ABSTRACT
There is disagreement about what sustainability means, but the concept has increasingly become a guiding principle for humanity’s future. Broadly speaking, 656sustainability has ecological, economic, and social dimensions. For developing countries, the sustainability challenge is to expand economic production and improve human well-being without taking the same resource-intensive path taken by currently developed countries, as envisioned in the Sustainable Development Goals. Further reforming international development organizations such as the World Bank is critically important so that developing countries can obtain the financing and technical assistance to pursue sustainability objectives. Local initiatives can also be successful, focused on organic farming, sustainable forestry, women’s empowerment, renewable energy, and other issues.
For developed countries, a critical question is whether absolute decoupling can be sufficient to achieve sustainability objectives. If so, then a green growth future is possible focused on areas such as services, communication, arts, and education that contribute to human welfare but have relatively low resource requirements. Most empirical evidence, however, indicates that current and projected decoupling rates may not be sufficient for sustainability, and that a transition to a “post-growth” or steady-state economy is needed, possibly with a period of degrowth in developed countries. This transition could only be accomplished with extensive changes in government policy.
While there is disagreement about what sustainability means, the concept has increasingly become a guiding principle for humanity’s future. For developing countries, the sustainability challenge is to expand economic production and improve human well-being without taking the same resource-intensive path taken by currently developed countries, as envisioned in the Sustainable Development Goals. Further reforming international development organizations such as the World Bank is critically important so that developing countries can obtain the financing and technical assistance to pursue sustainability objectives.
For developed countries, a critical question is whether absolute decoupling can be sufficient to achieve sustainability objectives. If so, then a green growth future is possible. Most empirical evidence, however, indicates that current and projected decoupling rates may not be sufficient for sustainability, and that a transition to a “post-growth” or steady-state economy is needed, possibly with a period of degrowth in developed countries. This transition could be accomplished only with extensive changes in government policy.
Regardless of how we envision sustainability, economics will play a central role as developing and developed countries pursue their environmental goals. We have seen in this chapter, and throughout the text, that economists working on environmental issues present a wide range of perspectives and policy recommendations. Standard environmental economics implies significant policy reforms, including internalizing externalities, managing resources for long-term efficiency and sustainability, and valuing use and nonuse environmental benefits. Ecological economics suggests more substantial reforms, including industrial ecology, regenerative agriculture, and ultimately a transition to some type of post-growth economy.
The sustainability challenges for developing and developed countries are daunting, including reducing carbon emissions and air pollution, protecting 657biodiversity, and creating sustainable agricultural, natural resource, energy, and water systems, all while equitably increasing human well-being. Insights from many disciplines, including ecology, political science, engineering, chemistry, philosophy, and sociology, are needed to develop effective responses. But economics clearly has an essential role to play as various nations chart a path to sustainability. Whether you pursue additional economic studies or not, we hope you leave this book agreeing with us that economics can contribute to a transition to a climate-stabilized and ecologically resilient world. But most of all, we hope you leave inspired to be part of that transition, working in your personal and professional lives to help achieve the goal of reconciling human well-being with ecological sustainability.
