Lucile Mabilais
Author
Sufficiency is a competitive advantage, not a constraint. By embedding across all EU policies, Europe can guarantee well-being for all, long-term stability and social fairness amid growing geopolitical and environmental pressures. Making sufficiency the cornerstone of Europe’s sustainable future and its signature on the global stage.
Sufficiency avoids demand for natural resources, lowering risks tied to supply chain disruptions, price volatility, and geopolitical uncertainty. It's especially critical for energy, food and critical minerals. Demand for energy and materials can be avoided upfront (external link) through green roofs or safe cycling infrastructure, while meeting citizens' needs for comfort and mobility. Sufficiency is essential for meeting the Union's Economic Security Strategy (external link) goals and achieving Open Strategic Autonomy. (external link)
Sufficiency also boosts European's economic competitiveness by supporting business models rooted in durability, and repairability. Overconsumption benefits producers in low-cost countries, not European businesses. Unlike the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (external link), often criticized for mitigating harmful models, sufficiency proactively enables sustainable alternatives, where environmental legislation becomes a catalyst, not a constraint.
The European Commission's Green Deal was a bold response to scientific warnings on climate. Yet, its implementation faces mounting challenges, and calls for simplification grow louder. Environmental concerns alone no longer drive climate action across Member States. Sufficiency offers a science-based solution, addressing not only climate change but all nine planetary boundaries. (external link)
At its core, sufficiency means doing well with less, not through deprivation and sacrifice, but by enabling for a societal organization that fosters social, eudemonic and economic well-being within the planet's limits. It implies avoiding demand upfront for energy, materials, land, water and other natural resources, before seeking efficiency gains that trigger rebound effects. With sufficiency policies like shifting investments from car-centric infrastructures to walkable cities, the green transition becomes aspirational, not burdensome. This societal model aligns progress with both planetary boundaries and EU strategic imperatives.
Finally, sufficiency ensures a fair and inclusive transition, lowering costs, especially for low-income households. It's about enabling sustainable choices through the right infrastructures, rather than compensating for the fallout of an unfair transition (e.g., carbon pricing). Reducing the need for such compensation makes policy more cost-effective. By promoting a "Good Life" centred on well-being, and empowerment, sufficiency fosters optimism and civic resilience, vital at a time when the rule of law and democratic values are under pressure across and beyond the EU.