ABSTRACT
Economic development and sustainability patterns highly depend on technological progress, which has brought reduction of Emission/GDP intensity over time. Technological development is necessary but not sufficient to ensure enhancements in the overall wellbeing of society, which also strongly depends on health, environmental and education achievements. This chapter conceptually discusses how theories of ecological economics may provide a basis to investigate social wellbeing. Human development and sustainability are shown to be strictly connected from theoretical and macroeconomic accounting point of views. The focus is also on empirical evidence on key themes such as green technologies, human development, environmental policies, and their interrelations in the increasingly globalised economy in various countries. Finally, convergence in human development performances is analysed with regard to EU countries.
