Ecological Economics: Principles And Applications - Hardcover

Daly, Herman E.; Farley, Joshua

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1559633123 ISBN 13: 9781559633123

Publisher: Island Press, 2003

Synopsis

Conventional economics is often criticized for failing to reflect adequately the value of clean air and water, species diversity, and social and generational equity. By excluding biophysical and social systems from their analyses, many conventional economists overlook problems of the increasing scale of human impacts and the inequitable distribution of resources. Ecological Economics is an introductory-level textbook for an emerging paradigm that addresses this flaw in much economic thought. The book defines a revolutionary "transdiscipline" that incorporates insights from the biological, physical, and social sciences, and it offers a pedagogically complete examination of this exciting new field. The book provides students with a foundation in traditional neoclassical economic thought, but places that foundation within a new interdisciplinary framework that embraces the linkages among economic growth, environmental degradation, and social inequity. Introducing the three core issues that are the focus of the new transdiscipline -- scale, distribution, and efficiency -- the book is guided by the fundamental question, often assumed but rarely spoken in traditional texts: What is really important to us? After explaining the key roles played by the earth's biotic and abiotic resources in sustaining life, the text is then organized around the main fields in traditional economics: microeconomics, macroeconomics, and international economics. The book also takes an additional step of considering the policy implications of this line of thinking.Ecological Economics includes numerous features that make it accessible to a wide range of students: more than thirty text boxes that highlight issues of special importance to students lists of key terms that help students organize the main points in each chapter concise definitions of new terms that are highlighted in the text for easy reference study questions that encourage student exploration beyond the text glossary and list of further readingsAn accompanying workbook presents an innovative, applied problem-based learning approach to teaching economics.While many books have been written on ecological economics, and several textbooks describe basic concepts of the field, this is the only stand-alone textbook that offers a complete explanation of both theory and practice. It will serve an important role in educating a new generation of economists and is an invaluable new text for undergraduate and graduate courses in ecological economics, environmental economics, development economics, human ecology, environmental studies, sustainability science, and community development.

About this title

About the Author

Herman E. Daly is Professor Emeritus at the University of Maryland, School of Public Affairs. From 1988 to 1994 he was senior economist in the environment department of the World Bank. Prior to 1988 he was Alumni Professor of Economics at Louisiana State University, where he taught economics for twenty years. He is a co-founder and associate editor of the journal Ecological Economics.
He is co-author with theologian John B. Cobb, Jr. of For the Common Good (1989; 1994) which received the Grawemeyer Award for ideas for improving World Order. His other books include Steady-State Economics (Freeman, 1977; second edition, Island Press, 1991); Valuing the Earth (MIT, 1993) and Beyond Growth (Beacon, 1996). In 1996, he received the Heineken Prize for Environmental Science awarded by the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Right Livelihood Award, Sweden's alternative to the Nobel Prize.

Joshua Farley is a fellow at the Gund Institute for Ecological Economics and professor of community development and applied economics at the University of Vermont. He is coauthor with Herman Daly of Ecological Economics: Principles and Applications (Washington, DC: Island Press, 2003; 2nd ed., 2010), which helped define the then-emerging field of ecological economics. His broad research interests focus on the design of economic institutions capable of balancing what is biophysically possible with what is socially, psychologically, and ethically desirable. He has previously served as the executive director of the University of Maryland’s International Institute for Ecological Economics. Farley is a fellow of Post Carbon Institute.

Review

"Revised second edition presents an introduction to the field of ecological economics and considers alternatives to the current economic goals of infinite growth and limitless material consumption." (Journal of Economic Literature)

Edition details

• Publisher: Island Press
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 1559633123
• ISBN 13: 9781559633123
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 488