The last part of this volume follows up on the previous two parts by exploring how an ecological economy can be implemented, at the micro- and macro-levels. As pointed out in part 1, our current environmental crisis is a result of a peculiar type of thinking and relating to the environment, which resulted in a dominant approach that shows little concern for its environmental context, as well as the related pressing problems of social and ecological justice. Recognizing this myopia calls for changes in our current patterns of thought and behavior. Needed changes in micro- and macroeconomics, and in our overall cultural ethos, are detailed in the next three chapters.
SUMMARY OF CHAPTERS
“Toward an Ecological Macroeconomics,” by Peter A. Victor and Tim Jackson
In this chapter, the authors share the results of their research in developing an ecological macroeconomics. They begin with a discussion on the dilemma of the current economic system, noting that the natural dynamics of the system push it toward either perpetual growth or collapse. The business-as-usual scenario of relentless economic growth is needed for continual and stable functioning of the system, even though it undermines the life-support system of the planet. To resist growth is to risk economic and social collapse. What is needed is an ecological macroeconomics that would be based on some key existing macroeconomic variables (e.g., investment, government expenditure) while incorporating some new elements (e.g., a transformation of the money system, a different national accounting system that takes into account environmental and resource variables).
Three models are presented in this chapter. The first is Victor’s LowGrow model of the Canadian economy, which showed that slower growth in net investment, productivity, government expenditure, and cessation of growth in population, besides other conditions, will lead to a form of growth of the gross domestic product that eventually levels off. The second is a simulation model of the UK economy, created to examine the characteristics of an economy that focuses on human and social services, which has limited productivity growth potential but also entails less material throughput. Finally, the authors provide a brief introduction to their Green Economy Macro-Model and Accounts framework, which integrates an understanding of the real economy, the financial economy, and the ecological and resource constraints.
“New Corporations for an Ecological Economy: A Case Study,” by Richard Janda, Philip Duguay, and Richard Lehun
This chapter focuses on the role of the extraordinary presence of corporations in our current economy, arguing that the current ethical commitment of “corporate social responsibility” is subordinate to wealth maximization for the shareholders. Instead, the authors point to the recent legal innovation of the “benefit corporation” as another alternative—a business corporation that has elected to promote the “general public benefit.” They review the legal structure and enabling clauses for such corporations, as well as various certification standards providers. They argue that the benefit corporation of the future can be a “virtuous hybrid” of different sets of ethical rules by which corporations can operate in an ecological economy.
“Ecological Political Economy and Liberty,” by Bruce Jennings
Bruce Jennings argues that developing the ethical foundations of ecological economics should include a reconsideration of the concept of liberty and the concept of the person. Other chapters provide cross-cultural examples of ecological ways of thinking about economic activity, valuing nature, justice, and responsibility. An ecological understanding of the person and of freedom will help to complete the task of reconceptualization undertaken in this volume as a whole. Mainstream economics of the liberal and capitalist era stands in need of revision by ecological economics precisely because it has cultivated environmentally overbearing and unsustainable modes of production and consumption in the pursuit of a specific ideal of how human beings should live and how they should be free to live. Alternative modes of production and consumption need to be developed, to be sure, but that task alone will be incomplete unless the underlying ideal of human flourishing is also reconceptualized and redefined. The two components of this ideal of living involve the identity and fulfillment of the human being who lives a life (the person) and the shape of the activity of this living (the freedom or liberty of the person).
The primary purpose of this chapter is not to rehearse the ideas of personhood and liberty that have been pillars of mainstream economics and the political economy of unsustainable growth. Many critiques of libertarian individualism and negative liberty have been written. Instead, this chapter will explore a more positive vision of an ecologically informed ideal of living, supported by a relational conception of liberty and of the person. Freedom, in this view, is constituted not in spite of connections and commitments linking self to others but in and through these connections and commitments. The ecological person or self is an identity built out of an ongoing practice of building certain kinds of relationships and structured interactions that exemplify the creative and aesthetic dimensions of humanity and living nature. Such relationships involve not only social interactions with other human beings but also—and crucially—meaningful connections between the person and his or her own activity on and in the world of nature, living systems, and material objects. An ecological conception of freedom and of the person contains a countervision to notions of alienation, commodification, and the objectification of the human or natural other. Such a vision leads away from the control of natural material as a source of fulfillment and wealth and toward a notion of artistry, craftsmanship, and the accommodation of the inherent properties of natural form and the liberal tradition. In developing an account of freedom and personhood along these lines, the chapter will draw upon a critical and utopian tradition of countervisions to the economic modes of life in the modern period (e.g., in writers such as Ruskin and Morris) and in contemporary work on the concepts of liberty and autonomy and on ecological conceptions of the self.
“A New Ethos, a New Discourse, a New Economy: Change Dynamics Toward an Ecological Political Economy,” by Janice E. Harvey
This chapter explores the important issue of how to realize the cultural changes in society that are needed for a transition to an ecological economics. In particular, Harvey considers the processes and interventions by which change might be realized. After discussing the relationship between discourse and cultural change, she explores how the hegemonic discourses of neoliberalism and consumerism affect institutional practice. Four barriers to a transition to ecological economics are identified: the globalization of financial markets, which makes it difficult and risky for countries to unilaterally embark on the transition; a dependence of individual well-being on the present economic growth model, which results in a similar difficulty for individuals to live according to an ecological economy; the discourse of consumer culture; and the media reinforcement of the norms of economic growth and consumption.
Recognizing that cultural change is more stable than political change and is therefore more efficacious in bringing about permanent changes in society, Harvey identifies four propositions on the characteristics of cultural change. First, cultural change usually begins at the top. Second, change is typically initiated by elites who are outside the centermost position of prestige. Third, culture change is most concentrated when the networks of elites and the institutions they lead overlap. Finally, cultural changes usually occur with some form of resistance. She concludes with considerations of how those changes may be implemented.