Economics and Ecology:

1
Economics and Ecology

• Specialize, Separate, and Reintegrate

Chrissie Nims
2
The Reductionist Paradigm

• The world can be divided into isolated units and
  can be studied separately and put back together
  to see the whole picture.
• This procedure reduced the connection between
  areas of study.

3
A Change in Ecology and Economics

• Economics
• The economics departments rewarded economic
  theory rather than actual application.
• Economics textbooks mainly focused on supply and
  demand, and no longer discussed the connection to
  the natural environment.
• Ecology
• There was a split from the study of biology into
  zoology and botany.
• Although it is necessary to include many systems
  when observing ecosystems, the majority of
  ecologists view the study of humans as a part of
  the social sciences.

4
The Reintegration of Ecology and Economics

• In the 1980s it was found that the well being of
  future societies was based on the upgrade of
  environmental policies.
• Ecological economics was considered the
  connection between ecologists and economists to
  apply new policies to help prevent environmental
  degradation.

Mexico City
5
General System Theory

• One might define systems analysis as the
  scientific method applied both across and within
  disciplines, scales, resolutions, and system
  types.
• This type of analysis uses mathematical modeling
  and is very complex. The availability of
  computers and technology promotes the process of
  systems analysis.

6
Open-Access Resource Management

• A resource with many users is often exploited
  when there are no rules to govern its
  availability. Disaster often occurs if common
  governing institutions disintegrate.
• Generally this disaster happens as society moves
  from a traditional to a more modern form.
• For example, in order to prevent further
  environmental degradation, it is necessary to
  have a common regulatory institution for the
  global climate.

7
Energetics and Systems

• Due to many of the oil crises that the world
  experienced, the role of energy in the economy
  was realized.
• Georgescu Roegen Economic process uses energy
• ENTROPY LAW Available energy in a closed system
  can only decline.
• Criticssay that the earth is not a closed system.

8
Spaceship Earth and Steady-State Economics

• Frontier economics growth in human welfare
  means growth in material consumption.
• Spaceship economics growth in human welfare
  does not necessarily come by material
  consumption.
• Steady-state economics the Earth is materially
  finite and non-growingthe economy is a subset of
  this finite global system and cannot grow
  forever.
• Herman Dalys steady-state economy lead the way
  for ecological economics.

9
Adaptive Environmental Management

• Involves the integration of science and
  management.
• Holling claims that the management process must
  be experimental and must constantly adapt its
  policies because ecosystems evolve and change
  over time.
• Adaptive environmental management is an
  established beneficial method in monitoring
  complex systems.

C.S. Holling (Canadian Ecologist)
10
Co-evolution of Ecological and Economic Systems

• Each subsystem (knowledge, values, organization,
  technology, environment) is related to each of
  the others yet each is also changing and
  affecting change in the others through
  selectionWith each subsystem putting selective
  pressure on each of the others, they co-evolve in
  a manner whereby each reflects the other.
• Co-evolutionary explanation of the
  unsustainability of modern societies
• Hydrocarbons permit people to control their own
  environments while influencing the global
  environment and causing long term implications.

11
The Role of Neoclassical Economics in Ecological
Economics

• Neoclassical market analysis is still an
  important pattern of thinking in ecological
  economics. Generally, neoclassical economists
  believe that technological advance will outpace
  resource scarcity.
• On the other hand, ecological economists view
  more severe ecological limits and are doubtful
  that technology can help the economic disasters
  caused by resource scarcities.

• Ecological economics uses the framework of
  neoclassical economics but is not constrained to
  use only that framework.

12
Increased Efficiency and Dematerialization
Ecosystem Health

• In general, only individual species have been
  managed
• INEFFECTIVE!
• Ecological Economics looking toward prevention
  and anticipating broad disturbances.
• Conservation biology instead of studying the
  downward trend of biodiversity, save the species
  from extinction.

• The need to get more from less
• Dematerialization by stabilizing the rate of
  material throughput in the economy.

13
Environmental Epistemology
Political Ecology

• The philosophy that studies how we think we can
  learn truth.
• Human Problem
• Basic thought that nature is predictable and that
  it reacts along the lines of universal principles.

• New field of political ecology formed by Marxist
  anthropologists, economists, historians, and
  sociologists.
• The environmental crises of the latter half 20th
  Century have stimulated new critiques of
  capitalism.

14
Conclusion

• Ecological economics has united many fields of
  study and has shown doubt in traditional notions.
• Since the earth has a limited capacity for
  sustainably supporting people and their
  artifacts, new institutions and environmental
  policies are necessary to keep the economy within
  that capacity.

15
Discussion Questions

• Do you think that Earth is a closed or open
  system?
• Does the neoclassical approach of economic growth
  diminishing the inequality between the rich and
  the poor speak true to you?
• The management of individual species is said to
  be ineffective. Do you agree/disagree?

16
Works Cited

• An Introduction to Ecological Economics
• www.eia.doe.gov/ emeu/cabs/mexenv.html
• www.ec.gc.ca/seminar/ holling_e.html
• www.ecology.com/ feature-stories/fate-black-rhino/