{"title":"Varieties of capitalism and environmental performance","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108362","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>This paper investigates the role of institutions in decoupling economic growth from environmental impacts, employing the Varieties of Capitalism framework. It finds that Northern European countries have achieved more significant decoupling than other Western OECD countries since the 1980s, as measured by the Ecological Footprint of Consumption. Differences in corporatism, as well as the amount and type of public social expenditures, are hypothesized to play a crucial role in explaining this pattern. Multiple regression analysis reveals that larger proportions of GDP allocated to universal social expenditures — not contingent on work status — are robustly associated with stronger decoupling. This suggests that the considerable investments of Northern European countries in universal social benefits have been key for effectively reducing the environmental impacts associated with economic growth.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":51021,"journal":{"name":"Ecological Economics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":6.6000,"publicationDate":"2024-09-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Ecological Economics","FirstCategoryId":"96","ListUrlMain":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921800924002593","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"ECOLOGY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
This paper investigates the role of institutions in decoupling economic growth from environmental impacts, employing the Varieties of Capitalism framework. It finds that Northern European countries have achieved more significant decoupling than other Western OECD countries since the 1980s, as measured by the Ecological Footprint of Consumption. Differences in corporatism, as well as the amount and type of public social expenditures, are hypothesized to play a crucial role in explaining this pattern. Multiple regression analysis reveals that larger proportions of GDP allocated to universal social expenditures — not contingent on work status — are robustly associated with stronger decoupling. This suggests that the considerable investments of Northern European countries in universal social benefits have been key for effectively reducing the environmental impacts associated with economic growth.
期刊介绍:
Ecological Economics is concerned with extending and integrating the understanding of the interfaces and interplay between "nature''s household" (ecosystems) and "humanity''s household" (the economy). Ecological economics is an interdisciplinary field defined by a set of concrete problems or challenges related to governing economic activity in a way that promotes human well-being, sustainability, and justice. The journal thus emphasizes critical work that draws on and integrates elements of ecological science, economics, and the analysis of values, behaviors, cultural practices, institutional structures, and societal dynamics. The journal is transdisciplinary in spirit and methodologically open, drawing on the insights offered by a variety of intellectual traditions, and appealing to a diverse readership.
Specific research areas covered include: valuation of natural resources, sustainable agriculture and development, ecologically integrated technology, integrated ecologic-economic modelling at scales from local to regional to global, implications of thermodynamics for economics and ecology, renewable resource management and conservation, critical assessments of the basic assumptions underlying current economic and ecological paradigms and the implications of alternative assumptions, economic and ecological consequences of genetically engineered organisms, and gene pool inventory and management, alternative principles for valuing natural wealth, integrating natural resources and environmental services into national income and wealth accounts, methods of implementing efficient environmental policies, case studies of economic-ecologic conflict or harmony, etc. New issues in this area are rapidly emerging and will find a ready forum in Ecological Economics.