Degree | Type | Year | Semester |
---|---|---|---|
4313784 Interdisciplinary Studies in Environmental, Economic and Social Sustainability | OT | 0 | 1 |
No aplica.
The course will introduce the field of ecological economics, paying attention to theoretical, methodological and empirical issues. Classic themes, important debates and recent research foci will receive attention. Valuation methods that cut across ecological and environmental economics will also be explored.
At the end of the course the student is expected to have a good understanding of:
The FEE course involves a series of 3-hour lectures organised in four main sub-modules under the responsibility of specific teachers. Some teachers may provide slides in advance through the CV but others may not. All readings need to be found by the student from internet and academic library sources (e.g. Scopus, Web of Knowledge) available on the UAB campus.
Sub-Module 1: Foundations, Policy & Innovation (JvdB)
1. History and principles of ecological economics (comparing with traditional environmental economics)
2. Welfare, markets, externalities and public goods
3. Environmental policy instruments
4. Theories and methods of environmental valuation
5. Economics of climate policy
6. The environment-versus-growth debate
Sub-Module 2: Institutional economics and environmental applications (SV)
7. Introduction institutional economics
8. Basics of game theory and coordination problems
9. Property rights and the theory of the commons
10. Environmental governance: Markets, governments and communities
Sub-Module 3: Methods for integratedassessment (CC)
11 Social multe-criteria evaluation - SMCE
12 SMCE in practice
13 Introduction to analysis of social metabolism
14 Application of social metabolism to case studies
15 Environmental Valuation and Ecosystem services
Sub-Module 4: From Steady-State economics to degrowth (CC)
16. Ecological macroeconomics and SystemDynamics
17. Political Ecological Economics
18. Alternative economic practices
Lecturers will present a given topic and students will be expected to prepare for the class reading in advance the compulsory readings suggested in the bibliography. Lectures will involve time for questions and answers and for discussion; they might also involve role-play exercises and video-material. In class participation, tests and essays preparation will involve group and individual work, respectively.
Title | Hours | ECTS | Learning Outcomes |
---|---|---|---|
Type: Directed | |||
Lectures | 54 | 2.16 | 6, 4 |
Presentation and discussion in class | 8 | 0.32 | 3, 6, 2, 4, 9 |
Type: Autonomous | |||
2 short essays, and tests at the beginning of classes which involve reading the necessary literature to write the essays | 60 | 2.4 | 8, 6, 4, 9 |
Reading articles, books and studying for each of the given lectures and the final exam | 100 | 4 | 7, 1, 5, 6, 4, 9 |
Students will be assessed on the basis of (a) a written, closed-book exam; b) written essays, and c) their participation in class. In particular, they will be assessed based on:
1) A 500-words personal statement corresponding to the last lecture of the course, focused on the environment-versus-growth debate, and to be submitted in class and to Jeroen van den Bergh, contributing to 10% of the final mark.
2) A 1000-words argumentative essay discussing critically a statement related to the sessions 7-10, to be submitted by email to Sergio Villamayor, and contributing to 20% of the final mark; the question(the statement to be discussed will be formulated in session 10)
3) Team-based closed-answer tests to be answered at the beginning of classes nd based on the mandatory readings of the corresponding classes, and contributing to 20% of the final mark:
Title | Weighting | Hours | ECTS | Learning Outcomes |
---|---|---|---|---|
2 short essays and tests at the beginning of classes | 50% | 0 | 0 | 8, 3, 7, 5, 6, 2, 4, 9 |
Final Exam | 50% | 3 | 0.12 | 8, 3, 7, 1, 5, 6, 2, 4, 9 |
The literature marked with (*) is obligatory and must be read prior to each lecture since it will be the basis for the respective class. The other literature mentioned is voluntary background reading but students are encouraged to read as much as they can.
1. History and principles of Ecological Economics
(*) van den Bergh, J.C.J.M. 2000. Ecological Economics: Themes, Approaches, and Differences with Environmental Economics. Regional Environmental Change, 3(1): 13-23.
Martinez-Alier, J., Roca Jusmet, J. 2000. Economía Ecológica y Política Ambiental. PNUMA y Fondo de Cultura Económica.
Ropke, I. 2005. Trends in the development of ecological economics from the late 1980s to the early 2000s. Ecological Economics, 55: 262– 290.
2. Welfare, markets, externalities and public goods
(*) Kahn, J.R. 2004. The Economic Approach to Environmental and Natural Resources. 3rd edition, Thomson/South-Western, Fort Worth, Mason, Ohio. ch. 2; & ch. 4, section “What is Value”.
(*) Verhoef, E.T. 1999. Externalities. Chapter 13 in: J.C. J.M. van den Bergh (ed.). Handbook of Environmental and Resource Economics. Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, pp. 197-214.
3. Environmental policy instruments
(*) Russell, C.S., Powell, P.T. 1999. Practical considerations and comparison of instruments of environmental policy. Chapter 21 in: J.C.J.M. van den Bergh (ed.). Handbook of Environmental and Resource Economics. Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, pp. 307-328.
Sterner, T. 2003. Policy Instruments for Environmental and Natural Resource Management. Resources for the Future (RFF Press), Washington D.C., USA, 504 pages.
4. Theories and methods of environmental valuation
(*) Perman et al., Valuing the Environment, Chapter 4 in Natural Resource and Environmental Economics
Hanley, N., Spash, C.L. 1993. Cost-Benefit Analysis and the Environment. Edward Elgar Publishers, Aldershot.
Martinez-Alier, J., Munda, J., O'Neill, J. 1998. Weak comparability of values as a foundation for ecological economics. Ecological Economics, 26: 277–286.
5. Economics of climate policy
(*) Executive summary of The Stern review: The Economics of Climate Change (2006). http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/30_10_06_exec_sum.pdf
(*) McKibbin, W.J., Wilcoxen, P.J. 2002. The role of economics in climate change policy. Journal of Economic Perspectives 16(2): 107-129.
J.C.J.M. van den Bergh (2010). Safe climate policy is affordable – 12 reasons. Climatic Change 101(3): 339–385.
Responses to / debate on the Stern review (http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/6520.htm).
Tol, R.S.J. (2009). The economic effects of climate change. Journal of Economic Perspectives 23(2): 29-51.
6. The environment-versus-growth debate
(*) Beckerman, W. 1992. Economic growth and the environment. World Development, 20(4): 481-496.
(*) Daly, H.E. 2005. Economics in a full world. Scientific American 293(3).
(*) van den Bergh, J., de Mooij, R. 2002. Growth and the environment in Europe: a guide to the debate. Empirica, 29: 79-91.
Kallis, G. 2011. In defence of degrowth. Ecological Economics, 70(5): 873-880.
van den Bergh, J.C.J.M. 2009. The GDP Paradox. Journal of Economic Psychology, 30(2): 117-135.
van den Bergh, J.C.J.M. 2011. Environment versus growth — A criticism of “degrowth” and a plea for “a-growth? Ecological Economics, 70(5): 881-890.
Introduction institutional economics
(*) Paavola, J., and W. N. Adger (2005), Institutional ecological economics, Ecological Economics, 53(3), 353-368.
(*) Vatn, A., (2007), 1. Institutions the web of human life, in Vatn, A. Institutions and the Environment: Edward Elgar Publishing (pp. 1-20)
Hodgson, G. M. (1998), The Approach of Institutional Economics, Journal of Economic Literature, 36(1), 166-192.
Ostrom, E. (1998), A Behavioral Approach to the Rational Choice Theory of Collective Action: Presidential Address, American Political Science Association, 1997, The American Political Science Review, 92(1), 1-22.
Hall, P. A., and R. C. R. Taylor (1996), Political Science and the Three New Institutionalisms*, Political Studies, 44(5), 936-957.
8. Basics of game theory and coordination problems
(*) Bowles, S., (2009), Social interactions and institutional design, in Bowles, S., Microeconomics: behavior, institutions, and evolution: Princeton University Press (pp. 23-56).
Varian, H. R., and J. Repcheck, (2010), Chapter 28, in Varian, H.R., and J. Repcheck, Intermediate microeconomics: a modern approach, (Vol. 6): WW Norton & Company New York, NY (pp. 505-519)
Varian, H. R., and J. Repcheck, (2010), Chapter 29, in Varian, H.R., and J. Repcheck, Intermediate microeconomics: a modern approach, (Vol. 6): WW Norton & Company New York, NY (pp. 505-519)
9. Property rights and the theory of the commons
(*) Cole, D. H., G. Epstein,and M. D. McGinnis (2014), Digging deeper into Hardin's pasture: the complex institutional structure of ‘the tragedy of the commons’, Journal of Institutional Economics, 10(3), 353-369.
(*) Ostrom, E., J. Burger, C. B. Field, R. B. Norgaard, and D. Policansky (1999), Revisiting the commons: local lessons, global challenges, Science, 284(5412), 278-282.
Agrawal, A. (2001), Common Property Institutions and Sustainable Governance of Resources, World Development, 29(10), 1649-1672.
Ostrom, E. (2007), A diagnostic approach for going beyond panaceas, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 104(39), 15181-15187.
Schlager, E., and E. Ostrom (1992), Property-Rights Regimes and Natural Resources: A Conceptual Analysis, Land Economics, 68(3), 249-262.
10. Environmental governance: Markets, governments and communities
(*) Ostrom, E. (2010), Polycentric systems for coping with collective action and global environmental change, Global Environmental Change, 20(4), 550-557.
Acheson, J. M. (2006), Institutional Failure in Resource Management, Annual Review of Anthropology, 35, 117-134.
Lemos, M. C., and A. Agrawal (2006), Environmental governance, Annu. Rev. Environ. Resour., 31, 297-325.
Muradian, R. (2013), Payments for ecosystem services as incentives for collective action, Society & Natural Resources, 26(10), 1155-1169.
11. Analysis of Social metabolism: MEFA, MuSIASEM, MultiEROI
(*) Gerber, J.F. and Scheidel, A., 2017. In search of substantive economics: comparing today’s two major socio-metabolic approaches to the Economy - MEFA and MuSIASEM. Ecological Economics 144, pp.:186-194
(*) Giampietro, Mario; Mayumi, Kozo; Ramos-Martin J., 2009. Multi-scale integrated analysis of societal and ecosystem metabolism (MuSIASEM): Theoretical concepts and basic rationale. Energy 34(3), pp.: 313-322
(*) Tello, E. et al 2017. Opening the black box of energy throughputs in farm systems: a decomposition analysis between the energy returns to external inputs, internal biomass reuses and total input consumed (the Valles county, Catalonia, c.1860 and 1999). Ecological Economics 121, pp.:160-174
Ramos-Martín J., Cañellas-Boltà S., Giampetro M., Gamboa G., 2009. Catalonia's energy metabolism: Using the MuSIASEM approach at different scales. Energy Policy, vol 37, (2009), p 4658–4671.
D’Alisa G. and Cattaneo, C., 2013. Household work and energy consumption: a degrowth perspective. Catalonia’s case study. Journal of Cleaner Production 38, pp.:71-79
12. Social multi-criteria evaluation - SMCE
(*) Cattaneo, C. and Baulcomb, C. 2016. Social Multi-Criteria Analysis. Tutorial Booklet. Will be uploaded to the platform.
(*) Munda G. Social multi-criteria evaluation: methodological foundations and operational consequences. European Journal of Operational Research;Vol 158(3): Pp 662-677.
Martinez-Alier, J., Munda, J., O'Neill, J. 1998. Weak comparability of values as a foundation for ecological economics. Ecological Economics, 26: Pg 277–286
European Environmental Agency. Late lessons from early warnings. The precautionary principle in Europe. https://www.eea.europa.eu/publications/late-lessons-2
13. SMCE in practice
A Multi Criteria exercise will be practiced by student teams in class. Information about the exercise will be uploaded on the platform.
14. Ecological Macroeconomics and System Dynamics
(*) Hardt, L. and D. O’Neill (2017) “Ecological Macroeconomic Models: Assessing Current Developments”, Ecological Economics, 123, 198-211.
Jacobs, M. (2012) “Green Growth: Economic Theory and Political Discourse”, Centre for climate change economics and policy working paper, 108.
Jänicke, M. (2012). “Green growth”: From a growing eco-industry to economic sustainability. Energy Policy, 48, 13-21.
Highlights of the lecture:
We present and critically discuss the green growth approach.
We introduce and investigate the ecological macroeconomics literature
Whysystem dynamics is a powerful tool for policies evaluation
A post-growth model of Ecological Macroeconomics (EUROGREEN)
15. From Steady State to Degrowth - introduction of the core arguments of degrowth
(*) Kerschner, C., 2010. Economic de-growth vs. Steady state economy. Journal of Cleaner Production, 18 pp.:544-551
(*) Demaria, F., Schneider, F., Sekulova, F. and Martinez-Alier, J., 2013. What is degrowth? From an activist slogan to a social movement. Environmental Values, 22 pp.:191-215
16. Political Ecological Economics - integrating the ideas of political ecology to those of ecological economics
(*) Kallis, G. 2018. The economic process revisited. Chapter 2 in Kallis, G. Degrowth. Agenda Publishing
(*) Kallis, G. 2017. Economics without growth. Chapter 2 in Castells M. et al. (Eds), Another economy is possible, Polity Press.
Kallis, G. Indefense of degrowth. Opinions and minifiestos. (Chapters 2 and 3) https://indefenseofdegrowth.com
17. Well-being and happiness economics
(*) Sekulova F., van den Bergh J.C.J.M. 2014. Climate change, income and happiness: An empirical study for Barcelona". Global Environmental Change 23(6), pp.: 1467-1475
(*) Easterlin, R.A. (2003), ‘Building a better theory of well-being’, IZA Discussion Paper No. 742, Institute for the Study of Labor, Bonn.
http://www-bcf.usc.edu/~easterl/papers/BetterTheory.pdf
Diener, E. and R. Biswas-Diener (2002), ‘Will money increase subjective well-being? A literature review and guide to needed research’, Social Indicators Research, 57 (2), 119–69.
Easterlin, R.A. (2013), ‘Happiness and economic growth: the evidence’, in Global Handbook of Well-Being and Quality of Life, IZA Discussion Paper No. 7187, Institute for the Study of Labor, Bonn.
18. Solidarity economies
(*) Miller, E. 2009. Solidarity Economy - Key concepts and issues. In Kawano et al., (Eds) Solidarity Economy I: Building alternatives for people and planet. Center for Popular Economics.
Gritzas G. and Kavoulakos, I. 2015. Diverse economies and alternative spaces: An overview of approaches and practices. European Urban and Regional Studies, 1-18
Conill, J., Castells, M., Cardenas, A. and Servon, L.J. 2012. Beyond the crisis: alternative economic practices in Catalonia. In Castells et al. (Eds) Aftermath. The cultures of the economic crisis. Oxford University Press
Varvarousis, A and Kallis, G. 2017. Commoning against the crisis. Chapter 6 in Castells M. et al. (Eds), Another economy is possible, Polity Press.