this initiative is groundbreaking for:
- Demonstrating municipal-level implementation of degrowth principles
- Creating a replicable model for other Catalan municipalities
- Developing policy tools that connect urban centers with their surrounding bioregions
- Establishing formal governance structures that prioritize ecological boundaries
- Building bridges between academic degrowth theory and practical municipal governance
## Timeline
- **Early 2024**: Signing of post-growth memorandum of understanding
- **2024-2025**: Initial policy review and outline proposals development
- **2025-2027**: Collaborative refinement of proposals with stakeholders
- **2027**: Target for comprehensive just, eco-social transition plan implementation
## Media Coverage
The initiative has received significant media attention in both Catalan and international press:
- NacióDigital
- Climática
- Ara
- The Atlantic
- El Crític
[Sources: https://degrowth.org/projects/girona/, https://darkmatterlabs.org/feed/fostering-a-post-growth-municipality-in-girona, and Bioregionalisme a Catalunya documentation]