Intro to Sustainability

Lecture 2 - A history and perspectives on sustainable development

Economics and the environment

 Concern about the impact of economic activity on the natural world is not new
- Early 19th Century economic thinkers (Malthus and Ricardo) were
preoccupied with limits to natural resources

 Economists in the industrial revolution turned their back on the natural world
- Marx saw the environment as the servant of humankind; to be harnessed
through science and technology
- Anti-Marxists focussed on market dynamics and the benefits of a free
market; founded the neo-classical tradition (still not bothered about the
environment) with micro-economic focus

 Early 20th Century economists (esp. Keynes) focussed on unemployment, and

economy-wide (macro-economic) approaches to tackling it

 Environmental economics becoming more prominent recently

Modern environmental movement

Modern environmental movement said to have begun with the publication of Silent Spring
(1962), an argument against pesticide-use or, at least, the excessive use of pesticides

During the same period

• Development gains unevenly distributed – models increasingly criticised
• First international conference on environment in Stockholm in 1972
• Oil crisis in 1973
• Birth of G77 and NIEO around 1974

Late 1970s and early 1980s saw rise of neoliberal world view
• More confrontational relationship between industrialised and developing worlds
• Recently fragmenting G77 (rise of BRICs)

International systematic research

World Commission on Environment and Development, 1987 report
International policy development

Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992

(UN Conference on Environment and Development – UNCED)
• Agenda 21
• Global Environment Facility (GEF) to finance Agenda 21
• UNFCCC – UN Framework Convention on Climate Change
• UN Commission on Sustainable Development (UNCSD)
(UNCSD closed 20/09/2013; High-level Political Forum on Sustainable Development – HLPF
– replaced UNCSD on 24/09/2013)
• CBD – Convention on Biological Diversity

Follow-on conferences in Johannesburg (2002) and Rio again (2012 – Rio+20)

• Sustainability debates
Counter-arguments continue to be made, e.g. from Bjørn Lomborg

• Sustainability debates
As do arguments about economic growth and sustainability

• Green economy concepts

Recent years have seen a range of green economy initiatives emerge

Sustainable Development
Definitions

Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without
compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs
(WCED 1987, p43)

It contains within it two key concepts:

• The concept of ‘needs’, in particular the essential needs of the world’s poor, to
which overriding priority should be given; and
• The idea of limitations imposed by the state of technology and social organization on
the environment’s ability to meet present and future needs.
(WCED 1987, p43)

Thus the goals of economic and social development must be defined in terms of
sustainability in all countries – developed or developing, market-oriented or centrally
planned.
Interpretations will vary, but must share certain general features and must flow from a
consensus on the basic concept of sustainable development and on a broad strategic
framework for achieving it.
(WCED 1987, p43)

Development involves a progressive transformation of economy and society.

A development path that is sustainable in a physical sense could theoretically be pursued
even in a rigid social and political setting.

But physical sustainability cannot be secured unless development policies pay attention to
such considerations as changes in access to resources and in the distribution of costs and
benefits.

Even the narrow notion of physical sustainability implies a concern for social equity
between generations, a concern that must logically be extended to equity within each
generation.
(WCED 1987, p43)

Where does this WCED definition (and its elaboration) take us for understanding
sustainable development?

Environment-Society-Economy

Environment

Bearable Viable

Sustainable

Society Equitable Economy

Environment-Society-Economy

Environment

Society

Economy
How do we make progress from this notion of the economy being embedded in society
and both (economy & society) embedded in the environment?

MDGs to SDGs
2000 to 2015
8 goals
Developing countries

2016 to 2030
17 goals
Global

Multiple Pathways
 Simplification Through ‘Organised’ Becomes Complex reality

Dimensions of framing:

‘Objective’
−Scale
Different actors, networks, narratives

environment −Boundaries
−Key elements and relationships
−Dynamics in play
FRAMINGS

−Outputs

‘system’ Subjective
−Perspectives
−Interests
−Values
−Notions of relevant expertise
−Goals

Source: Based on Leach et al (2010, pp44-45)

Summary
• Economics and environment concerns since early 19th century
− But mainstream economics lost interest (development of neo-classical
economics)
− Some re-emergence recently with environmental economics
• Modern environmental movement since early 1960s
• Sustainable development term coined from Brundtland report (1987)
• UN and international efforts gathering pace since 1992
• Post financial crisis, green growth (and variants) becoming mainstream
• MDGs replaced by SDGs
• 50+ years since Silent Spring, strengthening SD moves but future uncertain
• Uncertainty inherent to development and sustainability…
• Readings: this lecture
Lecture 3 - Market equilibrium and externalities

Economics and policy

• Many senior government advisors are economists

• Many senior politicians have economics training and/or experience
• Finance ministries staffed with economists and have power over budgets
• Economics tools are often used to assess policies and policy instruments

The price system

Supply of
Goods and Services

Production Prices Consumption

Demand for
Goods and Services
Demand function

Demand in graphical form

This graph represents the sum of all units of a product demanded (quantity,
Q) at a given price (P) by all purchasers in a market (e.g. the market for
widgets, or sugar, or oil, etc.)

Price

P3

P2

P1

Q3 Q2 Q1 Quantity

Plotting a ‘demand curve’ or demand function

• Economists plot demand curves by observing people’s willingness to pay

(WTP) for a good (not need or ability to pay)
• Its shape is illustrative – real demand curves can be different
Price

Quantity

Why do demand curves matter for policy?

• They show us how a tax might affect the quantity of a good or service being
consumed
• But what happens if no market exists?
– i.e. things are free (such as environmental resources)
 Why do demand curves matter for policy?

• If no market exists (e.g. for environmental

resources) there is a tendency for chronic
overuse unless regulations prevent this
• This phenomenon is called the first law of
Price demand in economics: “All other things
remaining constant, more of a good will be
demanded at a lower price” (Beardshaw et
al 2001, p49)
• But ‘Giffen goods’ may exist with the
opposite effect

P1
Quantity Q=?
Beardshaw, J, D.Brewster, P. Cormack and A. Ross (2001) Economics: a student’s guide, 5th edition, Financial Times Prentice Hall, Harlow

Shifting demand curves

D1 to D2 is a rightward shift of
Price the demand curve

P2

P1
D2
D1
Q2i Q1i
Q2 Q1 Quantity

What causes a shift in the demand curve?

• Income (as income rises, demand grows)

• Change in the price of substitutes (e.g. pepsi becomes cheaper than coke, or cost of
public transport becomes much cheaper than petrol)
• Advertising (same price, more people know about it/desire it)
• Changes in taste and fashion (same price, more people desire it)
• Population/demographics (numbers, age, gender)

Shift in a demand curve is brought about by changes OTHER THAN change in price of a
commodity
 Price elasticity of demand

A large change in the price

Price offered results in a small
change in the quantity
P2 demanded:

Inelastic Demand

P1

Q2
Quantity
Q1

Price elasticity of demand

A small change in the price

Price offered results in a large
change in the quantity
demanded:

Elastic Demand
P2
P1

Q2 Q1 Quantity

The price elasticity of demand is the first differential (dQ/dP) or the slope of the demand
function:
• An elasticity >1 means demand for a commodity is elastic
• An elasticity <1 means demand for a commodity is inelastic
• An elasticity =1 means demand for a commodity is unit elastic
 Price elasticity of demand

D2: Inelastic Demand

Price Elasticity < 1

D1: Elastic Demand

Elasticity > 1

Quantity

What contributes to elasticity of demand?

• Availability of substitutes (e.g. affordable public transport vs. using a car)

• Whether the good is a necessity or luxury (e.g. electricity vs. ipods)
• Whether the good is habit forming (e.g. cigarettes vs. DVDs)

Why is this important for policy?

• Both businesses and governments are interested in elasticities

• Finance minsters like to tax commodities with inelastic demand (e.g. tobacco,
alcohol, petrol) to maximise revenue
• To use a tax for environmental purposes, it is desirable for the commodity to have
elastic demand – the tax will reduce demand
• Elasticity varies inversely with the ‘breadth’ of a commodity – the elasticity of fish
fingers is high; for food it is low
Supply function

• As with the demand function, we will consider the price (P) and quantity (Q)
relationship but from the perspective of a producer (supplier)

• What do producers need to consider in deciding what they will supply into the
market?
– Costs: e.g. machinery, property, labour
– Profit
– Price they can sell the good or service

A supply curve

S
Price

P2

P1

Q1 Q2 Quantity

• Higher market prices will tend to attract more producers into the market (assuming
that everything else remains the same).

• For a constant cost structure (e.g. the cost of producing a tin of beans), higher prices
mean higher profits.

• As with demand, the shape of the curve is an illustrative example – but its general
direction is true of many real market supply curves.
 Shifting supply curves

S1 S2
Price

P2

P1

Q1i Q1ii Q2i Q2ii Quantity

What causes a shift in the supply curve?

• Changes in input costs: i.e. more/less profit at the same price

• Technological improvements: e.g. more efficient use of inputs

Why is this relevant to policy?

• If taxes are imposed, and they cannot be passed on to the consumer, costs increase,
profits are squeezed and the quantity supplied at a given price will decrease

• Regulations could require the use of specific clean or safe technologies. If this increases
costs of production then supply curves will shift leftwards

• If environmentally friendly efficiency improvements are made, the quantity supplied

might shift rightwards, thus putting a question mark over the aggregate environmental
benefit (known as the ‘rebound effect’)

• Ultimately, the overall effect depends on the interaction between supply and demand
 Balance of supply and demand:
Market equilibrium
Price
S

P1

Q1 Quantity
• Economic theory suggests that markets will always tend towards the point at which
demand equals supply
• This leads to an equilibrium price and quantity in the market

Market equilibrium

Price
S

P1

Q1 Quantity
• Left to its own devices, the market will tend to a price P1 and a quantity Q1
• This tendency is what Adam Smith meant by the “invisible hand” of the market

Market failures and (environmental) externalities

Overview

• Part of the critique of conventional economics includes considering:

 Market failures
 (Environmental) externalities

• This leads to the distinction between two types of market equilibrium:

 Private equilibrium
 Social equilibrium
Assumptions and ‘market failures’

• Microeconomic models of supply and demand will only produce expected results if
certain conditions are fulfilled
– Perfect competition between suppliers
– Perfect information for suppliers and consumers
– Free entry to (and exit from) the market
– All costs and benefits are accounted for in the market price

• In reality, many market failures exist:

– Monopoly or cartels (imperfect competition), also, see monopsony
– Supplier and/or consumer ‘ignorance’ (knowledge asymmetry, deficit)
– It costs something to enter (and exit from) the market
– Not all ‘costs’ and benefits can be known or (should be?) monetised

Externalities

• Market failures are particularly important because they can cause (environmentally)
negative externalities

• A negative externality occurs where a transaction imposes costs on a third party (not
the buyer or seller) who is not compensated
– It is an “unintended and uncompensated side effect of one person’s or firm’s
activities on another” (Sterner 2003, p23)
– Adam Smith’s “invisible hand” versus Michael Jacob’s “invisible elbow” (see Jacobs
1991, p25)

• A positive externality occurs where a transaction …

Environmental externalities generally arise for three reasons…

• Lack of, or insufficiently enforced, property rights, including common or open access
resources – not privately owned (or so the argument goes)
 Example: ocean fisheries, many forests

• Public goods – indivisible common resources

 Example: the air

• Future generations – have little or no influence on the present

 Example: carbon emissions changing climate with significant impact
in the future
 Private vs. social equilibrium

Price
S

P1

Q1 Quantity

When negative externalities exist, the private equilibrium of supply and demand is not the
same as the social equilibrium (which includes all costs and benefits)

Shifting supply curve

Price S1
S

P2

Q2
Quantity
If factors other than price affecting supply change then the supply curve will shift.

If costs go down (e.g. cost-saving technical improvements) then the curve shifts right (e.g.
to S1)

Shifting supply curve

S2
Price
S

P3

Q3
Quantity

If costs go up (e.g. the producer is forced to pay the costs of negative environmental
externalities), the curve shifts to the left (e.g. to S2)
Social and private equilibrium

S (includes external costs

Price and benefits)
S (private)

Social Equilibrium
Private Equilibrium

Quantity
Lecture 4 - Optimal pollution and valuing the environment

Negative externalities

• Negative environmental externalities are important consequences of what we call

‘market failure’.

• A negative externality occurs where a transaction imposes costs on a third party (i.e.
not the buyer or seller) who is not compensated.

Private to social equilibrium

S2
Price Price
S S

P2
P1

D D

Q1 Quantity Q2
Quantity

Market
Market

Externality

Basic Keynesian macro-economic model

Goods and Services

Production Consumption

Labour
 Economic functions of the environment

Goods and Services

Production Consumption

Labour

Waste Assimilation

Resource Supply Aesthetic Services

Biosphere
(life support)

Damage costs

• To internalise externalities, we need to examine the concept of ‘damage costs’

– These are ‘simply’ the monetary cost of the (environmental) externality

• Damage costs will normally be proportional to environmental harm or pollution

– Although there might in some cases also be thresholds

• Measurement of these is conceptually straightforward

– It simply involves adding up those costs not included in a private transaction
– In practice, getting an accurate measure is extremely difficult
– And, in some cases, how meaningful – or ethical – is costing?

Damage costs
Damage cost curve

Costs

TDC
(normally external)

0
Output (Pollution)

Note: ‘TDC’ stands for

‘Total Damage Cost’
Control costs

• In a completely free market, a producer will have no incentive to control their

pollution because it is external to their costs

• Similar to a damage cost curve, a control cost curve can be constructed which
shows how much a producer would have to spend for reductions in pollution
– This money will only be spent if externalities are ‘internalised’
 That is, control costs need, somehow, to be forced into the producer’s costs

• As money is spent on pollution control equipment, the producer’s costs will move
along the cost curve to the left

Control costs
Control cost curve

Costs

TCC (normally internal)

0 P1 Output (Pollution)

Decreasing pollution
Note: ‘TCC’ stands for
‘Total Control Cost’

Sulphur damage and control from a coal-fired

power plant
900
800 Replace with gas-fired power plant
700
600
Cost (£m)

Fit flue gas desulphurisation

500
400
300
200
TDC TCC
100
0
0 20 40 60 80 100
SO2 pollution (k tonnes)
Optimal pollution

The lowest cost to society as a whole (including producers, consumers and third parties) is
the minimum total cost of damage AND control

• This is illustrated by the lowest point on a total cost curve (adding the damage and
control cost curves together)
• Note that the lowest point of this total cost curve is not necessarily where the two
individual cost curves cross
• This is how economics considers pollution – it is tackled at minimum total cost
• Controversially (?), in economics, the aim is not to minimise but to optimise
pollution – to reach the optimal pollution level

Optimal pollution

Costs
Total Costs

TDC
(normally external)

C0

Cd
TCC (normally internal)
Cc

0 P0 P1
Output (Pollution)

Back to our example ...

900
800
700
600
Cost (£m)

Optimal Pollution Level

500
400
300 TDC
200 TCC
Total
100
0
0 20 40 60 80 100
SO2 pollution (k tonnes)
Valuing the environment

• Valuing the environment is used for various purposes, e.g.

 Cost-benefit analysis
 Valuing ecosystem services

• Three ways of calculating damage costs and some of the issues with these methods
 Direct Measurement
 Hedonic Valuation
 Contingent Valuation

Valuing damage and control costs

• How do we construct the damage and control functions?

 Valuing control costs is relatively straightforward
– Markets exist in which pollution control equipment can be bought
– We often know how much damage these can prevent or control
 Valuing damage costs is more challenging – rarely easy, often very difficult,
sometimes meaningless or worse?

• Here we will explore some methods for valuing damage costs and consider their
strengths and weaknesses, and implications

Valuing damage costs

Three main methods have been developed by environmental economists to try to meet
these challenges
• Direct Measurement
• Hedonic Valuation
– Property value method
– Travel cost method
• Contingent Valuation

Direct measurement

• Occasionally, it is possible to measure damage costs directly

• For example, acid rain from a power station may damage crops
– Value of reduced crop yields is the damage cost
– Here, there is a market price for crops (e.g. wheat, cabbages, etc.)
• But even in these ‘simple’ situations, problems arise
– How much land has been affected, in what way and for how long?
– To calculate optimal pollution, sources of the acid gases must be identified
accurately
Hedonic valuation

• Hedonic valuation tries to establish people’s willingness to pay for cleaner

environments or better environmental services
• Property value method
− The important feature of this method is that it must be possible to identify
meaningful differences in property values

The difference in property values is used to put a monetary value on environmental

damage or its avoidance. For example
• Houses under airport flight paths cost less than similar houses out of range of airport
noise
• Houses next to polluted rivers cost less than those next to green fields
• Houses with great views over the South Downs cost more

Examples:
• Many studies have been carried out using hedonic valuation
– A study in Los Angeles concluded that a 1% increase in air pollution causes a
reduction in property prices of approximately 0.22% (i.e. USD220 off a
USD100,000 house)
– The impact of aircraft noise on house prices around Gatwick Airport has
shown a 1.46% decrease in house prices per unit of NNI (Noise and Number
Index: an index of aircraft noise and number of take-offs/landings; 55 is high,
35 is low)
• Problems with these exercises include
– Where to draw the boundary of the area affected
– How much of the difference is due to other sources of damage
– It assumes that people can readily/easily move house

Travel cost method

The travel cost method is essentially a type of hedonic valuation

• It measures people’s willingness to pay by identifying transport costs for visiting an

environmental amenity (e.g. a park)
• Like hedonic valuation, a market (this time, in mobility) is used as a proxy for
environmental services
• For example: The ‘recreational value’ of a Scottish forest was calculated by adding up
travel costs of tourists. These were just over GBP1m per year

Problems

• Assumption that the cost of travel is the only factor in the equation (sometimes,
‘cost’ of time spent is also estimated)
• Excludes preferences of people who do not visit the forest or amenity
– What about those who live nearby – spend little on travel?
– What about those who cannot afford to travel?
Contingent valuation

• This is used where no market or proxy market exists for environmental damage or
preservation
• It uses survey methods to ask people how much they would be prepared to pay to
avoid damage or preserve services

How much would you be prepared to pay (per person per year)
• For a pollution-free Brighton beach and sea?
• To prevent building on the South Downs?
• To limit human-induced climate change beyond that already expected from
historical greenhouse gas emissions?

• Many studies have been done (often in North America)

– Visitors to a river in Pennsylvania bid USD12.26 to make it OK for fishing, and
a further USD29.64 to make it OK to swim in too
– People in a US survey were prepared to pay USD24.00 to preserve grizzly
bears (even though most had no intention of seeing one)
– A survey of 202 households in the US found that 59% were willing to pay at
least an extra 50 cents per month for renewably-generated electricity, and
45% willing to pay at least USD8 extra per month
• So, we get values …
• … but is this accuracy misleading?

Problems

• Surveys are prone to many sources of bias, amongst which are:

– Order of questions
– Who you ask
– Who returns the survey (if postal, online)
– What starting price is used (if any)
• It is impossible to check whether you have the ‘right’ answer
– Checks are sometimes made by comparing results from different methods
(e.g. hedonic; direct valuation)
– This is no good if other methods are unavailable – i.e. when contingent
valuation is most likely to be used!
 ‘The’ social cost of carbon

Here are some values from studies of the cost of damage from one tonne of carbon emissions
Social Cost of Carbon Estimates USD/tC

500

450

400

350

300

250
SCC

200

150

100

50

0
1990 1992 1994 1996 1998 2000 2002 2004 2006
-50
Year of Publication

Source: Using data from Tol (2008:11-16), available:

http://www.economics-ejournal.org/economics/journalarticles/2008-25

‘The’ social cost of carbon

Why the variation? (Watkiss and Downing 2008)
Uncertainty in Valuation

Market Non Market Socially Contingent

Uncertainty in climate change

Coastal protection Heat stress Regional costs

Projection
Loss of dryland Loss of wetland Investment

Energy (heating/cooling)
predictions

Agriculture Ecosystem change Comparative

Bounded Water Biodiversity advantage &
risks Variability Loss of life market structures
(drought, flood, storms) Secondary social effects

System Above, plus Higher order

change Significant loss of land social effects Regional
and resources collapse
and Regional collapse
surprise Non-marginal effects
Irreversible losses

Valuing human life?

•
Whether we like it or not, a feature of many exercises to establish damage costs is
an implicit or explicit valuation of human life
– Assessments of transport schemes may look at road deaths
– Assessments of pollution control may look at fatalities from disease
• A Canadian exercise came to a figure of CAD4.1m (GBP2.5m)* per life
– How do we know this is correct?
– Do we want a figure at all?
• This is a severe test for environmental valuation methods and for their
acceptability
• And what about other aspects – meanings of place, social relations, future lives?
*Using exchange rate of CAD1 = GBP0.61 (as at 11/10/17)
Lecture 5 – Sustainable Development Frameworks

Innovation: some basics

• Invention is NOT innovation

− Invention is a new idea; innovation is implementing a new idea
• Innovation is often assumed to mean radically new technology
− e.g. introduction of smart phones
• But most innovations are incremental
− e.g. efficiency improvements
• And innovation can be in products, processes, services, behaviours, laws, arts, etc.
• We need transformative change to achieve sustainability
− Can our understanding of innovation help us?

Understanding innovation

• Long history in (some schools of) economics

− e.g. Marx, Schumpeter, Freeman, etc.
• Recent decades:
− Sociological analysis has become an important influence
− Political and geographical analyses growing too
• Now much broader understanding is possible
− From focus on firms … (continues: e.g. economics of innovation; innovation
systems theories)
− … to the whole of society, and socio-economic & ecological systems
• This has developed insights about ‘socio-technical’ change

Long-run socio-technical change

A highly complex process
“Success” of a technology requires many things to be in place
For example: the case of offshore wind generators

Maintenance
Social acceptability Willing customers (utilities)

Skilled workforce
Institutions
Components Policies, laws, regulations

Environmental impacts
Energy markets Known, unknown

Carbon markets Core technology

Scientific knowledge Grid management

Infrastructure
Source: Smith, A. (2010) Sustainability transitions research at SPRU, Tyndall Centre Meeting 19th January 2010, SPRU, University of Sussex, Brighton, slide 4
Image: http://www.ecn.nl/typo3temp/pics/3df63e965f.jpg

Stability of incumbent systems

• Prevailing systems and modes of provision tend to be stable
• This disadvantages alternatives due to a variety of path-dependencies (more on
this later)
– Capabilities (e.g. skills, knowledge, experience – see Bell and Pavitt 1993)
– Economic structures
 – Vested interests, politics and power
– Infrastructure
– Institutions
– Technological and user cultures
• Social and technological, material and discursive processes reinforce one another
– e.g. ‘safe transport’ narrative >> autonomous vehicles (AVs) >> policy and
finance for AVs >> AV R&D >> AV ‘hype’ and AV narratives >> demand for
AVs, etc.
– Attempted ‘radical’ changes in one process are resisted by the others

Long-run socio-technical change

Sources of instability of incumbent systems

Incumbent systems are under pressure too, e.g.

– Environmental change
– Social pressure
– Demography
– Development ideologies
– Internal dynamics and contradictions

• Instabilities provide opportunities for alternatives

• Policies and programmes can be used to destabilise incumbents and/or promote

alternatives

Some basic concepts

Path dependency
• Current options available depend on past actions taken

Co-evolution
• The interdependent changes of two or more processes

Lock-in
• Unruh (2000, p818) argues that lock-in is
“a path-dependent, co-evolutionary process involving positive feedbacks among
technological infrastructures and the organizations and institutions that create, diffuse and
employ them”
Socio-technical concepts

• Technology is not just a discrete artefact

• An artefact is highly visible but is embedded in a complex social, economic and
technical system
• This system can be conceptualised as a technological regime
“… the whole complex of scientific knowledge, engineering practices, production
process technologies, product characteristics, skills and procedures, established user
needs, regulatory requirements, institutions and infrastructures”
(Hoogma, Kemp, Schot and Truffer 2002, p19)

Socio-technical transitions

Socio-technical transitions theory

Landscape
• Heterogeneous set of factors such as values, demographics, trends, events (e.g. war,
accidents, disasters, etc.)

Socio-technical regime
• Dominant system of serving a societal function (e.g. mobility)

Socio-technical niche
• A “proto-regime” where novel technologies are the focus of experimentation and
learning (Geels 2002, pp1259-1261)

Transitions are then defined as “changes from one sociotechnical regime to another”
(Geels and Schot 2007, p399)

Socio-technical transitions theory

• A key feature of a socio-technical regime is alignment of its dimensions

− policy, science, technology, culture, users and markets
• ‘Alignment’ means they are mutually reinforcing so that
“to understand dynamics in [socio-technical] systems we should look at the co-
evolution of multiple trajectories”
(Geels 2004, pp911-912, following Freeman and Louça 2001)
 Socio-technical transitions theory
Regime alignments

Source: Geels, F. (2004) “From sectoral systems of innovation to socio-technical systems: Insights about dynamics and change from
sociology and institutional theory”, Research Policy 33(2004), p912

Structure-agency dynamics, based on Geels (2002; 2004)

Landscape
Values Mitigated
Demographics climate
Trends change
Events (e.g. Wars) Climate change

Socio-cultural
Regime
Science
Dominant practices
User & market
Dimensions aligned
Policy
Stable

Technology

FOSSIL FUEL REGIME RENEWABLE ENERGY REGIME

RENEWABLE ENERGY NICHE NUCLEAR FUSION NICHE

Niche
Experimentation
Learning
Alignment processes

Time

Reflections

• Transitions theory gives us a way to think about system-change

• Processes of learning are crucial – solutions take time
• Change in one part of the system can ripple through to others
Lecture 6 - Politics of Sustainable Development and Sustainability
Assessment

Making sense of the politics

One kind of approach is political economy analysis (DfID 2009, p4)

Political economy analysis is concerned with the interaction of political and economic
processes in a society
• the distribution of power and wealth between different groups and individuals
• the processes that create, sustain and transform these relationships over time

Political economy analysis is concerned with understanding

• Interests and incentives
• Role of institutions
− Formal: e.g. rule of law, elections, policies
− Informal (non-formal): e.g. social, political, cultural norms
• Impact of values and ideas

Sustainability assessment

Optimality
• We encountered the optimality notion in regard to ‘optimal pollution’
• To what extent does optimality make sense in the context of sustainability?
• Which of these is the optimal work of art?

Butterflies
Clocks
Swans

You might have a favourite but is there an objectively ‘optimal’ work?

We need to be cautious about the meaning of assessments
• Optimality approaches strive to reduce complexity to simple (often) one-dimensional
measures
– To ‘mechanise’ decision making
– Assumes politics is bad and so must be avoided
– Places decision making within elite technocracy

Rather, assessment methods should support – not replace – discursive and democratic
‘decision making’

Assessment variety

• Various assessment kinds have been developed

− Cost-Benefit Analysis (CBA)
− Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA)
− Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA)
 − Integrated Assessment (IA)
− Sustainability Assessment (SA)
• Each has advantages and disadvantages, strengths and weaknesses
• Underlying each is a different framing and set of assumptions

Sustainability Assessment (SA)

• There is no consensus for what SA is precisely (or how it should be applied)

• Hacking and Guthrie (2008, cited in Bond et al 2012) suggest a 3-dimensional framework
for classifying assessments and the extent to which they contribute to sustainability
− Strategicness
− Comprehensiveness
− Integratedness

Sustainability indicators

• We have critiqued the mainstream economics/growth model

− The measure GDP dominates in this model
• Here we consider alternative ways to measure how sustainably we (as
society/societies) are fulfilling our needs
− Alternatives to GDP
− Planetary boundaries…
− …and together with social foundations
− Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

Gross Domestic Product (GDP)

• GDP measures financial transactions in the economy

• GDP does not measure other kinds of ‘goods’ and ‘services’
• For well-being (personal, social and ecological) we need to measure (or describe) these
other facets of the world

Beyond GDP?

• Inadequacies of GDP have been recognised for many years

• Attempts are being made with other measures or indicators
 HDI is a relatively long-standing and established measure (it comprises
three indices: life expectancy, education and income) – see the HDI world
rankings according to the UNDP
 The Gini coefficient tries to describe relative inequality within a country
(or group – it can be used to indicate relative distributions of many
things) – see the World Bank explanation for more
 Varieties of ‘happiness’ indices
• See Wilkinson and Pickett on inequality and a critique of this view
• These are human-centred measures (direct measures of the environment are missing)
• A recent attempt to provide indicators of the environmental aspects of development is
the Planetary Boundaries concept (Rockström et al 2009)
− Identifies nine environmental dimensions of planetary health
− Provides some measures of their current state
− Not all indicators are yet quantified
− Those quantified are ‘first/educated guesses’
− Suggests we have already transgressed some of the boundaries

Planetary Boundaries
Have we already breached some?

Have we already breached some?

Planetary Boundaries and the Anthropocene

The notion of the ‘Anthropocene’ has risen in the past decade

• Andrew Revkin (Opinion piece, 11/05/11, The New York Times):
– “This is the proposed epoch of Earth history that, proponents say, has begun
with the rise of the human species as a globally potent biogeophysical force,
capable of leaving a durable imprint in the geological record.”
– The notions of Anthropocene and Planetary Boundaries (sometimes called
the “control variables of the Earth”) are easily linked
• The Anthropocene notion is contentious (as is the link to Planetary Boundaries)
– See, for example, Andy Stirling’s STEPS Centre blog and a response from
Laura Pereira

Safe and Just Space?

• Kate Raworth (2012) attempts to combine environmental and human-centred indicators

into a single framework
• She refers to this as “doughnut economics” or “a safe and just space for humanity”
• Raworth suggests eleven dimensions, some of which she has attempted to quantify
 Safe and Just Space?

Source: Leach, M., K. Raworth and J. Rockström (2013) “Between social and planetary boundaries: Navigating pathways in the safe and just space for humanity”,
in ISSC and UNESCO (2013) World Social Science Report 2013, Changing Global Environments, OECD Publishing and UNESCO Publishing, Paris, p86
http://www.worldsocialscience.org/activities/world-social-science-report/the-2013-report/

Development pathways in the safe and just space?

Source: Leach, M., K. Raworth and J. Rockström (2013) “Between social and planetary boundaries: Navigating pathways in the safe and just space for humanity”,
in ISSC and UNESCO (2013) World Social Science Report 2013, Changing Global Environments, OECD Publishing and UNESCO Publishing, Paris, p87
http://www.worldsocialscience.org/activities/world-social-science-report/the-2013-report/

Note: Graphic design by Lisa Dittmar

How are we doing?

Source: Raworth, K. (2012) “A safe and just space for humanity: can we live within the doughnut?”, Oxfam Discussion Paper, February, pp10-11:
http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/oxpp/oppccr/2012/00000008/00000001/art00001
Global development goals and measures

From the Millennium Development Goals

(MDGs) …

… to the Sustainable
Development Goals (SDGs)

− See http://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/rio20.html
− Also see House of Commons debate on Post-2015 Development Agenda