A Broadened Concept of Wealth and Sustainable Development

Abstract

A growing concern that China and most other developing countries face is that the patterns of their economic growth and development cannot be sustained because they tend to result in irreversible depletion of natural resources and deterioration of the ecological environment. It is mostly such concerns that have helped spawn an ever-increasing body of relevant literature on sustainable growth and development. However, There still remains a considerable challenge for scholars and policy makers to arrive at a theoretically consistent and empirically feasible criterion for evaluating policies that target sustainability in economic growth and development—especially under the current fast-growing climate of globalization.