What Charlie and the Chocolate Factory can teach us about the next stage of growth

Growth leads to a shift

In Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Willy Wonka invented everlasting gobstoppers. The infinite candy, the same particles being sucked forever and yet never getting any smaller.

Since the industrial revolution, the dominant mindset has been on infinite growth via the consumption of the same resources which must deplete. There are no everlasting gobstoppers. We exist in both a resource and economic growth constrained world. This aligns to the thinking of ‘donut economics' by Kate Raworth, which calls for a new kind of economics for the modern world to meet the needs of humans, while not overwhelming critical systems: regenerative, not degenerative, growth. 'Things are only going to get worse' as UK economy contracts in March We remain highly positive about ...