Costing the Earth?: Restructuring the Economy for Sustainable Development Book

Editor's Foreword ix

1 Introduction 1

An outline 1

Chapter contents 6

2 Where is the World Floating? 14

Economic growth and competition between industrialized countries and emerging developing countries 14

Continuous population growth 19

Increased raw material extractions and a continued rise in the emissions of pollutants 24

Tougher international competition for increasingly scarcer resources 30

The repercussions of ever increasing environmental damage 31

3 What are the Causes, and What Kind of Solutions do We Have? 38

The difference between the personal and social costs of using the environment 38

Economic instruments: tax, trading in licenses and subsidies 39

The necessary supplementary measures: communications and information policies, and cooperative solutions 47

Alternative regulatory policy instruments 50

Promoting intrinsic motivation 51

Ecological social market economy 52

4 The Sustainability Paradigm 56

The spirit of Rio 56

The three dimensions of sustainability 59

Why some ecologists and economists do not like this concept 66

From preventive environmentalism to sustainability strategies 67

Reconstructing the economy by increasing resource productivity 70

5 What Options Are There For Increasing Resource Productivity? 76

The Sufficiency Strategy: the role of the consumer 76

The Efficiency Strategy: Factor 10 innovations and investments to increase resource productivity 82

The importance of key technologies 90

6 What Precisely Needs to Change to Enable increased Resource Productivity in Europe? 97

Sustainability is indivisible 98

The role of economic instruments 100

Further developing emissions tradingallowances 101

The ecological tax reform 107

State-operated efficiency agencies 110

Subsidies for the use of innovative technologies 117

Research funding 120

The certification of consumer goods, durable goods, and buildings 122

The selection of technical standards for vehicles, buildings, and equipment 125

Education for sustainable development 128

Sustainability and business management 129

7 A Country in Focus: Germany What Changes Will Have to be Made to the Labor Market and to the Social Security System? 131

The labor market and demographic change - a status quo forecast 131

Mobilizing labor supply and education campaigns 137

Minimum income and the flexibilization of the labor market 140

Problems for the social security system? 142

8 Perspectives for More Sustainable Development in Europe 145

Estimating the potential of future developments using environmental economic models 145

The MOSUS Project - alternative scenarios for development in Europe 152

Can Europe's targets for sustainable development be met? 155

The global perspective 160

9 Creating an International Framework 166

The alternative: no international framework 166

The first attempt: the Kyoto Protocol 168

The problem with balancing the interests of the developing countries, the newly industrialized countries, and the industrial countries 175

10 Final Comments 179

Glossary 181

Bibliography 190

Picture References 195