Ecological Economics Concepts and Methods

Ecological Economics offers an authoritative overview of a rapidly developing discipline lying at the interface of economics, natural science and philosophy. This pioneering new book focuses on the concepts and methods required to integrate sciences and humanities in order to build ecological economics.

Ecological Economics as a practice seeks to comprehend the evolving interactions between humans and the natural world. Ranging across the discipline from its conceptual and philosophical foundations to problems of global warming and waste production in the chemicals industry, the authors confidently address the central dilemma of control over nature by humans ignorant of the environmental impacts of their actions. Faber, Manstetten and Proops argue convincingly for an evolutionary approach to human-nature interactions and for the use of natural science concepts, such as entropy.

Students and researchers concerned with environmental, resource and ecological economics will welcome Ecological Economics as a convincing and innovative approach to the creation of a discipline capable of contributing to a new relationship between human and non-human nature.

Malte Faber, Professor Emeritus of Economics, University of Heidelberg, Germany, Reiner Manstetten, Assistant Professor, Alfred Weber Institute, Heidelberg University, Germany and John Proops, formerly Professor of Ecological Economics, School of Politics, International Relations and the Environment, Keele University, UK