This textbook provides an overview of economic perspectives on sustainability. It synthesises economic, ecological and interdisciplinary sustainability research and by applying an integrated social-ecological and economic framework, demonstrates how this research can be improved and implemented in practice.
Split into three parts, the book begins by introducing a range of topics forming the basis of knowledge needed to understand the varying sustainability discourses in economics, ecology and interdisciplinary sustainability research. Chapters cover the political context of sustainability; the history of sustainability in European environmental discourses dating back to the seventeenth century; as well as various problems and forms of interdisciplinary knowledge integration and synthesis in the sustainability process. Part II reviews the core economic themes relevant to sustainable development including natural resource management, environmental economics and ecological economics. Also highlighted are often neglected issues such as conflicts, disasters and interrelated crises on the way towards sustainability. The chapters in Part III discuss the future of the sustainability process. They argue for the necessity of overhauling the relationship between science and practice; explore failures and the unforeseen difficulties of sustainability transformation; and discuss how to enable a long term sustainability process that reaches into the distant future.
An innovative resource for a broad range of interdisciplinary programmes on sustainability. The book will be an invaluable reference for master and PhD students, instructors, researchers and practitioners in sustainability governance.
Author(s): Karl Bruckmeier
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Year: 2021
Language: English
Pages: 447
City: Cham
Preface
Acknowledgements
Contents
Abbreviations
List of Figures
List of Tables
List of Boxes
Part I: The Sustainability Process: Context and Scope
1: The Policy Context of the Sustainability Discourse
1.1 Genesis of the Political and Public Sustainability Discourse
1.2 Sustainable Development in the Brundtland Report
1.3 Sustainable Development in the Policy Process after the Brundtland Report
1.3.1 The Global Sustainability Process
1.3.2 The Sustainability Discourse as a Joint Learning Process
1.4 Economic Knowledge for Sustainable Development
1.5 Discussion and Conclusions
Appendices: Further Information and Material
1. Questions and Individual Exercises
Learning Exercise 1: Sustainability as an Essentially Contested Concept
Learning Exercise 2: Critical Text Analysis—The Brundtland Report—Aims and Assumptions
Learning Exercise 3: Discussion About the Global North–South Divide (Group Work)
2. Additional Reading (recommended to deepen your knowledge about the theme of the chapter):
References
2: The Historical Context: Sustainability in Modern Society
2.1 Sustainability in Historical Perspective: Nature and Humans
2.2 Crises of Natural Resource Use in Modern Society
2.2.1 Environmental History: The Forest Crisis in Modern Society
2.2.2 Environmental History: Interdisciplinary Research
2.3 Connected Discourses About Nature and Sustainability in Modern Society
2.3.1 Ecological and Social Critique of Industrial Society in Europe
2.3.2 Sustainability in Pre-Industrial and Industrial Modern Society
2.4 The Building of the Modern World System and Its Transformation
2.5 Discussion and Conclusions
Appendices: Further Information and Material
1. Questions and Individual Exercises
Learning Exercise 1: “Industrial Society and Ways Beyond”
Learning Exercise 2: “Agenda 2030” for Sustainable Development
2. Further Reading Suggested: Deepening, Thematically Specialised
References
3: The Knowledge Context of the Sustainability Discourse
3.1 Deficient Knowledge Processes in Sustainable Development and Their Improvement
3.1.1 Inter- and Transdisciplinary Knowledge Integration in the Sustainability Process
3.1.2 Complex Systems and Processes
3.2 Knowledge Integration: Epistemological and Methodological Problems
3.3 Application of Economic Knowledge in the Sustainability Process
3.4 Controversial Themes in Economic Research About Natural Resource Use and Sustainable Development
3.4.1 Economic Value of Nature, Natural Resources and Ecosystems
3.4.2 Limits to Growth: Naturally and Socially Caused Scarcity of Natural Resources
3.5 New Interdisciplinary Analyses of Nature–Society Interaction
3.6 Discussion and Conclusions
Appendices: Further Information and Material
Learning Exercise 1: Discussion of Theoretical Concepts for Interdisciplinary Sustainability Research
Learning Exercise 2: The Interests of Future Generations
Learning Exercise 3: Development of Macro-societies as Exceptional Forms in Human History
Further Reading Suggested: Deepening, Thematically Specialised
References
Part II: Economic and Ecological Knowledge in the Sustainability Process
4: Economics Outright: Management of Natural Resources
4.1 Economics, Natural Resource Management and Sustainable Development
4.1.1 Controversies in Economics about the Meaning of Economics and the Economy
4.1.2 Ecology as the “Economy of Nature”
4.2 Resource Economics as Management Science: Organisation and Knowledge Practices
4.2.1 Sector-Specific Resource Management: First, Second and Third Economic Sectors
4.2.2 Interdisciplinary and Holistic Approaches to Natural Resource Management
4.3 Institutions of Resource Management: Property Rights in Natural Resource Use
4.3.1 Property Rights: The Commons, Common Pool Resources and Privatisation
4.3.2 The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity
4.4 Discussion and Conclusions
Appendices: Further Information and Material
Learning Exercise 1. Definitions of Economics and Economy and Their Practical Utility
Learning Exercise 2: The Tragedy of the Commons
Learning Exercise 3: The Circular Economy as a Component of Sustainability Transformation
Learning Exercise 4: Bioenergy—A Controversial Case in the Building of Sustainable Energy Systems
Learning Exercise 5: Critical Discussion of the TEEB Project of Economics of Ecosystem Services
Further Readings Suggested: Deepening, Thematically Specialised
References
5: Environmental Economics: Orthodox Perspectives
5.1 History and Development of Environmental Economics
5.1.1 The Changing Thematic Scope of Environmental Economics
5.1.2 Trends in the Economic Growth Debate
5.2 Transformation of the Growth Debate in the Sustainability Discourse
5.2.1 The Blocked Growth Discourse and Its Renewal
5.2.2 Technological Innovation and the Digital Economy from the Perspective of Sustainability
5.3 Complementary Approaches to Environmental Economics
5.3.1 The Theory of Ecological Modernisation of the Economy
5.3.2 Environmental Policy: Green Growth as a Transition Strategy to Sustainability
5.4 Critique of Environmental Economics
5.5 Discussion and Conclusions
Appendices: Further Information and Material
1. Questions and Individual Exercises
Learning Exercise 1: Discussion and Critique of Economic Growth Models
Learning Exercise 2: Environmental Valuation Methods
2. Further Reading Suggested: Deepening, Thematically Specialised
References
6: Ecological Economics: Critical Perspectives
6.1 Ecological Economics in a Historical Perspective
6.1.1 Ecological Discussion in the History of Economics
6.1.2 The New Ecological Economics
6.1.3 Creating Knowledge Through Interdisciplinary Communication and Knowledge Exchange
6.2 Degrowth: The Concept and the Controversy About Growth
6.2.1 Development of the Idea of Degrowth
6.2.2 Integration of the Degrowth Concept in Ecological Economics
6.3 Requirements of Social-Ecological Transformation Towards Global Sustainability
6.4 Discussion and Conclusions
Appendices: Further Information and Material
1. Questions and Individual Exercises
Learning Exercise 1: Development of an Interdisciplinary Economic Theory for Sustainability Transformation
Learning Exercise 2: An Economic Vision of a Sustainable Society and Economy
Learning Exercise 3: Transition to a Sustainable Economy
2. Further Reading Suggested: Deepening, Thematically Specialised
References
7: Conflict, Relapse and Failure in the Sustainability Process: Neglected Problems
7.1 The Societal Context of Conflicts and Crises in the Sustainability Process
7.1.1 Prevention and Creation of Conflicts through Sustainable Development
7.1.2 Origin of the Conflicts Affecting Sustainable Develop ment
7.2 Knowledge-Related Conflicts in the Sustainability Discourse and Process
7.3 The Development of Sustainability-Related Conflict Research
7.3.1 Resource Use Conflicts and Ecological Distribution Conflicts
7.3.2 Conflict Economics
7.3.3 Policy-Related Research on Environmental and Resource Use Conflicts
7.4 Relapse, Failure, Disasters: Unexpected Problems in the Transition to Sustainability
7.4.1 Sustainability Transformation as Blocked Process
7.4.2 The Resilience Discourse
7.4.3 The Productive Potential of Failure and Crisis for Sustainability Transformation
7.5 Discussion and Conclusions
Appendices: Further Information and Material
1. Questions and Individual Exercises
Learning Exercises
2. Further Reading Suggested: Deepening, Thematically Specialised
References
Part III: The Future: Sustainability Transformation
8: Science and Practice in the Sustainability Process
8.1 Communication and Transfer of Knowledge in Environmental and Sustainability Research
8.1.1 Critique and Change of Knowledge Transfer
8.1.2 Complex Forms of Knowledge Exchange and Sharing
8.1.3 Application of Knowledge from Environmental and Sustainability Research
8.2 Economics and Ecology: Constructing Science-Practice Links in Resource Use
8.3 Re-Connecting Science and Practice: Sustainability Science
8.4 After Sustainability Science: Transformation Science
8.5 The Future as Knowledge Problem for Science and for Sustainability Governance
8.5.1 Dilemmas in the Sustainability Process
8.5.2 Temporal Dimensions of Sustainable Development
8.6 Discussion and Conclusions
Appendices: Further Information and Material
1. Questions and Individual Exercises
Learning Exercise 1: Example of a Traditional Concept and Model for Connecting Science and Practice
Learning Exercise 2: A Complex Model of Science-Practice Relation—Systemic Interaction
Learning Exercise 3: Transition and Transformation
Learning Exercise 4: Responsibilities of the Present Generation Towards Future Generations
2. Further Reading Suggested: Deepening, Thematically Specialised
References
9: Re-Thinking Temporal Perspectives of Sustainability Transformation
9.1 The Structuring of Time in Social and Ecological Processes
9.1.1 Changing Views of Knowledge in the Sustainability Process
9.1.2 Views of the Future: Knowledge and Ignorance
9.2 Reconceptualising Time in the Sustainability Process: Interaction of the Past, the Present, and the Future
9.3 The Ways to the Future: Sustainable Development as Transformation
9.3.1 The “Longue Durée”: Conceptualising Social-Ecological Transformation
9.3.2 Future Literacy: Anticipating the Future as Process of Knowledge Creation
9.4 The Distant Future
9.5 The Great Ignorance: Unknown Ways to Solidarity
9.6 Discussion and Conclusions
Appendices: Further Information and Material
1. Questions and Individual Exercises
2. Further Reading Suggested: Deepening, Thematically Specialised
References
10: Recreating Sustainability: Conjectures and Conclusions
10.1 The Guiding Questions of the Book
10.2 Conclusions from the Chapters Regarding the Future Sustainability Process
10.3 Sustainability Dilemmas: Complexity of Changes and the Limits of Science and Governance
10.4 The Way Beyond “Agenda 2030”
10.5 Sustainability Related Themes Not Discussed in the Book
References
Glossary
Index
