Philip Lawn

This book explains why the climate change crisis is a symptom of a much larger underlying problem – namely, humankind’s predilection with continuous GDP-growth. Given this starting point, the world’s high-income nations must begin the transition to a qualitatively-improving steady-state economy and low-income nations must follow suit at some stage over the next 20-40 years. Unless they do, a well-designed emissions protocol will be as useless as the paper it is written on. Adopting an ecological economic approach, this book sets out why we must abandon the goal of continuous growth; how we can do so in a way that improves human well-being; what constitutes a safe atmospheric concentration of greenhouse gases; and what type of emissions protocol and emissions-trading framework is likely to achieve a desirable climate change outcome. Failure of the world’s leaders to achieve these goals will not only put future human well-being at risk, it will threaten freedom in the liberal-democratic tradition and international peace.

This book explains why the climate change crisis is a symptom of a much larger underlying problem – namely, humankind’s predilection with continuous GDP-growth. Given this starting point, the world’s high-income nations must begin the transition to a qualitatively-improving steady-state economy and low-income nations must follow suit at some stage over the next 20-40 years. Unless they do, a well-designed emissions protocol will be as useless as the paper it is written on. Adopting an ecological economic approach, this book sets out why we must abandon the goal of continuous growth; how we can do so in a way that improves human well-being; what constitutes a safe atmospheric concentration of greenhouse gases; and what type of emissions protocol and emissions-trading framework is likely to achieve a desirable climate change outcome. Failure of the world’s leaders to achieve these goals will not only put future human well-being at risk, it will threaten freedom in the liberal-democratic tradition and international peace.

Ecological economics formally emerged in the late 1980s in response to the failure of mainstream economic paradigms to deal adequately with the interdependence of social, economic and ecological systems. Frontier Issues in Ecological Economics focuses on a range of cutting-edge issues in the field of ecological economics and outlines plausible measures to achieve a more sustainable, just, and efficient world for all. Covering a broad range of key subjects, this book deals with some of the frontier issues that have recently emerged in ecological economics and those that continue to remain a source of disagreement and debate. In doing so, the book highlights the importance of natural capital, the limits to growth and markets in achieving sustainable development, the policy-guiding value of sustainable development indicators, ecological tax reform considerations, environmental-macroeconomic issues such as the reconciliation of the ecological sustainability and full employment objectives, and measures to deal with growing globalisation concerns. The book concludes with the optimistic assessment that a transition to a steady-state economy - necessary to achieve sustainable development - is entirely compatible with a democratic-capitalist system. Philip Lawn's latest book will appeal to academics and researchers working in the areas of ecological, environmental and natural resource economics, sustainable development, green national accounting, environmental management and development studies. Policymakers, environmental managers and NGOs will also appreciate this book.

This book has been written with the intention of taking the reader through the process of preparing a Genuine Progress Indicator (GPI). The book's presentation reflects the natural progression of identifying the deficiencies commonly found in widely used income-based measures of sustainable well-being; putting forward an alternative measure of sustainable well-being, such as the GPI; explaining how the GPI has been constructed and calculated; presenting and analysing the results of our study; drawing policy conclusions; acknowledging some of the criticisms directed towards the GPI (and defending it in the process); and, finally, concluding with a brief summary.