Pub Date : 2024-10-29DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108438
Alessandro Del Ponte , Aidas Masiliūnas , Noah Lim
Can climate accords based on decentralized and voluntary agreements successfully reduce carbon emissions? We designed an economic experiment to study the effectiveness of the best-known mechanisms to foster international cooperation on climate change mitigation: climate pledges, financial penalties, and peer evaluation. We test each mechanism both separately and together. In the climate pledge treatments, participants could pledge their desired emissions target, approved by majority vote. In the treatments with financial penalties, failure to meet pledges triggered monetary sanctions. In the peer evaluation treatments, participants could evaluate each other, which determined who would receive an additional nonmonetary environmental prize. We find that most participants joined climate agreements and met their pledges, but pledges were insufficiently ambitious. As a result, neither pledges, financial penalties, nor peer evaluation reduced emissions. These results question the effectiveness of decentralized and voluntary climate agreements, such as the Paris Agreement.
{"title":"Decentralized voluntary agreements do not reduce emissions in a climate change experiment","authors":"Alessandro Del Ponte , Aidas Masiliūnas , Noah Lim","doi":"10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108438","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108438","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Can climate accords based on decentralized and voluntary agreements successfully reduce carbon emissions? We designed an economic experiment to study the effectiveness of the best-known mechanisms to foster international cooperation on climate change mitigation: climate pledges, financial penalties, and peer evaluation. We test each mechanism both separately and together. In the climate pledge treatments, participants could pledge their desired emissions target, approved by majority vote. In the treatments with financial penalties, failure to meet pledges triggered monetary sanctions. In the peer evaluation treatments, participants could evaluate each other, which determined who would receive an additional nonmonetary environmental prize. We find that most participants joined climate agreements and met their pledges, but pledges were insufficiently ambitious. As a result, neither pledges, financial penalties, nor peer evaluation reduced emissions. These results question the effectiveness of decentralized and voluntary climate agreements, such as the Paris Agreement.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":51021,"journal":{"name":"Ecological Economics","volume":"227 ","pages":"Article 108438"},"PeriodicalIF":6.6,"publicationDate":"2024-10-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142538147","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-10-29DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108440
C. Xiang , T. van Gevelt
In recent years, China has pivoted towards a global leadership role in mitigating and adapting to climate change. Notwithstanding the complex political economic reasons underlying China's global leadership aspirations, we are interested in seeing whether the associated national discourse championed by the state increases domestic support for climate policy. That is, do China's international leadership aspirations foster a unifying sense of national pride among the domestic population, thereby lending support to the legitimacy of the state and expediting the implementation of costly domestic climate policies? To test our hypothesis, we enumerated a vignette experiment embedded with conjoint analysis to a nationally representative sample (n = 4788). We found no evidence that exposure to China's global leadership aspirations increased domestic support for national-level climate policy, as proxied by a carbon tax. Indeed, we found that exposure to China's global climate leadership aspirations decreased domestic support for a carbon tax under certain scenarios. Our findings demonstrate a potential disconnect between global and local climate policy discourses and suggest that China's policymakers need to exercise caution in ensuring that their global climate leadership aspirations do not come at the expense of decreased domestic support for the national-level policies required to meet China's goal of carbon neutrality by 2060.
{"title":"China's global leadership aspirations and domestic support for climate policy","authors":"C. Xiang , T. van Gevelt","doi":"10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108440","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108440","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>In recent years, China has pivoted towards a global leadership role in mitigating and adapting to climate change. Notwithstanding the complex political economic reasons underlying China's global leadership aspirations, we are interested in seeing whether the associated national discourse championed by the state increases domestic support for climate policy. That is, do China's international leadership aspirations foster a unifying sense of national pride among the domestic population, thereby lending support to the legitimacy of the state and expediting the implementation of costly domestic climate policies? To test our hypothesis, we enumerated a vignette experiment embedded with conjoint analysis to a nationally representative sample (<em>n</em> = 4788). We found no evidence that exposure to China's global leadership aspirations increased domestic support for national-level climate policy, as proxied by a carbon tax. Indeed, we found that exposure to China's global climate leadership aspirations decreased domestic support for a carbon tax under certain scenarios. Our findings demonstrate a potential disconnect between global and local climate policy discourses and suggest that China's policymakers need to exercise caution in ensuring that their global climate leadership aspirations do not come at the expense of decreased domestic support for the national-level policies required to meet China's goal of carbon neutrality by 2060.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":51021,"journal":{"name":"Ecological Economics","volume":"227 ","pages":"Article 108440"},"PeriodicalIF":6.6,"publicationDate":"2024-10-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142538265","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-10-29DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108431
By Sarah Ann Wheeler , Ying Xu , Daniel Gregg
Increasing landfill and environmental costs are driving municipalities to search for effective policies to change household food waste disposal, balancing competing attributes such as effectiveness, fairness and feasibility. In order to better understand households' policy perspectives, we conducted an online survey with 1520 South Australians regarding four different food waste policies, namely: 1) frequency-based pricing for bin collection; 2) penalties for bin misuse; 3) changing bin collection timing; and 4) extension and education. A structural equation modelling approach was used to model overall policy preference, based on perceived policy attributes and household socio-demographics. Results highlighted that respondents' rated economic incentives (pricing and penalties) as the most effective in changing food waste behaviour, but rank these policies low in feasibility or acceptability. Conversely, education and information campaigns were rated as the lowest in effectively changing behaviour, but the most acceptable and fairest policy overall. Overall, respondents from households producing less food waste were more favourable towards introducing economic incentive food waste policies.
{"title":"Exploring South Australian households' perceptions towards various food waste policies","authors":"By Sarah Ann Wheeler , Ying Xu , Daniel Gregg","doi":"10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108431","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108431","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Increasing landfill and environmental costs are driving municipalities to search for effective policies to change household food waste disposal, balancing competing attributes such as effectiveness, fairness and feasibility. In order to better understand households' policy perspectives, we conducted an online survey with 1520 South Australians regarding four different food waste policies, namely: 1) frequency-based pricing for bin collection; 2) penalties for bin misuse; 3) changing bin collection timing; and 4) extension and education. A structural equation modelling approach was used to model overall policy preference, based on perceived policy attributes and household socio-demographics. Results highlighted that respondents' rated economic incentives (pricing and penalties) as the most effective in changing food waste behaviour, but rank these policies low in feasibility or acceptability. Conversely, education and information campaigns were rated as the lowest in effectively changing behaviour, but the most acceptable and fairest policy overall. Overall, respondents from households producing less food waste were more favourable towards introducing economic incentive food waste policies.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":51021,"journal":{"name":"Ecological Economics","volume":"227 ","pages":"Article 108431"},"PeriodicalIF":6.6,"publicationDate":"2024-10-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142538146","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-10-29DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108429
Roman Hausmann , Anne-Kathrin Schwab
The ‘social provisioning process’ framework postulates that making provisioning processes more socially and ecologically sustainable requires structural changes in terms of the material, social, and cultural bases of economies. This paper explores the ways in which local community-led grassroots initiatives (GIs) contribute to such structural changes. The purpose of this paper is twofold: First, we offer systematic empirical evidence on the impact of GI activities on societal structures, which are crucial for assessing the transformative potential of GIs but have been insufficiently addressed in the literature. Second, we adapt and further develop the ‘social provisioning process’ framework to make it operational for research on local provisioning processes, thereby proposing a strong heterodox economic theory – which accounts for the structural dimension – to the research field of GIs that it was lacking so far. To this end, a qualitative multiple-case study design is employed to investigate three GIs. Eight categories of provisioning structures are identified as an advancement of the ‘social provisioning process’ framework. The data show how the three GI cases build a structural basis in each of the eight categories, which tends to facilitate more sustainable provisioning, and reveal foci, strategies, and limitations in the creation of those structures.
{"title":"Building a local structural basis for economic change? A case study on grassroots initiatives from a ‘social provisioning’ perspective","authors":"Roman Hausmann , Anne-Kathrin Schwab","doi":"10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108429","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108429","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The ‘social provisioning process’ framework postulates that making provisioning processes more socially and ecologically sustainable requires structural changes in terms of the material, social, and cultural bases of economies. This paper explores the ways in which local community-led grassroots initiatives (GIs) contribute to such structural changes. The purpose of this paper is twofold: First, we offer systematic empirical evidence on the impact of GI activities on societal structures, which are crucial for assessing the transformative potential of GIs but have been insufficiently addressed in the literature. Second, we adapt and further develop the ‘social provisioning process’ framework to make it operational for research on local provisioning processes, thereby proposing a strong heterodox economic theory – which accounts for the structural dimension – to the research field of GIs that it was lacking so far. To this end, a qualitative multiple-case study design is employed to investigate three GIs. Eight categories of provisioning structures are identified as an advancement of the ‘social provisioning process’ framework. The data show how the three GI cases build a structural basis in each of the eight categories, which tends to facilitate more sustainable provisioning, and reveal foci, strategies, and limitations in the creation of those structures.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":51021,"journal":{"name":"Ecological Economics","volume":"227 ","pages":"Article 108429"},"PeriodicalIF":6.6,"publicationDate":"2024-10-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142538266","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-10-29DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108407
Xi Sun, Karsten Neuhoff
This paper introduces an analytical model that characterizes the incentives of the manufacturing industry, consumers, and waste management sectors in closing the material loop. To address identified market failures, various policy instruments are evaluated both theoretically and numerically, using the example of the EU PET market. The assessment shows that a policy package consisting of carbon pricing, advanced disposal fees, and product standards substantially reduces total material consumption and enhances material recovery, leading to a notable reduction in emissions. The analysis of material cost savings, surplus allocation, and social welfare also shows the advantages of such a policy package compared to individual policy instruments.
本文介绍了一个分析模型，该模型描述了制造业、消费者和废物管理部门在闭合材料循环过程中的激励机制。为解决已发现的市场失灵问题，本文以欧盟 PET 市场为例，对各种政策工具进行了理论和数值评估。评估结果表明，由碳定价、高级处置费和产品标准组成的一揽子政策大幅降低了材料总消耗量，提高了材料回收率，从而显著减少了排放量。对材料成本节约、剩余分配和社会福利的分析也表明，与单个政策工具相比，这种一揽子政策具有优势。
{"title":"Nobody decides for all — Modeling incentives and policies for closing the material loop","authors":"Xi Sun, Karsten Neuhoff","doi":"10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108407","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108407","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This paper introduces an analytical model that characterizes the incentives of the manufacturing industry, consumers, and waste management sectors in closing the material loop. To address identified market failures, various policy instruments are evaluated both theoretically and numerically, using the example of the EU PET market. The assessment shows that a policy package consisting of carbon pricing, advanced disposal fees, and product standards substantially reduces total material consumption and enhances material recovery, leading to a notable reduction in emissions. The analysis of material cost savings, surplus allocation, and social welfare also shows the advantages of such a policy package compared to individual policy instruments.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":51021,"journal":{"name":"Ecological Economics","volume":"227 ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.6,"publicationDate":"2024-10-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142528939","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-10-28DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108420
Anna Maria Addamo , Alessandra La Notte , Silvia Ferrini , Gaetano Grilli
Seagrass habitats are essential and vulnerable ecosystems with several key roles, from biodiversity hotspots to climate change mitigation. Their characteristics, current condition and potential benefits, are the main core of this study which presents one of the first applications of marine accounts for the European Mediterranean Sea. The assessment focuses on four marine and coastal ecosystem services (i.e. fish and raw biomass provision, blue carbon, and nature-based recreation) and relies on habitat modelling for the biophysical assessment and a diversity of economic valuation tools (e.g. resource rent, avoided costs, benefit transfer) for the monetization of benefits. The findings highlight the essential benefits provided by seagrass meadows for Mediterranean European countries. Accounting tables display the role of seagrass to enhance environmental and economic well-being and the support that accounting evidence can provide for conservation, restoration and marine spatial planning.
{"title":"Marine ecosystem services of seagrass in physical and monetary terms: The Mediterranean Sea case study","authors":"Anna Maria Addamo , Alessandra La Notte , Silvia Ferrini , Gaetano Grilli","doi":"10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108420","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108420","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Seagrass habitats are essential and vulnerable ecosystems with several key roles, from biodiversity hotspots to climate change mitigation. Their characteristics, current condition and potential benefits, are the main core of this study which presents one of the first applications of marine accounts for the European Mediterranean Sea. The assessment focuses on four marine and coastal ecosystem services (i.e. fish and raw biomass provision, blue carbon, and nature-based recreation) and relies on habitat modelling for the biophysical assessment and a diversity of economic valuation tools (e.g. resource rent, avoided costs, benefit transfer) for the monetization of benefits. The findings highlight the essential benefits provided by seagrass meadows for Mediterranean European countries. Accounting tables display the role of seagrass to enhance environmental and economic well-being and the support that accounting evidence can provide for conservation, restoration and marine spatial planning.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":51021,"journal":{"name":"Ecological Economics","volume":"227 ","pages":"Article 108420"},"PeriodicalIF":6.6,"publicationDate":"2024-10-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142529040","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-10-28DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108432
Asia Guerreschi , Emy Zecca
The distinct characteristics of cooperatives, grounded in values such as self-help, selfresponsibility, etc. (ICA) make them a distinctive form of enterprise that necessitates examination. As other forms of enterprise, cooperatives bear the same onus of ensuring sustainability. To comprehend the social and economic contribution of cooperatives, we investigate their impact and role in attaining environmental sustainability, focusing on circular strategies. Preliminary literature in EI finds that cooperatives facilitate the implementation of some circular economy (CE) processes with general cooperation as an EI driver. After reviewing the literature on the drivers behind the introduction of EI in SMEs, we sought to investigate the specific drivers for cooperatives. To do this, we employed an econometric model to examine CES behaviour in a sample of over 280 Italian cooperatives across various regions and sectors in Italy. The findings underscore the role of cooperation and key managerial factors as drivers for implementation of circular economy innovative strategies. While innovation drivers have been researched for SMEs, the absence on research focusing on the cooperative model, makes this paper strongly relevant to investigate how a specific firms structure would lead to their transition to be a circular innovative cooperative or rather “green” cooperative.
合作社以自助、自我负责等价值观为基础，具有鲜明的特点（国际合作社联盟），使其成为一种独特的企业形式，有必要对其进行研究。与其他形式的企业一样，合作社同样肩负着确保可持续发展的重任。为了理解合作社的社会和经济贡献，我们调查了它们在实现环境可持续性方面的影响和作用，重点是循环战略。环境创新方面的初步文献发现，合作社促进了一些循环经济（CE）进程的实施，而一般合作是环境创新的驱动力。在回顾了有关中小企业引入环境创新背后驱动因素的文献后，我们试图调查合作社的具体驱动因素。为此，我们采用计量经济学模型，对意大利不同地区和行业的 280 多家合作社的 CES 行为进行了抽样调查。研究结果强调了合作和关键管理因素对实施循环经济创新战略的推动作用。虽然已经对中小企业的创新驱动力进行了研究，但缺乏针对合作社模式的研究，这使得本文与研究特定企业结构如何促使其转型为循环创新合作社或 "绿色 "合作社密切相关。
{"title":"Green coops: Drivers of innovation for circular strategies among Italian cooperatives","authors":"Asia Guerreschi , Emy Zecca","doi":"10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108432","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108432","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The distinct characteristics of cooperatives, grounded in values such as self-help, selfresponsibility, etc. (ICA) make them a distinctive form of enterprise that necessitates examination. As other forms of enterprise, cooperatives bear the same onus of ensuring sustainability. To comprehend the social and economic contribution of cooperatives, we investigate their impact and role in attaining environmental sustainability, focusing on circular strategies. Preliminary literature in EI finds that cooperatives facilitate the implementation of some circular economy (CE) processes with general cooperation as an EI driver. After reviewing the literature on the drivers behind the introduction of EI in SMEs, we sought to investigate the specific drivers for cooperatives. To do this, we employed an econometric model to examine CES behaviour in a sample of over 280 Italian cooperatives across various regions and sectors in Italy. The findings underscore the role of cooperation and key managerial factors as drivers for implementation of circular economy innovative strategies. While innovation drivers have been researched for SMEs, the absence on research focusing on the cooperative model, makes this paper strongly relevant to investigate how a specific firms structure would lead to their transition to be a circular innovative cooperative or rather “green” cooperative.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":51021,"journal":{"name":"Ecological Economics","volume":"227 ","pages":"Article 108432"},"PeriodicalIF":6.6,"publicationDate":"2024-10-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142528941","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-10-26DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108428
Noelia Parajuá , Enric Tello , Jessica Duncan
This article aims to advance understandings of food systems functioning at a national level and explore ways for its transformation towards sustainability and social justice. Integrating food regime theory from political economy with social metabolism from ecological economics, and surplus/reproduction from feminist economics, we develop a novel research framework which combines six dimensions—food systems governance, monetary agrifood chain, socio-metabolic agrifood chain, surplus/reproduction, socioecological impacts, and conflicts & levers of change—encompassing 34 elements linked through six key connections. The research framework highlights the role of cheap food for the social reproduction of the labouring population in capitalism. Since national states play important roles in maintaining food regimes, we conducted a critical literature review through which we identified the main contributions and limitations of studies of food regimes at the national level aimed at foreseeing exit ways beyond the current corporate food regime. This regime is one of the main drives of the overcoming of planetary boundaries. An agroecological transition and food system change is needed to address this socio-ecological crisis, and this requires new food polices at a national level as well. This is why we consider it essential to integrate social metabolism with the approaches of food regimes and surplus/reproduction.
{"title":"A research framework to investigate food systems at a national scale","authors":"Noelia Parajuá , Enric Tello , Jessica Duncan","doi":"10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108428","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108428","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This article aims to advance understandings of food systems functioning at a national level and explore ways for its transformation towards sustainability and social justice. Integrating food regime theory from political economy with social metabolism from ecological economics, and surplus/reproduction from feminist economics, we develop a novel research framework which combines six dimensions—food systems governance, monetary agrifood chain, socio-metabolic agrifood chain, surplus/reproduction, socioecological impacts, and conflicts & levers of change—encompassing 34 elements linked through six key connections. The research framework highlights the role of cheap food for the social reproduction of the labouring population in capitalism. Since national states play important roles in maintaining food regimes, we conducted a critical literature review through which we identified the main contributions and limitations of studies of food regimes at the national level aimed at foreseeing exit ways beyond the current corporate food regime. This regime is one of the main drives of the overcoming of planetary boundaries. An agroecological transition and food system change is needed to address this socio-ecological crisis, and this requires new food polices at a national level as well. This is why we consider it essential to integrate social metabolism with the approaches of food regimes and surplus/reproduction.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":51021,"journal":{"name":"Ecological Economics","volume":"227 ","pages":"Article 108428"},"PeriodicalIF":6.6,"publicationDate":"2024-10-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142528940","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-10-22DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108423
Querine Kommandeur , Juliette Alenda-Demoutiez , Maria Kaufmann , Ingrid Visseren-Hamakers
The confluence of multiple crises has prompted a growing recognition of the need for transformations. Economic systems, including patterns of consumption and production, play a key role in sustainability transformations. The notion that capitalist systems are at the root of current ecological and social crises has led to the emergence of different alternative economic discourses, that seek to address the indirect drivers of unsustainability. In this article, we aim to contribute to moving the debate beyond critiques of capitalism by focussing on the paths of transformation towards alternatives. To this end, we analyse several alternative economic discourses in order to show the breadth of the debate, and to better understand the roles and strategies of various discourses in societal transformation. Seven discourses are included, of which Buen Vivir, Degrowth and Wellbeing Economy are analysed in-depth. This is done through a systematic analysis of literature published between 2015 and 2022, using an enhanced conceptual framework based on the works of Wright (2019) and Chertkovskaya (2022). Our analysis suggests that the discourses represent different modes of transformation, and that these differences exist both between, as well as within the different discourses. We argue that transformations cannot be achieved through single discourses, or modes of transformation. Rather, concerted efforts of different discourses aimed at addressing indirect drivers of unsustainability can provide the multi-faceted processes of societal change, in which they can support and reinforce one another through alliances and mutual learning.
{"title":"Varieties of Anticapitalism: A systematic study of transformation strategies in alternative economic discourses","authors":"Querine Kommandeur , Juliette Alenda-Demoutiez , Maria Kaufmann , Ingrid Visseren-Hamakers","doi":"10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108423","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108423","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The confluence of multiple crises has prompted a growing recognition of the need for transformations. Economic systems, including patterns of consumption and production, play a key role in sustainability transformations. The notion that capitalist systems are at the root of current ecological and social crises has led to the emergence of different alternative economic discourses, that seek to address the indirect drivers of unsustainability. In this article, we aim to contribute to moving the debate beyond critiques of capitalism by focussing on the paths of transformation towards alternatives. To this end, we analyse several alternative economic discourses in order to show the breadth of the debate, and to better understand the roles and strategies of various discourses in societal transformation. Seven discourses are included, of which Buen Vivir, Degrowth and Wellbeing Economy are analysed in-depth. This is done through a systematic analysis of literature published between 2015 and 2022, using an enhanced conceptual framework based on the works of Wright (2019) and Chertkovskaya (2022). Our analysis suggests that the discourses represent different modes of transformation, and that these differences exist both between, as well as within the different discourses. We argue that transformations cannot be achieved through single discourses, or modes of transformation. Rather, concerted efforts of different discourses aimed at addressing indirect drivers of unsustainability can provide the multi-faceted processes of societal change, in which they can support and reinforce one another through alliances and mutual learning.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":51021,"journal":{"name":"Ecological Economics","volume":"227 ","pages":"Article 108423"},"PeriodicalIF":6.6,"publicationDate":"2024-10-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142528983","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-10-21DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108426
Marco Rudolf, Mario Schmidt
Humanity faces a dilemma: The satisfaction of human needs gravely endangers the natural basis of life. As potential strategies for resolving this dilemma, we revisit the discourse on efficiency, sufficiency and consistency. Although there has been much discussion about the three strategies in recent decades, there is a lack of a clear distinction between the strategies and little understanding regarding their respective impact on both the environment and human needs satisfaction. This leads to persistent disagreement about which strategies are best suited to pursue in the short, medium and long term. In this article, we resolve this problem on a conceptual level through a graphical classification of the three strategies according to their effects on consumption levels and environmental impact. This framework contributes to the literature on energy transition and the circular economy as key paths to sustainability by showing the limited effects of efficiency and sufficiency strategies over the long run in contrast to the promise of the consistency strategy as a systemic change.
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