Steady-state Economy Research Articles

The Neoclassical Trojan Horse of Steady-State Economics

The vision of a steady-state economy elaborated by Herman Daly describes an economy that uses materials and energy within the regenerative and assimilative limits of the planet's ecosystems. Sustainable scale, just distribution, and efficient allocation are its constitutive theoretical goals. This paper is a critique of the theoretical foundations of steady-state economics. It argues that steady-state economics consists in an attempt to squeeze neoclassical economics into a biophysical and ethical corset. As a result, many fundamental flaws and criticisms of neoclassical economics remain. As a consequence, steady-state economics does not lead to a radical departure from, or improvement upon, neoclassical theory but rather to fundamental internal inconsistencies between the ‘old’ economics paradigm and ‘new’ progressive ecological economic thinking. Contradictions appear at various levels ranging from ontology and methodology to theory and values. As Daly has pioneered the foundations of ecological economics with his thinking, these ambiguities are not only problematic for steady-state economics but ecological economics as a field more generally. The paper concludes that ecological economics has to let go of neoclassical foundations as they contradict its core values and ambitions. A new and consistent theory of political economy of the environment along heterodox lines is needed.

Towards a Steady State Economy in Sri Lanka

In general, it is desired that Sri Lankan economy shows growth. A growing economy brings waste production which leads environmental pollutions such as air pollution water pollution etc. At present, increasing population in Sri Lanka requires more natural resources to meet the market demand. The ultimate result is an imbalance in the biological cycles, and an irreversible change in both economic process and environment. An irreversible economic process increases entropy. Ultimately, the entropy will reach its maximum value. Then everything will become standstill since there would not exist more energy to continue the economic process. As a solution, the concept of a steady state economy is structured.Sri Lankan economy was assessed within steady state economics to evaluate the present economic situation of Sri Lanka. A statistical analysis was carried out on Gross Domestic Product (GDP), population, energy use, CO2 emission through time series analysis and regression analysis,to identify the extent to which Sri Lankan economy has deviated from a steady state economy. Regression analysis indicates a strong relationship between GDP and CO2 emission. Total population size in Sri Lanka is increased from 9.9 million in 1960 to 20.48 million in 2013. CO2 emission per capita is increased from 0.25 metric tons in 1960 to 0.65 metric tons in 2010. CO2 emission is increased from 2259 kiloton in 1960 to 12831 kiloton in 2010. Rapid growth rates, CO2 emissions, population growth rates reveal that Sri Lankan economy is far apart from the concept of steady state.Transition to a steady state economy would require the implementation of new policies to restrict the utilization of nonrenewable resources. On the other hand it is mandatory to have legal regulations encouraging renewable resource use, energy efficiency, and reuse and recycling.

The Role of Law in Transitioning to a Sustainable Economy

Facilitating legislation is required for citizens to initiate local referendums to adopt urban property rights that provide sustainable affordable housing and infrastructure. New laws and regulations are required so official currencies do not: (a) create inefficiencies and climate change from mispricing resources, or (b) earn interest to exacerbate resource misallocation and inequality. Corporate constitutions require changes to minimize overpayments to investors creating inefficiencies and inequality not reported by accountants and so not discussed by economists or politicians. The problems created by non-ecological property rights have been exacerbated by democracy being degraded from the power and influence of a small minority who own the majority of private assets and influence the use of public assets. Achieving a sustainable steady state economy requires scholars and activists educating citizens how it can become more equitable, efficient resilient in providing well being while consuming less. Democratizing property creates a third way to distribute national income other than through work or welfare to reduce the size and cost of government. Ecological ownership could provide a universal basic income to remove the need for compulsory private funding of pensions and allow policies of full employment to be replaced with policies of fulfillment in work and/or leisure.

Is Overpopulation a Growth? The Pathology of Permanent Expansion

Both economic and population growth are commonly understood as an indefinite, quantitative increase that is both necessary and desirable for human well-being. In contrast, proponents of a steady state economy and of the de-growth movement have advocated for an end to the dominant ideology of growth as a way to tackle environmental problems, but have eschewed a deeper questioning of the meaning of growing. In the final section of the article, I put forth an alternative, qualitative notion of human growth that embraces both our unfolding as a species and a conscious acceptance of our finitude and limits.

Tracking resource use relative to planetary boundaries in a steady-state framework: A case study of Canada and Spain

There is a growing understanding of the biophysical processes that regulate the stability of the Earth-system, yet human pressures on the planet continue to increase rapidly. Here, recent advances in defining Earth-system thresholds using the planetary boundaries framework are translated down to national and sub-national levels. A set of 10 indicators is developed in a biophysical accounting framework that links the sustainability of resource flows from the biosphere to final consumption. The indicator set includes three measures of physical stocks, three measures of aggregate resource consumption, and four indicators of sustainable scale. The four scale indicators are ratios of (i) cumulative carbon footprint relative to carbon budget, (ii) nutrient use relative to biogeochemical boundaries, (iii) blue water consumption relative to monthly basin-level availability, and (iv) land footprint relative to biocapacity. Taken together, the indicators measure how close high-consuming societies are to meeting the conditions of a “steady-state economy”, defined here as an economy with non-growing physical stocks and flows maintained within shares of planetary boundaries. The framework is applied over a 15-year period to the economies of Canada and Spain, along with two sub-national regions (Nova Scotia and Andalusia). Nova Scotia is the only study site experiencing stable or decreasing biophysical stocks and flows. None of the study sites are consuming resources within their shares of all four planetary boundaries. Overall, the set of indicators provides guidance for prioritizing which environmental pressures need to decline (and by how much) for societies to be more effective stewards of Earth-system stability.

Economic development and prosperity patterns around the world: Structural challenges for a global steady-state economy

Abstract Taking a global perspective this paper sets out to theoretically and empirically identify prosperity patterns for four groups of countries at different levels of economic development. It conceptualizes ‘prosperity’ in terms of ecological sustainability, social inclusion, and the quality of life and contextualizes this definition in global perspective. Subsequently, it operationalizes and measures these dimensions on the basis of data from sources such as the World Bank, the Global Footprint Network and the OECD for 138 countries and by applying dual multiple factor analysis. Building on earlier research that suggested that higher development levels in terms of GDP per capita are capable of providing social and individual prosperity but at the expense of environmental sustainability, we ask whether other interrelations between prosperity indicators exist on other levels of economic development. Empirically distinguishing between ‘rich’, ‘emerging’, ‘developing’ and ‘poor countries’ the paper finds that social and individual prosperity indicators largely increase with economic development while ecological sustainability indicators worsen. Our analyses further reveal that ‘social cohesion’ can be established under different economic and institutional conditions, that subjective wellbeing increases with income rises at all levels of economic development and that a decoupling of carbon emissions from the provision of prosperity is, in principle, achievable, while a reduction of the global matter and energy throughput poses a much greater challenge. The paper concludes by highlighting the repercussions of these findings for the trajectories that countries at different levels of economic development would need to undertake.

Growth Critique in the 1970s Crisis and Today: Malthusianism, Social Mechanics, and Labor Discipline

This article examines the perspective on labor in two critiques of “growth” as elaborated in the context of two capitalist crises: the Keynesian model of industrial development in the 1970s, and the neoliberal finance capitalist growth model of today. A landmark event for the first critique was the publication of the “Limits to Growth” report, and for the second the emergence of the “degrowth” theoretical current. Both critiques have a Malthusian point of departure, and their view on overpopulation is accordingly discussed. Comparison between them shows that despite their ecological and supposedly socially and politically neutral point of departure, both bodies of critique examined here—that of the 1970s and the contemporary one—prescribe for labor the obligation of social discipline and acceptance of labor-market insecurity, along with the undermining of welfare rights. First, I argue that there is no such thing as an ahistorical critique of growth, but only critiques of different, case-specific models of growth in each particular instance. Second, I argue that the idea of a steady-state economy that predominates in growth critical programs is incompatible with the process of expansion and continual enlargement inherent to capitalism. Finally, I argue that, in the framework of two different crises, both critiques of growth promoted a vision of social pacification and, on the basis of ecological arguments, justified the preservation of capitalist power relations.

Contemporary Discourses of Green Political Economy: A Q Method Analysis

ABSTRACTFor over two decades, the concept of sustainable development has been salient in political discourse. But its promise of reconciling economic development, social welfare, and environmental sustainability has proven rather elusive. In recent years, we've seen numerous competing concepts emerge in debates about sustainable economic development. While many advance ideas of a green economy and green growth, others talk about wellbeing, gross national happiness, inclusive wealth, harmony with nature, de-growth, steady-state economy, and buenvivir (living well). This rhetorical diversity shows that there is no single vision for reconciling environmental sustainability and economic development. But the varied terminology itself obscures actual points of agreement and disagreement. This article reports on a bilingual ‘Q study’ of international debates about sustainable economic development. It reveals that three discourses underpin these debates: Radical Transformationism; Cooperative Reformism; and Statist Progressivism. The article dissects these discourses and contextualizes their key points of contention in wider sustainability debates over the past two decades.

Ecological economics: From humanity’s current dilemma to policies for a steady state economy

Students entering a foundation course in economics are often told, 'economics is the study of choice; of decisions on the allocation of scarce resources between competing needs'. Ecological economics extends this definition to include choices made across time and between generations. In doing so it debates competing views of technological advances, questioning the security they can offer, and interrogates the natures of welfare, growth, development and the measurement of them. It is in the growth/development debate that ecological economics deviates furthest from the common conventions of environmental economics. Where modern economics still assumes a frontier economy, with boundless opportunities for growth, the ecological economist sees a world that is already nearly full.

Climate Change, Capitalism and Degrowth Trajectories to a Global Steady-State Economy

Climate change (CC) is one of the major and most encompassing threats in the world today. While the facts and high-consensus predictions among natural scientists are increasingly well-known, the understanding of CC as a socio-ecological issue is much less clear and uncontroversial. This paper summarizes the available climate science expertise and then discusses the genesis of CC as a socio-ecological issue highlighting its parallel development with capitalism. It moves on to review institutional approaches to study the link between capitalist diversity and greenhouse gas emissions and outlines future research directions with emphasis on a possible reconciliation of Marxian and “degrowth” thought. Due to the lacking evidence for absolute decoupling of economic growth, material resource use and carbon emissions it is argued that all societies, whether socialist or capitalist, will need to deprioritize economic growth as policy goal in the course of the twenty-first century. International critical thought should be dedicated towards analyzing the structural challenges and opportunities in building a global steady-state economy as well as associated post-growth societies.

The proximity of nations to a socially sustainable steady-state economy

There has been increasing interest in new economic models that aim to improve quality of life without increasing consumption. This article provides the first empirical analysis of how close modern-day economies are to the concept of a “steady-state economy”, and explores whether there is any relationship between a country's proximity to such an economy and its social performance. The analysis is carried out using the Degrowth Accounts, a set of 16 biophysical and social indicators that are derived from Herman Daly's definition of a steady-state economy and the social goals of the degrowth movement. These indicators are applied to ∼180 countries over a 10-year period. The analysis reveals that the majority of countries in the world are biophysical growth economies. There are only a small number of countries where resource use is relatively constant from year to year (e.g. Denmark, France, Japan, Poland, Romania, and the US), and only four countries experiencing biophysical degrowth (Germany, Guyana, Moldova, and Zimbabwe). There are no countries that achieve a true steady-state economy, defined as an economy with a stable level of resource use maintained within ecological limits. However, a few countries come relatively close, including Colombia, Cuba, Kyrgyzstan, Romania, and South Africa. In general, countries with stable resource use perform better on many social indicators than countries with either increasing or decreasing resource use. This finding runs contrary to conventional economic thought. However, social performance is also higher in countries with greater per capita resource use. Overall, these findings suggest that a steady-state economy can be socially sustainable, but countries need to become much more efficient at transforming natural resources into human well-being if all seven billion people on Earth are to lead a good life within ecological limits.

P-368 – Thrombopenie et angiome cutané penser au syndrome de Kasabach Merritt

The coming fossil fuel peak may cause shortages in energy supplies and major disturbances in the global economy. The forecasts for the future of our way of life are very divergent depending on the prediction used for future human access to energy, and they range between collapse and indefinite growth. The LINEX production function, which depends on energy input, was modified, calibrated and used to model the gross domestic product (GDP) of the US economy under several different energy scenarios after the fossil fuel peak. The effects of information and communication technologies and technological innovation after energetic crises have been also modeled. A future renewable mix of global scale will require the use of a major fraction of the reserves of several important minerals. In this context, a future steady-state economy appears to be the best plausible scenario. Some of the implications and challenges derived from this steady-state economy are discussed.

Change in Sustainable Economies

Two important problems in models for a sustainable economy are (1) how to connect environmental models with societal models and (2) how to model the impact of societal changes upon an environment.For the first challenge, the Leontief economic model has been transformed from a vector to a tensor equation, as a model for integrating regional descriptions of an economy and its local environment. However, this is a static model of a steady-state (stasis) economy during a given period; and here we address the second challenge of modeling the impact of societal change upon an economy and its environment.We apply the modeling of societal change in the historical case of Australia’s Mining Rent Tax of 2012-2014.

What Should Be Held Steady in a Steady‐State Economy?: Interpreting Daly's Definition at the National Level

SummaryWithin this article, I investigate a number of the conceptual issues that arise when attempting to translate Herman Daly's definition of a steady‐state economy (SSE) into a set of national biophysical indicators. Although Daly's definition gives a high‐level view of what would be held steady in an SSE, it also leaves many questions unanswered. How should stocks and flows be aggregated? What is the role of international trade? How should nonrenewable resources be treated? And where does natural capital fit in? To help answer these questions, I relate Daly's definition to key concepts and terminology from material and energy flow accounting. I explore topics such as aggregation, international trade, the relevance of throughput, and hidden flows. I conclude that a set of biophysical accounts for an SSE should include three types of indicators (stocks, flows, and scale), track how stocks and flows are changing over a 5‐ to 10‐year period, use aggregated data that measure the quantity of resource use (rather than its quality), measure both total and nonrenewable resource use, adopt a consumption‐based approach, include hidden flows, and exclude indicators that measure characteristics of the stock of natural capital (with the notable exception of indicators that measure the regenerative and assimilative capacities of ecosystems).

Civic Education for Sustainable Development

Abstract Education for sustainable development (ESD) often fails to consider the political dimension. To address this gap, this paper focuses on a specific political approach to ESD. The model presented is derived from the four sustainable growth targets of German Development Policy. Instead of relying on a neo-classical or neo-liberal economic paradigm, however, the goals of social justice, environmental sustainability, economic productivity and good governance are interpreted using a sustainability model. This model is anchored in a steady-state economy that has overcome the myth of unlimited material growth and seeks to stay within the limits of the planet's resources. The preconditions of good governance are outlined, and it is described how the state and civil society can contribute to this normative goal. In addition to social, ecological, economic and political components, the presented model for civic education for sustainability considers conflicts between different development components and the need for horizontal and vertical coherence. In conclusion, the paper shows that civic education for sustainability must aim to produce informed and empowered global citizens. Citizens should have the ability to employ their knowledge and skills responsibly through local and global civic involvement while also remaining aware of their own interests. Furthermore, it falls to educational policy makers to create national as well as international organisational structures that facilitate civic ESD.

Think globally, research locally: paradigms and place in agroecological research.

Conducting science for practical ends implicates scientists, whether they wish it or not, as agents in social-ecological systems, raising ethical, economic, environmental, and political issues. Considering these issues helps scientists to increase the relevance and sustainability of research outcomes. As we rise to the worthy call to connect basic research with food production, scientists have the opportunity to evaluate alternative food production paradigms and consider how our research funds and efforts are best employed. In this contribution, we review some of the problems produced by science conducted in service of industrial agriculture and its associated economic growth paradigm. We discuss whether the new concept of "ecological intensification" can rescue the industrial agriculture/growth paradigm and present an emerging alternative paradigm of decentralized, localized, biodiversity-promoting agriculture for a steady-state economy. This "custom fit" agriculture engages constructively with complex and highly localized ecosystems, and we draw from examples of published work to demonstrate how ecologists can contribute by using approaches that acknowledge local agricultural practices and draw on community participation.

Potentials for a socially equitable and ecologically sustainable society

A steady state economy needs indicators that capture ecological sustainability, social inclusion and quality of life based on both objective and subjective data. Interrelations between indicators and country comparisons show the potential of increasing prosperity without raising material consumption.

Capitalist diversity and de-growth trajectories to steady-state economies

Growth-critical scholarship has done much to both expose the environmentally unsustainable nature of the capitalist growth-economies of the overdeveloped part of the world and to develop an alternative vision of a de-growth transition leading to a steady-state economy. However, this scholarship fails to adequately take into consideration that if planned de-growth actually materialised it would do so in societies that differ considerably from one another and that this would have implications both for the transition processes and the nature of their outcomes. In other words, not enough importance is ascribed to capitalist diversity and the nature of institutional change in the growth-critical literature. Against this background, the purpose of the present article is to make the “concrete utopia” of de-growth scholars and steady-state economists more specific by utilising insights from scholarship on capitalist diversity and institutional change. On the basis of a typology of different models of capitalism, the article suggests that if de-growth transitions took place they would take different forms and lead to a variety of types of steady-state economies (SSEs). To illustrate this point, three ideal-typical SSEs are delineated.

Limits to Economic Growth

First paragraphs: I am often asked why so few agricultural economists seem interested in sustainable agriculture or sustainable community development. Perhaps it's because unlimited growth is one of the foundational assumptions of neoclassical economics. If there are no limits to economic growth, questions of sustainability are needless or pointless. Ecological economists challenge this assumption and call for a steady-state economy, meaning one develops qualitatively without growing quantitatively... maintained at a level that is both sufficient for a good life and within the assimilative and regenerative capacities of the [natural] ecosystem (Daly, 2013). However, most economists seem to believe that human imagination and creativity is capable of finding a substitute for any natural resource we may deplete and finding a technological solution for any problem we might create — given adequate economic incentives. One argument for unlimited economic growth is limitless dematerialization, meaning an infinite ability to extract economic value from fewer natural and human resources. As ecological economists point out, this conflicts directly with the law of entropy, which is the second law of thermodynamics. Everything of any use to us, including everything of economic value, ultimately depends on the usefulness of energy. According to the law of entropy, whenever energy is used to do anything useful, some of its usefulness is lost. Accepting the law of entropy, there are physical limits to dematerialization and thus limits to economic growth. Unlimited economic growth would require ephemeralization, a term coined by Buckminster Fuller, meaning the ability of technological advancement to do more and with less and less until eventually you can do everything with nothing (Ephemeralization, 2013, para. 1). It doesn't seem reasonable to bet the future of humanity on this possibility....

‘New conservation’ or surrender to development?

Ecologists have concluded that diversity per se in ecosystems is important to ecosystem function and ecological services. Meta-analyses of several hundred investigations showed that a loss of diversity negatively affected ecosystem function (Balvanera et al., 2006; Cardinale et al., 2006, 2011; Tilman, 2012). Specifically, research showed that loss of species diversity decreased productivity, resilience, nutrient cycling, drought tolerance, options for water management, resistance to pests and efficiency of ecosystems while increasing chances of catastrophic disease (Keesing et al., 2010; Tilman, 2012; Washington, 2013). Yet, the planet’s biodiversity is affected by explosions in human population, advancing technology and increasing per capita consumption (Wilson, 2002). Lately, some propose that the future of conservation lies in managing nature for human benefit (Kareiva & Marvier, 2007; Kareiva et al., 2007; Nordhaus & Shellenberger, 2007; Marris, 2011; Kareiva, Lalasz & Marvier, 2012a; Duncan, 2013). Directing conservation action for human benefit is nothing new. It recycles the ideas of Gifford Pinchot, maximum sustainable yield and the Brundtland Commission. Here, we critique some recent assumptions in the various forms of this ideology (hereafter, ideology), many of which use human exceptionalism as a justification: (1) nature is a warehouse for human use; (2) humans can construct new ecosystems from non-native species; (3) humans do not have to live within limits; (4) nature is resilient; (5) nature is a social construct; (6) conservationists preach too much doom and gloom; (7) people can manage nature intensively while preserving biodiversity.