Definition
The concept of sufficiency in the context of consumption and lifestyles is based on having and doing “enough” for a good life, for what matters. Here, “enough” is both the opposite of “excessive” or “wasteful” – creating a sense of a ceiling – and a synonym for “adequate” or “appropriate”, creating a floor. As consumption choices are connected to diverse effects related to natural (i.e., energy, material, water, land) and human resources, they collectively exceed planetary boundaries, endangering livelihoods and the earth’s sustainability. Thus, sufficiency specifically asks for a reduction in wasteful consumption through lifestyle and behavioral changes, driven by both individual actions and institutional changes (see Behavior Change, Choice Editing, and Product-Service Systems). At the same time, many people worldwide still lack adequate access to services and goods for their livelihoods.
Along these lines, Chapter 9 of the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) summarizes sufficiency as “avoiding the demand for materials, energy, land, water, and other natural resources while delivering a decent living standard for all within the planetary boundaries”. It thus aligns with the concepts of doughnut economics or safe and just consumption corridors. This “avoiding” should not imply sacrifice but describes a new vision of a good life. While sufficiency aims at a reduction of energy and use of materials, it does not necessarily equate to austerity and is at its core still connected to a better quality of life and well-being (see Well-being Economy).
Sufficiency is different from the other two guiding strategies for sustainability: Efficiency and Consistency. Consistency aims at adopting processes and technologies in line with natural processes (e.g., “cradle-to-cradle” design) (see Circular Economy and Society). Efficiency aims at increasing output per input. Therefore, while these two focus on the characteristics of technologies and engineering systems, sufficiency is a normative concept asking us to reduce the impacts of our economic activities through lifestyle and behavior changes and secure “sufficient” human well-being for all.
History
Key elements of sufficiency – satisfaction through moderation, harmony with surroundings – have been the base principles of diverse communities across the globe for a long time, as reflected in concepts like Ubuntu, Buen Vivir, or ān fèn zhī zú (安分知足). Thailand has put forward the “sufficiency economy” as a driving principle for the country’s development since the 1997 Asian financial crisis, with sustainability based on moderation at its core.
In the West, since the 1960s, many scholars like Kenneth Boulding, Ernst F. Schumacher, Herman Daly, and Wolfgang Sachs have suggested broader ideas of sufficiency as an ethical responsibility for the planet. By noting that the incremental and relative (input to output) nature of efficiency is bound to be “incompatible with nature” as consumption increases, Sachs proposed sufficiency (“Suffizienzrevolution”) as an alternative principle to efficiency (see Steady-State Economy). Thomas Princen called for a normative sufficiency approach to integrate sustainability concerns into our economic activities, aiming to remedy the environmental impacts that threaten the regenerative capacity of ecological systems and, consequently, human well-being.
Recently, the topic has gained momentum in academia, with more quantitative insights on planetary boundaries and minimum well-being thresholds. Following these insights, sufficiency has entered policy discussions, so far mainly in the European Union.
Different Perspectives
Sufficiency is about recognizing the essential needs of people and acknowledging how they differ based on geographies or socioeconomic contexts (see Fair Consumption Space). It encompasses the sufficientarian view in ethics that everyone should be above certain levels of services to lead a dignified life, while setting aside the complex question of how to define the “certain minimum level”.
So far, the sufficiency literature has concentrated more on the context of high-income populations, with their affluence and structural/cultural wastefulness, and thereby on absolute material consumption reduction. Low-income countries might therefore see sufficiency as prescriptive and neglectful of the development needs and aspirations of poorer societies (a form of “bullying”, according to Monyei et al. (2019)).
Sufficiency at an individual level is often understood as the need to “restrain” consumption levels, either voluntarily or following regulation. It is frequently linked to concepts about lifestyle choices such as minimalism, voluntary simplicity, or alternative hedonism. According to Riefler et al. (2024), individuals associate voluntary consumption reductions with both losses and gains on a personal, social, and universal level, which are relevant to consider in the design and promotion of sufficiency strategies. While individuals are gradually adopting practices of sustainable consumption, the transformative impact of this might be limited if efforts on macro and meso (institutional) levels do not complement them. The focus of sufficiency at these levels is on facilitating societal norm changes and fostering collective and structural actions at the local, national, and international levels required to support beneficial sufficiency policies and provisioning systems (e.g., land-use planning, repurposing of buildings, redesigning transport systems; see Urban Planning and Spatial Allocation, Social Tipping Points, Social Norms, Political Economy of Consumerism, Foundational Economics).
The circular economy also aligns with sufficiency, by reducing the resource throughput of a society using strategies to minimize the use of new resources and reintegrate materials in production and consumption systems, including, for example, extending product lifetimes and fostering reuse and repair (see Extended Producer Responsibility, Product Returns and Right of Withdrawal, Repair). Similarly, sufficiency is also reflected in the “avoid” and “shift” components of avoid-shift-improve strategies that aim at reducing environmental impacts.
This concept is closely related to (and can be seen as an element in implementing) degrowth, which has been coined in high-income countries as the antithesis of the macroeconomic growth paradigm. Degrowth advocates for a shift away from GDP growth as a primary policy objective, aiming for a transformation of the entire economic system toward steady-state or contracting economies. This transformation consequently has implications beyond the production and consumption system. Sufficiency discussions must thus be extended to topics such as implications for labor and financial markets and business models (see The Role of Business). The contradictions between sufficiency and capitalism and growth present a key challenge in efforts toward sustainable consumption and lifestyles.
Application
Sufficiency, often through more structural changes, ultimately provides an opportunity to avoid or reduce resource-intensive behavioral, institutional, and infrastructural lock-ins, resulting from, for example, technological and financial path dependencies. Short-term policy measures have often focused on quick non-structural interventions implemented in the wake of energy crises (e.g., the energy sobriety plan in France or energy conservation plans in European and Asian countries, focusing on turning off lights, putting limits on thermostat settings, lowering car usage). However, policies involving more systemic changes are mostly absent.
Recognizing this, a Sufficiency Manifesto was recently signed by many European organizations, calling for more fundamental shifts toward sufficiency in the EU’s policy agenda. Sufficiency policy options widely discussed include:
- reducing individual car use or air travel through improved public transport and spatial planning, the latter especially in cities (see Urban Planning and Spatial Allocation, Choice Editing);
- introducing circular economy measures (lowering resource intensity and reducing waste) during the lifecycle of goods and services (e.g., right to repair, industry compatibility standards);
- optimizing existing building uses;
- financial interventions such as taxes, subsidies, or tariff systems to discourage excessive activities in resource-intensive consumption/production (e.g., progressive taxes); see Sustainable Finance, Money.
- regulations prohibiting or rationing excessive activities (e.g., rationing of flying, ban on short-haul flights, ban on single-use products, advertising bans) (see Personal Carbon Allowance).
One of the trickiest and most sensitive debates in discussions of sufficiency is how to operationalize and ultimately achieve what it intends: How will consumption be distributed within or across countries and time, accounting for technological change, human needs, and place- and time-specific conditions? Who can decide what is enough across massive heterogeneity in societies? Once such decisions have been made, who can enforce them? These questions hint toward an acceptability challenge once discussions become concrete, related to diverse questions of justice (see Climate Justice) and concern about restricting desired living standards and sacrificing well-being. For sufficiency to become an integral part of overall systemic change beyond transient projects and initiatives, these challenges have to be overcome.
Further Reading
Jungell-Michelsson, J., & Heikkurinen, P. (2022). Sufficiency: A systematic literature review. Ecological Economics, 195, 107380. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolecon.2022.107380.
Mathai, M.V., Sachs, W., & Lorek, S. (2023). Editorial: From an ethic of sufficiency to its policy and practice in late capitalism. Frontiers in Sustainability, 4. https://doi.org/10.3389/frsus.2023.1324319.
Monyei, C.G., Jenkins, K.E.H., Monyei, C.G., Aholu, O.C., Akpeji, K.O., Oladeji, O., & Viriri, S. (2019). Response to Todd, De Groot, Mose, McCauley and Heffron’s critique of “Examining energy sufficiency and energy mobility in the global south through the energy justice framework”. Energy Policy, 133, 110917. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2019.110917.
Princen, T. (2003). Principles for sustainability: From cooperation and efficiency to sufficiency. Global Environmental Politics, 3(1), 33–50. https://doi.org/10.1162/152638003763336374.
Riefler, P., Baar, C., Büttner, O.B., & Flachs, S. (2024). What to gain, what to lose? A taxonomy of individual-level gains and losses associated with consumption reduction. Ecological Economics, 224, 108301. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108301.