Red flags in the Green Transition?

When it comes to the push for a ‘green transition,’ Professor Dan Breznitz is blunt: “What we’ve been discussing just isn’t going to cut it.” As the Munk Chair of Innovation Studies and one of the University of Toronto's leading innovation scholars, Breznitz consistently challenges conventional thinking. “We need to start talking about the green transition as just one phase of something bigger,” he says, “and that’s the bioeconomy.”

The bioeconomy, considered by some the successor and antidote to the industrial economy and a complement to the digital economy, hinges on the use of biological resources from land and sea to create a circular and sustainable system. Many conventional ‘green’ initiatives rely on resource-intensive processes that necessitate extraction, such as with critical minerals and battery production. The bioeconomy emphasizes waste reduction and renewable inputs.

While scholars and activists have identified many limitations of the green transition, Breznitz contends that its failure to account for production waste and its impact on resource and extraction workers remains substantially overlooked. He sees the bioeconomy as a broader and more ambitious target, with the green transition being just an initial phase.

Breznitz’s interest in the bioeconomy ignited when fellow researchers approached him about it after reading his 2021 book, Innovation in Real Places: Strategies for Prosperity in an Unforgiving World. The book, recognized by the Financial Times as one of the best of 2021 and awarded both the inaugural Balsillie Prize for Public Policy by the Writers’ Trust of Canada and The Donner Prize, explores how local populations can benefit from concepts innovation rather than be left behind.

Applying these principles to the bioeconomy, Breznitz, along with co-authors John Zysman and David Zilberman, are conducting a comprehensive study for the State of California with a focus on one of North America’s most important agriculture regions – the Central Valley. They have examined how the bioeconomy could foster equitable prosperity in countries such as Israel, Japan, Denmark, Canada, and the United States. Their research analyzed lessons learned, challenges faced, and strategies for building inclusive bioeconomic policies. Their recent explainer published by the Centre for European Policy Studies includes a framework and practical strategies for fostering innovation, economic development and sustainability in specific locations.

“People assume the green transition will benefit workers,” Breznitz explains. “But that’s not necessarily the case.” He points out that populist rhetoric often resonates with those excluded from the benefits of current green policies, or those left with the waste produced by ‘greener’ products.

“Without figuring out a way to transition towards a bioeconomy that benefits the short-term, mid-term, and long-term wellbeing of workers, populist figures who espouse ‘anti-woke’ rhetoric, climate change denialism, and exclusionary policies will find more traction among those already left behind by the green transition and an economy that is not truly renewable.  

Breznitz plans to bring this perspective into the classroom. The concept of the bioeconomy will feature prominently in his first-year mandatory course for Master of Global Affairs students at the Munk School, Global Innovation Policy, which he teaches in partnership with Professor Darius Ornston. The course encourages students to critically assess who benefits from innovation and who is left behind, using case studies, international policy frameworks, and research.

While the idea of a fully circular, renewable economy based on advanced manipulation of the biosphere may sound like science fiction, Breznitz reminds us that many once-unimaginable technologies are now commonplace. “Cyberspace was a wild cutting-edge subject of science fiction book not long ago,” he says with a smile. “A lot of ideas were once science fiction until science made them real.”