




































Ecology, Economy and Society–the INSEE Journal 8(1): 147-151, January 2025 

BOOK REVIEW 
 

Navigating Environmental Crisis 
 

Shailesh Kumar  and Diptimayee Nayak  
 
Peter A. Victor. 2023. Escape from Overshoot: Economics for a Planet in Peril. 
Gabriola Island, BC: New Society Publishers. 320. ISBN 978-0-865-71975-0 
 

It is necessary now more than 
ever to be conscious of and 
consider the environmental toll 
that human activity has wreaked 
upon the Earth. Natural resource 
stocks are running out, and 
greenhouse gas (GHG) 
emissions are on the rise, directly 
affecting the rate of climate 
change. These changes will 
impact not only our longevity 
and survival but also the larger 
ecosystem, which includes non-
human life forms. Peter A. 
Victor, a professor emeritus at 
York University’s Faculty of 
Environmental and Urban 
Change, and a pioneering 
ecological economist, in this 
book presciently addresses the 
dangers associated with the 

                                                      
 Doctoral Fellow, Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, Indian Institute of 

Technology Roorkee, Uttarakhand, India 247667; skumar2@hs.iitr.ac.in  

 Associate Professor, Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, Indian Institute of 
Technology Roorkee, Uttarakhand, India 247667; dipti.nayak@hs.iitr.ac.in 

Copyright © Kumar and Nayak 2025. Released under Creative Commons Attribution © 
NonCommercial 4.0 International licence (CC BY-NC 4.0) by the author.  

Published by Indian Society for Ecological Economics (INSEE), c/o Institute of  Economic 
Growth, University Enclave, North Campus, Delhi 110007.  

ISSN: 2581–6152 (print); 2581–6101 (web).  

DOI: https://doi.org/10.37773/ees.v8i1.1453  

mailto:skumar2@hs.iitr.ac.in
mailto:dipti.nayak@hs.iitr.ac.in
https://doi.org/10.37773/ees.v8i1.1453


 Ecology, Economy and Society–the INSEE Journal [148] 

present state of affairs, beginning with the concept of overshoot. According 
to him, “[w]hen any organism exceeds the capacity of its environment to 
sustain it, it is in overshoot” which “can also be true of humans when our 
use of what nature provides is greater than nature’s capacity to regenerate” 
(3). An environment’s capacity to optimally sustain a population is known 
as its carrying capacity. This is important in understanding overshoot, as 
human demands “from the biosphere had begun to exceed what the 
biosphere could provide through its capacity to regenerate” (7). 

The first three sections of the book outline historical trends in carrying 
capacity, which are viewed in relation to the exponential increase in the 
human population since the 1800s. Overshooting the carrying capacity can 
lead to a decrease in the population, an increase in deaths, and a depleted 
ecosystem. To comprehend the ecological consequences of overshoot and 
its impact on an ecosystem’s carrying capacity, the ecological footprint of 
human activities is assessed. This approach “asked how much of the 
regenerative capacity of the biosphere—its biocapacity—was being used to 
support human activities” “instead of asking, what size of population can 
be supported by a given carrying capacity” (9). The biocapacity is measured 
in global hectares (gha) and can be estimated globally, nationally, and even 
locally, based on the “biological productivity of different land uses (e.g., 
forests compared to pasture) and in yields within the same land use (e.g., 
tropical forests compared to boreal forests)” (7). We are already 
overshooting, and every year, the regenerative capacity of the Earth is fully 
used before the end of the year. When that happens, it is observed as Earth 
Overshoot Day. The biocapacity of a depleted ecosystem can increase if 
efforts are made to support it, such as through an agroecological approach 
or by increasing agricultural output through intensive efforts. The ecological 
footprint also captures data on consumption levels, income inequality, 
living spaces, food habits, and standards of living. 

As the author points out, “differences among the ecological footprints of 
people living in high-income countries pale in comparison to the 
differences in average ecological footprints of people in countries grouped 
by income levels” (11). Thus, evaluating the ecological footprint aids in 
determining the extent of overshoot; however, how the overshoot is 
managed is not accounted for in the calculation. It has also been argued that 
planetary boundaries exist in areas such as ozone depletion, climate change, 
ocean acidification, and land use, which, if transgressed, would significantly 
increase the risk of catastrophe. Much of the concern regarding catastrophe 
stems from the economic nature of growth and progress, which is dealt 
with in the second part of the book, in which the author considers the 
economy as another subsystem among Earth’s systems, which is not seen as 



[149] Kumar and Nayak 

 
 

independent of it, as was the case in the past. For the future, the author lays 
out a conical perspective that is divided into five categories based on the 
likelihood of the occurrence of events and scenarios: preposterous, 
possible, probable, plausible, and preferable. 

Chapters 3 and 4 deal with the economic concept of growth as it evolved 
from classical economics to contemporary policy-making. The author 
remarks that the linear conception of growth is nowhere more prominent 
than in the modern economic idea of progress. Among the classical 
economists, the author discusses in detail the theories of Smith, Keynes, 
and Marx, thus mapping out an economic terrain that is both richly 
informed and conceptually multifaceted. They also differ in their analyses of 
capitalism, especially as it was expanding as the dominant mode of 
production during the Industrial Revolution. The author also looks at their 
theories in hindsight, examining the contributions they made to economics 
in promoting a more ecologically sensitive understanding. Marx, in fact, was 
cognizant of the “natural capital” that capitalists owned and profited from. 
The author also refers to M. Stanley Jevons and his study of coal 
production in Britain, which, as the author writes, “is critical when 
forecasting the contribution that technological advances can make to 
reducing and avoiding overshoot” (60). There was also the “marginal 
revolution” in economics, which argued that market prices were based on 
the marginal utility of commodities, which is an incremental change based 
on minuscule changes—not in productive forces but in market forces—
ushering in the era of neoclassical economics. Living by standards and 
consumption determined by the market, with complete disregard for the 
availability of the Earth’s natural resources, has brought us ever closer to 
the planetary peril of overshoot. 

Environmental economics, pioneered by Arthur Pigou, Wassily Leontief, 
Frederick Soddy, and Kenneth Boulding, among many others, addresses 
issues such as pollution and emission of GHGs, leading to new approaches 
such as “environmentally extended input-output analysis” (67). Such 
approaches have been used by scholars to compare and compute data on 
ecological footprints. Such segues made it possible for ecological economics 
to be discussed seriously, where both materials and energy follow the laws 
of thermodynamics. The author also borrows the notion of exclusion and 
rivalry. The former “exists when there are enforceable property rights that 
entitle the owner to exclude others from using something,” and the latter is 
discussed in terms of “refer[ring] only to whether the use or consumption 
of an item by one person necessarily prevents its use or consumption by 
another” (75). 



 Ecology, Economy and Society–the INSEE Journal [150] 

The most interesting juggernauts are described in Chapters 5 and 6, which 
present alternative visions and current trends that can help us escape the 
overshoot. Interesting observations can be found in demographic and 
technology trends, such as the increasing concentration of people living and 
working in urban areas and social media. The author argues that  

[the] prevailing growth paradigm, and the stories we tell ourselves about the 
future, tend to reinforce the idea that the future will look a lot like the present, 
with a linear progression to ever-greater prosperity and technological 
complexity—until, because of overshoot and its effects, it doesn’t. (149)  

Green growth is “the idea that economic growth can continue indefinitely 
while at the same time resource requirements and environmental impacts 
decline” (153). This growth is dependent on the market, as it is based on 
the observation of the GDP. The author suggests three types of decoupling: 
relative, absolute, and strong (or sufficient) decoupling, wherein the 
“greater the difference between the rate of emissions intensity reduction 
and the rate of economic growth, the greater is the rate of reduction in 
emissions” (159). This leads to a growth of many colours, wherein 
efficiency and economic growth have become emblematic of green growth. 
Escaping overshoot requires a move towards green investments made 
through taxation, borrowing, and revenues; however, the green economy is 
found to be inadequate to entirely correct for overshoot, and so the author 
ponders the possibilities of post growth and degrowth. 

Chapters 7 to 9 build a case and a model for “a post growth era in which 
wellbeing increases while throughput stabilizes then declines is what makes 
post growth both plausible, preferable, ad a potential escape from 
overshoot” (179). The author offers a solution based on the steady-state 
economy proposed by Herman Daly “in direct response to his concern with 
overshoot” (182). This solution emphasizes the maintenance of stocks that 
can rejuvenate the biosphere as well as support the throughput of both the 
population and the resources it requires within the capacity of the 
ecosystem, remaining sensitive to its biological limits. He discusses many 
economic models and working scenarios, such as the circular economy, the 
well-being economy, Buen Vivir (or living well), doughnut economics, 
regenerative economics, degrowth, and eco-socialism. Bodies like the 
United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) 
play an important role in bringing countries together to set common 
reduction targets at the Conferences of the Parties (COP) debates. He also 
discusses Earth4All, based on the system dynamics design of Jay Forrester, 
which was also used by the authors of the book, Limits to Growth. Through 
these and other simulations, the author demonstrates the escape scenario, 
which is “not an objective, but simply an outcome of other initiatives 



[151] Kumar and Nayak 

 
 

included in the Escape scenario to reduce material flows, GHG emissions, 
and the ecological footprint, without significantly affecting employment and 
reducing inequality” (242). 

The book is a highly valuable resource for a diverse audience, including 
policymakers, environmentalists, economists, and concerned activists. It 
provides actionable insights into the pressing need to rethink the economic 
growth model considering environmental constraints, offers a robust 
framework for advocating for systematic changes that address ecological 
limits, presents a fresh perspective on aligning economic activities with 
planetary boundaries, and empowers concerned citizens and activists to 
engage more effectively in public discussions on sustainability and 
environmental stewardship. 

Conflict of Interest Statement: No potential conflict of interest was 
reported by the author. 


