Moral Sentiments and Material Interests: Applying Findings from Behavioural Game Theory to Social Policy

Herbert M. Gintis

Behavioural decision theory and game theory have discovered important and hitherto unknown aspects of human behaviour that are of great importance for social policy. My talk will outline the major findings of the past several years and suggest their relevance for social policy.

The Fit Between Institutions and Ecosystem Dynamics

Marco Janssen

In a globalizing world challenged with environmental crises, we observed a trend of monocultures of institutional responses. The use of panaceas, single type of governance system applied to different contexts, is frequently failing. We need to derive a better understanding of institutional diversity in order to cope with the new challenges ahead of use. In this talk a multi-method research program is discussed that studies the interactions between behaviour, institutional arrangements and ecological dynamics. Especially the use of behavioural experiments in the laboratory and field experiments to study the impact of ecological dynamics on collective action is presented. Participants in these experiments use the ecological context to develop informal but effective institutional arrangements. Better understanding of the functional roles of social and ecological context will help us to develop a framework of functional institutional diversity.

Social Complexity and What It Means for Ecological Economics

Wander Jager

Consumers interact in various ways, using different channels such as direct word-of-mouth, observing the behaviour of others, reading blogs and product reviews on the internet. These interactions include product information as well as norms on what is fashionable. Additionally, some people appear to be more influential than others. Due to the many interactions between consumers, the resulting market dynamics are often highly (non-linear) dynamic, unpredictable and path dependant. These complexities result in market behaviour that deviates from what policy-makers - assuming more rational consumers - expect, and thus unexpected failures and successes are experienced. Especially in the field of managing ecological systems, social complexity may cause such unpredictability of policy measures. In the presentation I will focus on a complexity based perspective on consumer behaviour, explain and demonstrate how social simulation can be applied in modelling these complexities, and discuss a policy perspective on the management of such social complex systems focusing on management of complex systems instead of on predicting the effects of policy.

 

Carbon-energy taxation under a future international climate regime: the case for differentiated responsibilities and approaches

 

Mikael Skou Andersen

 

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This paper revisits the competitiveness issue and place findings of the COMETR project in the context of the Porter hypothesis and Leibenstein’s concept of X-efficiency, which have been quoted in support of a more vigorous energy and climate policy. Carbon leakage is a prominent concern and is examined against the broader patterns of international trade and development, whereby particular attention is paid to developments in China. Concerns for competitiveness will need to be realigned with concerns for fairness and equity, which figure prominently in emerging economies that so far are not parties to the control mechanisms of the Climate Convention. Differentiated responsibilities could include carbon-energy taxation for products exported from emerging economies to Annex-1 countries.

What Determines the Knowledge of CO2 Offsetting for Vehicle Use? A Micro-Econometric Analysis for Germany and the United States

Julia Schwarzkopf, Andreas Ziegler and Volker Hoffmann

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This paper empirically analyzes the determinants of the knowledge of CO2 offsetting, especially for vehicle use, as a possible measure to mitigate climate change. Our econometric analysis with different discrete choice models is based on unique data from computer assisted web interviews from Germany and the United States. Descriptive statistics show that knowledge of CO2 offsetting is relatively low and at similar levels in both countries. Our preliminary results indicate that higher education has a positive effect on carbon literacy, as do, to some lesser extent, higher income, higher age and being male.

The effect and responsibility of CO2 embodied in Italy-China trade

Valeria Andreoni and Marco Duriavig

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This paper estimates the amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions embodied into bi-lateral trade of manufactured products between Italy and China, from 1997 to 2003. Applying a consumption-based CO2 accounting approach, Italy results to be responsible for 54 Million Metric Tons of CO2 emitted in China. Our findings confirm that international trade contributes both to the increased greenhouse gas (GHGs) emissions and to displace environmental impacts to developing countries. These issues should be considered to improve the international accounting methodologies for carbon dioxide emissions and the environmental policies as the Kyoto Protocol. Since CO2 emissions are generated by our standards of life, the direct and indirect effects of our consumptions have to be considered in order to assign responsibilities for environmental damage.

Modelling Austrian Energy Scenarios for Renewables, Energy Efficiency and Behavioural Changes

Lisa Bohunovsky and Andrea Stocker

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An increase in renewable energies, improved energy efficiency and behavioural changes are necessary to manage the transition to a sustainable energy system. This paper presents energy scenarios for Austria up to the year 2020, which represent ambitious actions in all three areas and which comply with the objectives of the Austrian energy and climate change policy.

Energy and Poverty: An Analysis of Urban Households Access to Clean Cooking Fuels in Côte d'Ivoire.

Wadjamsse Beaudelaire Djezou

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Although the access to clean sources of energy is not a sufficient condition for poverty alleviation, it constitutes absolutely a necessary condition. In this way, this article analyze the determinants of urban households access to LPG in Côte d'Ivoire using a logit multinomial logit model by accounting for poverty dimension. The study reveals that the variables like income, the relative price gaz/charbon, LPG availability, education, LPG stove ownership are the key elements of an energy transition policy. The compensation to the poor to help them switch to LPG is at least 60% of the "energy poverty line" which is 14472 fcfa.

Vicent Alcántara, Pablo del Rio and Félix Hernández

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Climate change mitigation requires that manufacturing sectors increase their energy-efficiency in the use of electricity. The aim of this paper is to identify those sectors that contribute most to electricity consumption in Spain, using a methodology based on input-output tables, and to derive some recommendations aimed at increasing energy efficiency in those sectors. This input-output approach is complemented with a sector-focused study in which we identify the availability of electricity-efficient technologies per sector and the possibilities of cost pass-through into the prices of the products of the sectors. This hybrid approach is deemed very useful to derive policy implications.

Cost-Effectiveness of Energy Efficiency Options for Utilities

Ines Lima Azevedo

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The electricity sector accounts for 34% of US GHG emissions, and the buildings sector accounts for a similar share when electricity is allocated to end uses [1]. Therefore, it is critical that the government evaluate strategies and incentives to reduce GHG “at the source” and “at the pipe” emissions in the most cost-effective manner possible, while maintaining or even improving the energy services. This model explores for a utility or Energy Service Company (ESCO) perspective, under different types of incentives for energy efficiency investments, what would be the most cost-effective path of emissions reduction if it were to reduce its emissions by 10%, 20% or 40%.

Policy influence of indicators: framework for analysis and lessons from the UK energy sector

Markku J. Lehtonen

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This paper describes early results from an EU FP7 project on the influence of environmental and sustainable development indicators in policymaking. The paper presents the conceptual framework developed for analysing indicator influence, based on various strands of literature on the use of expert knowledge in policymaking. This framework is applied in a case study on the role of indicators in the UK energy policy. Information for the empirical study is obtained from documentary analysis, interactive stakeholder workshops and key stakeholder interviews. Conclusions emphasise the need for indicator experts to better understand the institutional and political context within which indicators are being applied.

Societal use of energy and sustainability

Igor Matutinović and Tommaso Luzzati

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The capitalist economy is the most efficient human system so far in terms of its capacity to exploit available energy gradients. Since institutional and productive technologies of capitalism are increasingly becoming the dominant way of societal organization at the world scale, energy requirements are inexorably rising. This brings in focus the societal use of energy both as scarce resource and for its wide and deep effects on the natural environment. We discuss it from the perspective of allocating energy among three major alternative societal uses - growth, maintenance of extant dissipative structures, and the pursuit of structural changes that impinge directly on human well-being.

Preliminary External Costs of Lead Emissions from a Municipal Waste Combustion Plant

Massimo Pizzol, Mikael Skou Andersen and Marianne Thomsen

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External costs of lead (Pb) emissions from municipal waste combustion (combined heat and power) plants can be assessed following the ExternE Impact Pathway Methodology. The framework involves modelling of pollutant dispersion and determination of resulting human exposure for specified scenarios. Selected consequent impacts can then be translated into monetary values. Updated preliminary external costs have been obtained using specific models for dispersion and accumulation of Pb in both in the environment and inside the human body, referring to spatially defined Danish conditions. This framework constitutes a link between emissions and costs in a decision-making support perspective.

Some empirical evidence on municipal solid waste in the EU

Marco Orsini, Tommaso Luzzati, Emilio Padilla Rosa, Annetta Binotti and Emanuela Meini

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This paper presents an empirical analysis, conducted both with parametric and non-parametric methods, on municipal solid waste at EU level. We focus on two issues. The first one concerns the hypothesis for a waste environmental Kuznets curve. The second one is about the role of different treatments on total generated waste.

The dynamics of waste generation and landfill diversion: economic drivers, policy factors and spatial issues

Massimiliano Mazzanti, Anna Montini and Francesco Nicolli

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This paper analyses municipal waste generation and landfill dynamics based on a provincial panel dataset for Italy over 1999-2006, to assess the effects of different drivers (economic, structural, policy), and the eventual differences between northern/richer and southern/poorer regions in terms of policy implementation, delinking and relevance of spatially correlated phenomena. We show that for waste generation there is still no Waste Kuznets Curve trend, although elasticity to income drivers appears to signal relative delinking overall. Waste tariff  policies  implemented at  decentralised level do  not seem to

provide backward incentives for waste prevention, even showing some endogeneity to income, while seem to impact on landfill diversion. Separated collection and waste policies are provincial based factors that impact on disposal strategies. Spatial effects seem overall to be negligible, probably depending on the strong decentralisation of waste management and policies that witnesses provinces in the same regional area behaving often quite differently, thus showing quite different environmental performances even at similar income levels. We can conclude that although absolute delinking is far from being achieved for waste generation, there are some first positive signs of an increasing relative delinking for waste generation and average robust landfill diversion.

Assessment of factors influencing behavioural change in the recycling system: a Bosnian case study

Azra Velagić

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Treatment of household waste has been one of the most problematic and demanding environmental problems in Bosnia and Herzegovina since the civil war ended. Nowadays, a segment of modern waste management, the recycling system (e.g. waste separation, collection, transportation, processing, etc) is facing several issues. Among these is an inadequate waste selection, irregular waste transportation, availability of recycling bins and suitable locations, lack of technology and laws. But also, there are issues on the side of households, as waste separation is not always much adopted by the people, which then results in further unsuccessful recycling. Research has proved that recycling behaviour is influenced by different social-psychological elements (e.g. knowledge, motivational factors, pro-recycling attitudes, etc). It was also observed that this set of variables stimulate potential behavioural change in an attempt to achieve complete recycling targets. This paper is based on case study being conducted in two different towns of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The case study uses interviews to explore motivational factors, concerns and attitudes, their influence on recycling behaviour and conditions necessary for the behavioural change. This considers different stakeholder groups in each town. Interview data indicates that recycling behaviour is influenced by motivational factors, concerns and attitudes that lead to further behavioural change.

Sustainable Regional Waste Management Systems: Multicriteria Ecological-Economic Modelling

Stanislav Shmelev and John Powell

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This paper summarises some recent work exploring the development of a multi-criteria optimisation tool for achieving sustainable solutions for municipal solid waste management systems (MSWMS). The aim of the project was to provide a new methodological background for the regional solid waste management modelling taking into account spatial and temporal patterns of waste generation and processing, environmental as well as economic impacts of the system development with a particular emphasis on public health and biodiversity.

Will climate crisis enforce global fairness? - Distributional solutions on different levels as a prerequisite for an effective climate change mitigation policy

Josef Baum

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Why till now there is no effective global climate mitigation policy? Concepts of burden (effort) sharing are on the agenda of the Copenhagen-conference. We currently see socially differentiated emissions per capita, differentiated historical responsibility and differentiated foreseeable development: The distributional problems are worldwide, and on local, regional, national, continental levels, also for gender, classes and income strata. - Furthermore climate crisis is interwoven to other forms of crisis. Fundamental principles of distribution in climate change issues are presented. The focus is on the "Equal Rights"-approach. Numerical results of the principle of equal rights show high amounts of triggered redistribution.

Integrating the Transnational Links and Territorial Spaces of Codified Voluntarism: Explaining the Early Diffusion of ISO14001 and the Global Compact

Eric Neumayer and Richard Perkins

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Within the context of a globalizing economy, global voluntary standards have emerged as increasingly important regulatory institutions, governing various aspects of corporate environmental and social responsibility. Yet, despite being available to all firms across the globe, uptake of these standards has proceeded unevenly across countries over time. In this article, we seek to provide new insights into how geography shapes these spatio-temporal variations, focusing on two leading examples of codified voluntarism: ISO14001 and the Global Compact (GC). Advancing on previous large-N, quantitative work into innovation diffusion, which has imposed an artificial divide between international and domestic factors, we model (internal) contextual attributes as conditioning the influence of (external) transnational interdependencies. Our econometric results lend empirical support to the idea that the domestic context shapes receptivity to transnational flows of information, norms and pressures: higher levels of country wealth and democracy are found to increase the strength of spatial interdependence for ISO14001 and the GC, respectively. Another important advance on previous studies is that we examine the influence of a larger number of measures of transnational economic linkage. We show that exports to, inward FDI and foreign business travellers from countries that have higher densities of ISO14001 and the GC increase domestic densities of the respective standard. Confirming existing studies, we thus find evidence for “trading-up” and “investing-up” dynamics, but show that these are not restricted to ISO14001. Also unique to the literature, we provide evidence of “visiting-up” effects.

Behavioural change to sustainable consumption as an economic driving force for enhancing the transition to sustainable business models in ski tourism

Tobias Luthe and Felix Schläpfer

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Alpine ski tourism, a major economic factor in the European Alps, is threatened by direct and indirect climate change impacts, as well as by other social dimensions of global change. So far, the industry has been focusing on technical adaptation to maintain a status quo of snow and skiing as the reaction to global change threats. The warmest winter on records though, 2006/07, proofed that technical adaptation alone neither is an adequate nor sustainable strategy, even leading to negative feedbacks on natural ecosystems. In order to innovate and incubate the transformation to sustainable business models in ski tourism, a shift of the supply side towards more behavioural and mitigative adaptation is needed. If market demand met such sustainable service offers, then sustainable tourism became a business case for the industry and a market based instrument to improve environmental governance in ski tourism. To answer this question we assessed the demand for sustainable ski tourism offers expressed in Euros willingness-to-pay, representing the biggest outbound tourism market worldwide, Germany, by applying the method of an online Conjoint analysis (CJA).

Sustainability Report for Tuscany - a composite indicator application

Matteo Floridi, Simone Pagni, Tommaso Luzzati and Simone Falorni

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The goal of this research is to evaluate the sustainability of an Italian region, Tuscany, by means of a set of indicators, and comparing Tuscany with the others Italian regions by using a composite indicator. To make this benchmark we consider the relative sustainability: the rank of every region results from its behaviour and from the behaviour of the other regions. The theoretical framework used is based on the EU sustainable development strategy adopted by the Council of the European Union and the EUROSTAT monitoring report “Measuring progress toward a more sustainable Europe” which is structured in ten pillars.

Lessons learned from transhumant pastoralism: The role of key resources in a heterogeneous environment

Romina Drees, Gisela Baumann, Birgit Kemmerling and Anja Linstaedter

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Due to a high climatic variability, grazing systems in arid and semi-arid regions face a high spatio-temporal uncertainty of natural resources. Key resources, providing reliable resources for livestock, are crucial components in these systems on a landscape scale (Illius and O'Connor, 2000). We discuss how to identify key resources from two points of views: First, we ask for ecological traits which enable plant species to survive in areas with highly variable rainfall. Second, we compare this to nomadic people's local knowledge on ecological key resources. Our findings indicate that local management strategies actively enhance productivity and resilience of key resources. Through the combination of ecological and socio-economic approaches, we evaluate potential improvements in the management of key resources and related risk management strategies.

Improving the environment in Australian agriculture: The experience of government policy initiatives with reference to environmental management systems

John Cary and Anna Roberts

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This paper broadly examines the efficacy of government-supported programs to encourage adoption of environmental management systems (EMSs) to improve the management of land and water systems associated with agricultural land in Australia. These programs were developed within a policy framework favouring market-based instruments (MBIs). Data are presented on reported EMS activity and the perceptions and experience of selected groups of broad-acre farmers in central Victoria and dairy and beef farmers in Gippsland. The farmers were participants in a project designed to encourage more sustainable catchments through actions on individual farms. There were three significant findings from the study. First, voluntary adoption of EMS practices with sufficient public benefits to justify government investment was unlikely at sufficient scale for significant catchment impact. Second, more targeted investment is required to protect the highest value ecosystem assets. Third, there were different comparative advantages for EMSs for different agricultural industries. There are implications for government intervention where the complementarities for ecosystem improvement and private benefit are not clearly understood.

Economic importance of biodiversity and ecosystem services of mangrove forest

Warnakulasuriya Leonard Stanley

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Mangroves in Sri Lanka contributes to the economic up liftment of small scale fisher folk despite their ecological services. However rapid urbanization, industrialization, and incautious land reclamation have taken their toll on the coastal environments as well. In the study Willingness to pay (WTP) for conservation of wet lands under the open – ended format was Rs 100.00(01 US $) per month per house hold. Using the OOHB bid function, an expected WTP value of Rs 264.27 (about 03 US $) was obtained. It was concluded that the WTP values could be considered as an economic tool when policy makers compare the development with conservation of wetland.

Socio-economic factors that influence farmers' adaptive capacity to drought - a global and multi-region perspective

Elisabeth S. Simelton, Evan D . G. Fraser, Andrew J. Challinor and Mette Termansen

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Droughts are expected to threaten future food security. By promoting farmers’ capacity to adapt, certain negative drought-related impacts can be alleviated. In this paper we use the ratio of “the impact a drought has on a (rice, wheat, maize) harvest” to the “severity of the drought” as an index to explore differing types of vulnerability to drought and identify socio-economic adaptation indicators. The results indicate that different socio-economic factors are associated with vulnerability depending on the country’s income level. Adaptation functions based on indicators of land, labour and capital, can provide a basis for revealing potential future food security hotspots and taking proactive adaptive measures.

Nature-related Transactions: Why do they require a special approach in institutional analysis

Konrad Hagedorn

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Nature-related transactions are typical for agriculture, horticulture, fishery and forestry which interact frequently with natural systems. This interaction represents a source of enforcement problems and transaction costs in the context of governing transactions. Institutional analysis frameworks used in agricultural economics should consider the particular properties of transactions involving natural systems. For ordering nature-related transactions, we propose a heuristic framework based on two dimensions: ‘modularity and decomposability of structures’ and ‘functional interdependence of processes’. It serves as a starting point for establishing a typology ranging from ‘atomistic-isolated transactions’ to ‘complex-interconnected transactions’. The complex process of institutionalising such transactions is decomposed into conceptual categories by means of a ‘transaction-interdependence cycle’.

The role of informal institutions for sustainable use of fragmented land in Bulgaria

Violeta Dinkova Dirimanova

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The aim of this paper is to demonstrate the role of the institutions for sustainable use of fragmented land in Bulgaria. In order to elucidate the processes affected by land fragmentation, new institutional economics is employed, and by employing case study approach, different informal arrangements among actors for land use are analyzed. The results of the study show that informal institutions reduce transaction costs created by fragmented landownership and make land use more sustainable.

Katharine Nora Farrell and Andreas Thiel

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In this paper we talk mainly about agricultural resource economics, while still viewing our work to be a valid contribution to the heterodox field of ecological economics. By focusing mainly on the resource economics discourse (taking our examples from agricultural and ecological economics), we are able to develop a tight argument concerning a challenge that is fundamental not only to this field but also to ecological economics: the epistemological question of how transactions that take place between social and ecological systems are perceived, formalised and incorporated into the analysis of coordination problems concerning resources use.

The contribution of established inter-disciplines to Sustainability Science

Karen Kastenhofer, Ulrike Bechtold and Harald Wilfing

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Sustainability Science developed from the 1990ies onwards and can be seen as an attempt to deal with complex socio-ecological systems following a post-normal science paradigm. In our paper, we want to raise the question to what extent established “inter-disciplines” such as Technology Assessment (TA), Science and Technology Studies (STS) and Ecological Economics (EE) reflect principles of Sustainability Science. To accomplish this, we discuss the quality of these inter-disciplines with reference to general characteristics of sustainability science. We also address the cross-reference of these inter-disciplines within journal articles.

Understanding Institutional Evolution: The Example of Biodiversity Policy in Finland

Juha Hiedanpää and Daniel W. Bromley

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We develop the general outlines of evolutionary biodiversity policy that is consistent with the cumulative causation of Thorstein Veblen as well as the pragmatism of Charles Sanders Peirce. Our model is applied to recent experiences with biodiversity policy in Finland, especially a local policy initiative Natural Values Trading (2003-2007). The purpose of this experiment was to explore how a voluntary, fixed-term, incentive-based scheme for biodiversity protection might perform. A related part of this project was to assess to what extent the model might then be generalized to all of Finland. We are interested in how institutional arrangements evolve as new ecological and social problems arise. A central component of this approach will be to gain clarity concerning how new policy instruments are formulated, implemented, and tested. The essential role of a policy entrepreneur will be highlighted.

Can sustainable consumption emerge from a well-being perspective?

Gabriela Weber de Morais and Achim Schlueter

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This study aims to explore the contribution of well-being approach to the sustainable consumption debate. Findings indicate well-being has a role to play in showing that curbing the consumption problem could provide a double dividend by improving both environment and quality of life. Nonetheless, well-being approach does not further explain how we can shift from the current consumer society to a sustainable one. To address this gap, it is suggested institutional theory could add to the well-being approach, by exploring and helping to craft the means – formal and informal institutions – to achieve a society within earth’s regenerating capacity. In the end, three initiatives are briefly described to provide empirical evidence for what has been discussed.

Work life balance policy as sustainable consumption policy: The environmental impacts of working time reduction in households with children.

Martin Iain Pullinger

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Work-life balance policies allow individuals to meet their preferences for reduced working hours to, for example, spend more time on child care. At the same time, this entails voluntary reductions in income and so expenditure and consumption, potentially leading to a double dividend of increased wellbeing and reduced environmental impacts. This paper analyses household expenditure data to quantify the greenhouse gas emission savings arising from work time reductions in households with children in the UK and The Netherlands, and develops advice to explicitly shape work-life balance policy to optimise these environmental benefits.

Jan Urban, Iva Zverinova and Milan Scasny

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The main objective of this paper is to analyze empirically determinants of organic food consumption, using data on a representative sample of consumers. The data were collected in an original survey conducted in 2008 in two regions in the Czech Republic. Structural equation modelling is used to test an extended model based on theory of planned behaviour complemented with variables capturing habitualization of behaviour and general pro-environmental norms. The results of the study suggest that social norms and health-related attitudes, as well as general pro-environmental values, are significant drivers of organic food consumption. On the other hand, perceived monetary costs and poor knowledge of organic logo, and the certification process, and low trust in certification of organic food are the main barriers to organic food consumption.

Integration of ICT in everyday life - exploration of transition processes in an environmental perspective

Inge Røpke

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Presently, one of the fastest growing fields of consumption is the use of information and communication technologies (ICT). The integration of ICT in social practices is part of wide-ranging transition processes constructing new ‘normal standards’ in everyday life, and these changes have large environmental impacts. The paper explores the ongoing processes in order to discuss whether they can be managed so as to better integrate environmental considerations.

Rationing transactions of regional biogas utilisation and their institutional alignment to environmental attributes between agreement, conflict and indifference

Melf-Hinrich Ehlers

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The paper presents empirical research on institutional economic factors that shape regional agricultural biogas sectors in Germany within their wider institutional context. With the help of two qualitative case studies it is investigated how rationing transactions relating to environmental attributes of biogas utilisation are being shaped through institutions at regional levels. A major finding to be expected is that institutional alignment to environmental attributes of transactions remained limited. As a result, there would be scope for adaptation, though within patterns of agreement, conflict and indifference among regional actors.

Applying the institutions of sustainability framework to the case of agricultural soil conservation

Katrin Prager

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The Institutions of Sustainability (IoS) Framework is a coherent framework that takes into account the interdependencies between ecological and social systems. It has been applied in previous studies and proven to be a useful tool for the analysis of issues in agricultural economics and resource management centred on human-nature interaction. However, previous contributions have not made explicit how to create the link between the analytical framework and practical empirical research, i.e. how to operationalise the IoS framework, how to ‘unpack’ action arenas, and how to derive a step by step analysis of the institutional arrangements. The paper explains the application of this framework using the example of agricultural soil degradation and soil conservation policy. We discuss several challenges that occurred when the framework was utilised to guide case study research. The paper aims to assist scholars from different disciplines in the application of the IoS framework to undertake a systematic institutional analysis.

How to define the environmental dimension of sustainability?

Robert Joumard

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The definitions of the environmental dimension of sustainability are usually vague and global. Most of the environmental assessments do not take into account the variety of the impacts. What are the impacts on the environment? We answer by using the concept of chain of causalities, describing the characteristics of the process between a source and a final impact. 50 independent chains of causalities are defined. It appears that the classifications usual in economy according to quality of life / natural heritage, or present / future generations are hardly pertinent, because these axes are rather continuous than discrete.

Learning Ecological Economics with Non-Governmental Organizations

Hali Healy, Mariana Walter, Leah Temper and Joan Martinez Alier

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CEECEC is an EC funded project to build CSO capacity to engage in / lead collaborative research with ecological economists. The first part of this session presents the objectives and outputs of CEECEC to date, focusing on 3 case studies: Lastovo Island, Croatia; Djerdap National Park, Serbia and Ecological Debt in Belgium. There will also be a “live” ecological economics session in which Slovenian CSOs will present environmental conflicts they are working on (light pollution, nuclear energy production and transit transport charging), followed by an open discussion of how the concepts and tools of ecological economics might benefit their work.

Towards Sustainability Economics? Transformation, Innovation, Adaptation

Tatiana Kluvankova-Oravska, Peter Söderbaum and Andrej Udovč

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Rather than the historical course along the concept, existed or perspective methodologies, the aim of this session is to provide the platform for conversation about the meaning and implication of three dimensional concept of sustainability economics for interdisciplinary theory and the policy at the level of enlarged European Union. In particular attention will be given to indicate the role and opportunities of ecological economics as interdisciplinary science in the evolution of transdisciplinary processes for sustainability economics. View which emphasizes dynamics, evolution and uncertainty is becoming dominant vision for better management of socio ecological systems. Understanding and predicting such systems is becoming increasingly important in particular with respect to unexpected events such as ecological or financial crisis. Thus complexity, adaptation and the concept of self-organized sustainability forms promising field for further research of sustainability economics.

Strategies for sustainability politics: On the need to reconsider theory of science, economics paradigm and political ideology

Peter Söderbaum

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When considering ways of approaching a more sustainable development path in relation to different fields of human activity, the tendency is to look directly for specific instruments or measures that, when implemented, are supposed to deal with unsustainable trends. It is here suggested that we also need to scrutinize fundamental perspectives in terms of theory of science (and role of science in society), disciplinary paradigm in economics, established and other political ideologies since these kinds of perspectives largely explain present unsustainable institutions. Limiting ourselves to dominant perspectives will limit our understanding of possible instruments or measures. Since economics is always political economics, economics need to be democratized and become pluralistic. Democratizing economics has implications for the kind of conceptual framework that can be used. It is suggested that individuals are regarded as political economic persons guided by their ideological orientations and that business corporations are understood as political economic organizations with their missions (that are not limited to monetary profits). Neoclassical cost-benefit analysis (CBA) has to be abandoned since dictatorship with respect to values or rules of valuation is contrary to democracy. Approaches to decision-making have to be open with respect to competing ideological orientations among actors in society. Recognizing that there is an ideological element in economics and also in ecological economics means that it becomes easier to accept any tensions and some of these are constructive. But we should always try to clarify such differences in perspective as part of our research efforts.

The role of solidarity in building sustainable economies - The perspective of the Central and Eastern European and West Balkan Countries

Andrej Udovč

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The contribution is aiming to present the elements of new solidarism’s idea and connect them to classical cooperative concepts to foster the discussion about sustainable economic development concept as a strategy for small size producers’ subsistence and development, which takes into account all the historical and socioeconomic specificities CEE and WB countries.

Costs of achieving objectives of the water framework directive by reducing diffuse nitrogen leaching in agriculture in the Weser river basin

Peter Kreins, Horst Goemann, Ulrike Hirt, Agnes Richmann, Björn Tetzlaff and Frank Wendland

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An interdisciplinary model network consisting of the regionalised agricultural economic model RAUMIS and two hydro(geo)logical models GROWA/WEKU and MONERIS is used to analyse the spatially differentiated impacts of nutrient reduction measures on the water quality of groundwater and surface water. The study region was the German Weser river basin that comprises 49,000 km2 and features heterogeneous natural site conditions (soil, geology, topography, climate), as well as agricultural production structures. In a first step, the model network was applied to analyse the status of nutrient pollution in 2003, and to derive a baseline scenario until 2015. According to the model results diffuse nutrient pollution will decrease overall in the Weser river basin in the baseline due to the changes of framework conditions in agriculture. E.g. the nitrogen surplus decreases by 10 – 15 kg per hectare. Even though agriculture will – by assumption – comply with best management practice the environmental targets set by the water framework directive will not be achieved for all ground and surface water bodies in the river Weser basin by 2015. In order to attain the targets additional in particular agri-environmental measures have to be offered to farmers which would require about 100 million Euros per year. Intensive counselling is crucial to help implement efficiently the changes of the administrative law in particular the manure regulation until 2015, and to improve the acceptance of further agri-environmental measures to achieve the water quality objectives.

Residential Water Demand in Portugal: checking for efficiency-based justifications for increasing block tariffs

Henrique Pedro Currais Monteiro

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Increasing block tariffs (IBT) for water are universally implemented in Portugal for residential use. We test conditions for IBT to be a second-best pricing practice under water scarcity and budget balancing constraints, when consumers are heterogeneous and the fixed charge is only allowed to cover fixed costs (as is presently the case in Portugal) by estimating the Portuguese residential water demand and show that the resulting recommended tariff schedule hinges crucially on the choice of functional form. We find that the proportion of seasonally inhabited dwellings and a reduced water quality on delivery can have a significant negative influence on the amount of water households consume.

Catchments as Assets: an Australian Case Study of Control Measures for Source Water Protection

Roel Plant, Joanne Chong and Rod Mcinnes

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This paper addresses the economics of improving drinking water quality by investing in catchment management. Three catchment management scenarios were studied for the mid-Yarra catchment in Victoria, Australia. Impacts of management interventions on water quality and volume were compared against “business as usual” investment in water quality management. Preliminary results for the mid-Yarra catchment in Victoria suggest that land use in this well developed catchment would be expensive to modify. The cost of buying back land in order to protect the source water would be extremely high, whereas a suite of catchment management practices would be comparatively cheap.

Species Protection From Current Reserves: Economic And Spatial Considerations

Bertrand Hamaide and Jack Sheerin

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Creating or enlarging nature reserves to preserve key habitats and species living within those reserves is one of the important strategies to conserve biodiversity. This paper uses 0-1 programming models originating from the location science, assigning species to land parcels and setting aside these parcels as nature reserves to protect species. The species under consideration in this study are the 68 mammals, reptiles and amphibians listed as threatened species in Thailand by the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Reserves (IUCN), and the sites under consideration are known in Thailand as “amphoes”, or small administrative districts. The model starts with the existing reserve network in Thailand and determines which species are currently considered as protected. It then estimates the most cost efficient method to select additional sites for protecting each additional species until all are part of an augmented, spatially conscious, reserve.

How to deal with biodiversity management at local level? The implementation of a multi-criteria deliberative method

Charlotte Da Cunha

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Biodiversity management, at the local scale, calls for the implementation of collective action involving different categories of stakeholders. As agricultural management is closely related to biodiversity management in the Île-de France region, biodiversity can be considered as a performance issue of agricultural activities. This paper presents the implementation of a multi-criteria deliberative method at the local scale; which aims to define how to manage biodiversity, by considering biodiversity as a performance issue of agricultural activities. This implementation allowed assessment of this method’s relevance to this complex environmental problem. A broader goal is to identify the important requirements to conduct an efficient deliberative process.

Managing  ecosystem services at multiple levels: Institutional change in the wetlands of the Lesotho Highlands

Alexander Bisaro

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Conservation has been characterised by conceptual trends pitting state-based, top-down approaches versus community-based, bottom-up approaches. These perspectives fail to account for provision of ecosystem services occurring at multiple levels, which engender different perspectives on the resource to actors at different levels. Potential conflicts between actors at different levels may be addressed through multilevel governance solutions. This paper reviews key literature on property-rights and common-pool resource approaches, and outlines the emerging multi-level governance perspective. The case of wetlands conservation in the highlands of Lesotho is presented to illustrate conflicting uses at different levels, and potential multilevel governance solutions.

Zebra mussel invasion management: Exploring the discrepancies between recreational users and the Ebro River basin authority

Kristofer Dittmer and Beatriz Rodriguez Labajos

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The zebra mussel, an invasive freshwater bivalve, was detected in the Ebro River in Spain in 2001. This study explores the discrepancies that have arisen regarding the navigation regulations established by the Ebro River Basin Authority in order to slow the spread of the invasion. Critical Systems Heuristics is applied to contrast the authority’s description of the rulemaking process with the descriptions and evaluations made by key informants from the navigation sector. Thereby, aspects of the process that are critical to address in order to resolve discrepancies and promote compliance are identified, and policy recommendations are given to this end.

Angela Daniela La Rosa

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In this conceptual paper, some considerations are presented about the utility of carrying quantitative analyses in order to assess the work done by the biosphere to guarantee the ecosystems services which fulfil the basic needs of humankind. Emergy synthesis, energy analysis, exergy analysis, embodied analysis, ecological footprint’ etc.., are some examples of tools used to evaluate the ecosystem support of anthropic activities. The utility of these tools is that the results obtained could be integrated with socio-economical inputs in order to gain a better understanding of the sustainability of the system under study. This approach could give useful information especially to decision makers.

Sustainable energy consumption and individual decisions of consumers

Klaus Rennings, Bettina Brohmann, Stefanie Heinzle, Joachim Schleich and Rolf Wüstenhagen

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The focus of our paper is on the individual decision of consumers, and it’s relation to sustainable consumption. Consumer behaviour is based on individual decisions, but it depends largely on supply-side measures and an appropriate infrastructure (e.g. the availability of energy-efficient household equipment) and on socio-political factors (e.g. if systems of emissions trading or eco-labels exist). It consists of daily “micro-decisions” which construct our self-identity or, in other words, our life-style. Thus behaviour can only be understood in a specific context. The context of beliefs, norms and values has to be analysed to understand sustainable consumption.

The sustainability of consumption of Hungarian university students and inhabitants of Szeged

Mónika Tóth and János I. Tóth

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In our study we investigate whether the consumption of university students and inhabitants of Szeged is sustainable. First, we examine the ecological footprint which is a sustainability indicator and we examine whether the ecological footprint is an appropriate measure for environment-conscious consumer behaviour. Afterwards we analyse the proenvironmental behaviour, environmental-conscious consumer behaviour and sustainable consumption in association with well-being in theoretical way. Furthermore we explore different factors that influence proenvironmental behaviour and environment-conscious consumer behaviour. In the last part we present our survey about the sustainability of consumption of Hungarian university students and inhabitants of Szeged.

Energy-Efficient Household Appliances and the rebound effect – A model on the demand for washing machines

Julia Sophie Woersdorfer and André Lorentz

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Environmental policies of the European Union target domestic appliances as an important determinant of residential energy consumption. Improvements in energy-efficiency in combination with eco labelling schemes still play the central role in more recent policy activities (e.g. EuP Directive 2005/32/EC). But with efficiency improvements comes the possibility of an adverse effect in the form of a ‘rebound’, i.e. potential energy savings partly being offset by a more intensive use of energy-driven products. We study rebound effects for washing machines by means of an agent-based simulation model, arguing that the occurrence of rebound effects depends on the type of consumer needs appealed to by a product and their levels of satiation.

Dieselization of passenger cars in the EU-15 in the nineties: environmental implications for transport policy

Mercedes Burguillo, Marta Jorge And Desiderio Romero

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During the last decade the stock of European Union’s diesel passenger cars has intensively grown. One of the main factors explaining this process is the political choice for "gasoil’s culture”. In this context European Union’s authorities have considered dieselization as a phenomenon harmonic with transport policy’s environmental objectives, just because, diesel vehicles use less energy per Km than petrol ones. Otherwise, the economic literature lacks in the study of dieselization. So there is either a lack in the study of dieselization environmental consequences. This work tries to give some light into this issue analysing, through the estimation of simultaneous equations, European Union’s diesel vehicle demand and gasoil demand in the nineties. The results permit to characterize dieselization, which could be considered a European phenomenon for the strength of the process in almost every European country. And then, they permit to discuss about the environmental implications of dieselization reframing it in a context where transport is the only European Union’s sector that has not met its environmental targets to avoid climate change.

Impact of voluntary Agri-Environmental Measures on farms’ income and labour management: The case study of a “Test –Action” in a river basin of south-western France

Ben El Ghali Mohamed, Ridier Aude, Kephaliacos Charilaos And Nguyen Geneviève

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Water quality degradation by pesticides and nitrogen has become a global concern. Although many legal and voluntary farm management practices have been initiated since several years, adoption rate by farmers in south-western France remains low. This research analyses how income impacts and labour availability could be key-factors in the adoption process at the farm level. Using a mathematical programming model, analysing rotation practices and land management shows that the adoption of new farm practices has, in some cases, a positive impact on both farmer mean income and labour spent. However, the quantity and the quality of labour spent in the change of practices is probably the main obstacle to the adoption of many innovative farming practices.

Analysis of environmental financing through various development strategies - recommendations for environmental protection financing system

Ana-Maria Boromisa, Ana Pavičić Kaselj and Sanja Tišma

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Sustained provision of sufficient financial resources for environmental investments is a prerequisite for addressing environmental challenges in the Republic of Croatia. The key component is the creation of specific national financial strategies for implementing concrete demands of particular directives. These specific strategies are parts of broader national investment strategies which aided governments in estimating the size of financial inputs and the time frame for their enforcement. Therefore, governments need to prioritize the environment in public expenditure framework, create suitable climate for private sector and establish mechanisms that will facilitate private sector contributions to public sector infrastructure projects.

Sandra Derissen, Martin F. Quaas and Stefan Baumgärtner

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Resilience as a descriptive concept gives insights into the magnitude of disturbances that can be absorbed before a system changes its structure. Sustainability as a normative concept considers basic ideas of inter- and intergenerational justice. We developed an ecological-economic model and derive conditions on the dynamics of the ecological-economic system and the sustainability requirement, such that resilience in a given regime is a) both necessary and sufficient, b) sufficient, but not necessary, c) necessary, but not sufficient, and d) neither necessary nor sufficient for sustainable development. As a conclusion we argue that the differentiation of these relationships is of particular importance in face of uncertain disturbances and that institutional settings are the driving-forces of resilience within ecological-economic systems.

Diet, trade and land use. The Social Ecology of the food system. Case study olive oil

Arnim Scheidel

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This paper examines production, trade and consumption of olive oil in the EU since 1972 with a particular focus on the case of Spain. It investigates the economic and institutional drivers behind the observed changes in social metabolism and the ecological impact associated with olive production and land use intensity. Analysing the European olive oil system and its spatial disconnect between increasingly intensified production and exponentially growing consumption in non-producing countries, shows that institutional settings play a crucial role in the evolution of diet, trade and land use patterns. Hence, they have to be considered as a major target of action towards sustainable consumption and production.

Rural households’ response to Fuel wood scarcity around Kakamega Forest, Western Kenya

Geophrey Omondi Sikei, John Mburu and Job Kibiwot Lagat

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The debate on forest degradation in Kenya is mainly concerned with the utilization and exploitation of forest resources. Of particular interest is fuel wood, whose scarcity is a major forest degradation concern. Fuel wood gathered from the forested commons is the most important source of domestic energy in the rural areas of many developing countries. For the case of Kakamega, as shown by this study, there is a declining trend in the availability of fuel wood. Despite this state, rural households still depend largely on it for energy provision in the face of limited options constrained by low capital base. This study sought to examine how these households cope with the existing scarcity of fuel wood. The study employed both primary and secondary sources of data. For primary data, a total of 140 households were selected and interviewed using semi-structured questionnaires. Response mechanisms were analyzed through descriptive methods by looking at collection attributes, use patterns and fuel saving technologies applied by households. Majority of households in Kakamega have resorted to planting trees on their own farms to ease problems of fuel wood shortage. Findings further reveal that households in their endeavour to circumvent the problem of continued scarcity, have resorted to poorer quality tree/bushes for fuel wood, alongside other innovative methods of responding to the fuel wood scarcity. With improved economic well being, households become less reliant on forests for their livelihoods. Since reduced forest reliance is positively related with reduced demand for forest products, the findings suggest complementarities between strategies aimed at poverty alleviation and those towards forest conservation.

How to live with fire in the Mediterranean region?

Albert Merino Saum

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In this paper we propose to re-frame the wildfire issue in the Mediterranean region through its societal contextualization. We adopt a new perspective integrating the different spheres of sustainability, and we render explicit the ways in which fire regime and its socio-economic and ecological impacts have been altered by human action and choices. Fire is not seen anymore as an environmental hazard totally disconnected from society, but on the contrary, as an element integrating an eco-socio-system. A social multi-criteria evaluation is proposed to inform a societal choice between different ways of living with fire (fight intensification, colonization, domestication and adaptation).

Harvesting  strategies and habitat diversity on a forest landscape

Julia Touza, Martin Drechsler, Mette Termansen and Andreas Huth

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Identifying how best to promote biodiversity conservation in managed forest ecosystems is an important area of research. This paper presents an ecological-economic model for exploring how harvesting regimes influence the distribution of habitats in a forest landscape managed for timber production. Any forest patch in the landscape can be in one of three succesional stages or habitats: gap, intermediate and climax stages. A Markov model is used to describe the successional dynamics in the forest based on transition probabilities for the change of the successional stage of each forest patch in the landscape. Given the Markov matrix for a tropical forest in Malaysia, and the benefit function for timber production, the results of numerical simulations indicate that maximisation of timber benefit will lead to forest conditions dominated by intermediate habitat and small fractions of gap and climax forest.

Local forest management and forest conservation: Friends or strangers?

Thorkil Casse, Jens Friis Lund and Kulbhushan Balooni

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The paper is a meta-study of local forest management experiences in developing countries drawn from a review of original 100 + articles (after screening the sample includes 55 papers). The existing literature does not address the issue of the impact of transfer of management of forest resources on the forest stock/forest area. Other meta-studies include different definitions of success (not only the forest stock) or lump together various management types (local management forests, private forests, and sacred forests). We found no systematic correlation between presence of local forest management and forest conditions. If anything, the enforcement of local rules is the closest variable to correlate with the forest condition variables. One explanation could be that community forestry will not work in a vacuum, as one could believe that a minimum requirement is probably the presence of a government legal structure, which exists in India and Nepal, but not in many other countries.

The Economic Valuation of the Change in Forest Quality in the Jizerske hory Mountains: a Contingent Behavior Model

Jan Melichar

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This paper presents a travel cost study which was conducted for the purpose of estimating a recreation value to the Jizerske hory Mountains in the Czech Republic. In addition, the welfare change of recreation users associated with damage on the forest quality was estimated using contingent behaviour model. In the study, the single site travel cost model with a Poisson specification was applied. The contingent behaviour model relied on both observed behaviours and stated behaviours to infer the change of value associated with forest recreation in this area. Both actual trips and intended trips were pooled under the hypothetical scenario to estimate the value of four public programs, including the change in the forest quality. To gather information about respondents, the survey was conducted on-site during September and October, 2005. A total of 312 questionnaires were completed. The consumer surplus per trip to the site under the current conditions was about USD 18 using Poisson model, USD 17 (truncated Poisson) and USD 56 (truncated Negative Binominal). There was significant evidence of over dispersion that is why the negative binominal regression model was preferred to the Poisson model. The decrease in the welfare change in the access value associated with the impacts of air pollution on the quality of forest ecosystems was estimated at CZK 67 for one trip (USD 3).

Meso-Matrical Synthesis of the Incommensurable

Bojan Radej

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Many of those currently involved in the assessment of government interventions' contribution to the social welfare have had significant difficulties in summarizing known but sometimes contradictory facts into summary conclusions. There are incommensurable viewpoints with regard to many social realities, and they provide us with very different 'numeraires' and macro-views of the world which are not reducible to common denominator. In particular, there is a disagreement over assumptions about the aggregation of the assessed policy impacts (micro) into summary conclusions (macro) that inform decision-makers operating at meso level. A new method is proposed of meso-matrical impact assessment (MIA) of policy interventions to cope with social incommensurability in scale (micro-meso-macro) and scope (economic-socialhuman-natural). It is based on Leontief's square input-output matrix that evaluates overlaps between incommensurable sets on their margin. In MIA secondary issues play a central role. Practical example illustrates the achievement, schematic presentation generalises the principle. Paper explains that social or political common ground is not the condition of unity and cohesion with the meso-matrical perspective in mind.

The Regional Administration of Sustainable Development : A Conventional Study Spplied to the Nord - Pas de Calais Region

Gaël Plumecocq

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This paper is based on the theoretical ground that analyzing sustainable development through the “Economies of Worth” model is possible provided we consider a particular vision of sustainable development that gets around problems of common humanity and of common dignity. The form and degree of legitimacy depends the application modalities of sustainable development that may qualify the nature in several sphere of legitimate justifications. But as we consider the Nord – Pas de Calais Region’s public organizations we can see that regarding the model the implementation of sustainable development raises a double questioning of legitimacy: on a new civic reality proof and on the industry ground of how public administrations are organized. These two elements are constituent of a new mode of coordination based on sustainable development projects.

Transition Management at the local scale-Strategic planning for sustainable transitions in infrastructure

Bernhard Truffer and Eckhard Störmer

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Transitions to more sustainable sector structures will be necessary for confronting problems of global environmental change. Particularly in infrastructure, established strategic planning procedures often tend to neglect context uncertainties, blind out radical system alternatives and focus on narrow value considerations. The paper introduces the “Regional Infrastructure Foresight” (RIF) method as a reflexive approach to infrastructure planning. It has been tested in five regional cases in the Swiss sanitation sector. The potential for furthering sustainable sector transitions will be discussed.

Cooperative behaviour and institutions

Arild Vatn

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The persistent observation of cooperative behaviour in situations where defecting would be individually prefer-able challenges the standard hypothesis of individual utility maximization. This has advanced search for alternative ways of understanding choice. Proposals dominantly include internal motivations into the utility function. The paper identifies some pertinent problems with these explanations. An alternative model based on the idea of plural rationality and institutions-as-rationality-context is developed. The model is confronted with data from existing experiments. Implications for public policy and ideas for further research are emphasized.

From Market Failure Paradigm to an Institutional Theory of Environmental Governance

Jouni Paavola

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This manuscript examines how an institutional theory of environmental governance might be based on a re-interpretation and re-working of the arguments of the market failure paradigm and its main criticisms. The manuscript first examines in detail the arguments of the market failure paradigm regarding externalities and public goods, as well as their criticisms. The paper then suggests an institutional re-interpretation and revision of the key arguments of the market failure paradigm. The institutional theory of environmental governance acknowledges the interdependence of economic actors and the resulting fundamental role of conflicts as the rationale for environmental governance and its institutions. As environmental conflicts are primarily a matter of distribution rather than of efficiency, it becomes important to understand the likely consequences of institutional alternatives in the specific socio-economic and physical setting of the environmental conflicts, and the degree to which these consequences match with the pertinent social or economic goals.

The Two Dimensions of Integration and Segregation in Institutional Analysis of Natural Resources

Konrad Hagedorn

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This paper has started with the question: What is special about those institutions which bring about sustainability? To contribute to an answer we propose that achieving sustainability has to do with balancing two sorts of costs; the costs of integration and segregation by institutions. Integrative institutions hold decision makers liable for the transaction costs they cause, they have the duty to internalise them and no right to externalise them. Segregative institutions soften this restriction, relieving decision makers from transaction costs and placing their burden (partially) on others. Similarly, integrative institutions are rules that make the decision makers eligible for the beneficial effects they cause and hold them liable for the adverse effects. Segregative institutions allow deviations from this principle so that the decision makers may forego some benefits, which then accrue to others, but their liability for some adverse effects may also be reduced in the sense that others have to accept nuisances. As a contribution to theory we suggest to conceptualize the problem of achieving sustainability as a cost-minimizing choice between these integrative and segregative properties of institutions.

Cerro De San Pedro : Grass roots movements in co-operation and conflict to stop a living city from disappearing

José G. Vargas-Hernandez

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The aim of this paper is to analyze relationships of cooperation and conflict between a mining company and the involved communities, New Social Movements and the three levels of government. The mining company begun operations for an open pit mine of gold and silver supported by officials from the local, state and federal government. The inhabitants of these communities supported by environmental groups and NGOs argue that the project will pollute sources of fresh water besides of perturbing the environment and the ecology of the region. The presence of the mining company (MSX) in Cerro de San Pedro has caused a severe social conflict among the inhabitants of San Pedro, Soledad y San Luis and has called the attention of all who are concerned by historic heritage, cultural and environmental issues. At the centre of the controversy is the cheap and efficient technology. Federal and state Laws were violated. It is quite evident the lack of sensitivity of foreign mining companies toward the consequence of their activities upon the communities and environment. This case also shows the lack of negotiation between firms, communities, new social movements and governments. Information about externalities and future costs of company activities is crucial but more crucial is formulation and implementation of more sensitive policies to avoid damage of the environment, biodiversity and health of population. Governmental institutions must be aware that their decisions may affect the community quality of life of actual and future generations only for a small increment in economic growth and large increase in private benefits of a small group of investors. More informed citizens tend to be more active protestors, such as the case of the students in San Luis.

Pere Ariza-Montobbio

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Researchers, policy makers and civil society discuss the potential of biofuels as partial substitutes for fossil fuels and as a solution for environmental (e.g. climate change) and social problems (eg. rural poverty). This paper assesses 1) the on farm performance and 2) the impact of Jatropha curcas plantations on local livelihoods and food sovereignty in Tamil Nadu, South India. Jatropha on farm yields were generally low, with higher yields under irrigated conditions. Jatropha curcas plantations were found to induce an important change for rural livelihoods, implying a multidimensional impact formed by different trade-offs and changes in livelihood strategies.

Designing instruments for rural landscape management: planning tools, economic incentives and Non Governmental Approaches

Stefania Troiano and Francesco Marangon

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To preserve rural landscape it is possible to use several instruments. The study of instruments for rural landscape management has became a factor of great importance in giving decision makers a true picture of consequences derived from their use. The aim of this study is to point out the features of the instruments able to guarantee a sustainable use of landscape. To this purpose we will describe the relation between agricultural activity and rural landscape quality and will point out the opportunities of PES use. In order to study the consequences of the instrument's use we analyse rural development documents of North-Eastern Italian Regions.

Assessment of local pollution from biofuels using a modified life cycle assessment methodology

Melaine Bricet

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We will develop here the main characteristics of LCA, especially their weaknesses, and we will try to find a way to avoid one of them, the fact that it does not analyze a product focusing on a geographical area but only in a global way, which doesn’t allow to understand the local impacts of biofuels production. Taking as a basis, the Pricewaterhouse Coopers/INCRA Life Cycle Assessment and redeveloping the analysis on a specific geographical area (Centre), over two years (2001 and 2006), which can be understood as a representative place where the biofuels production could be some day implemented in France. With the Life Cycle Assessment redrafted, we applied physical flows of biofuels on a monetary matrix in order to see what was the “environmental cost” of biofuels production in 2001 and 2006.

Socio-environmental impacts of the invasive species Dreissena polymorpha (zebra mussel) in the Ebro River

Beatriz Rodríguez Labajos and Kristofer Dittmer

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Presence of the invasive species Dreissena polymorpha (zebra mussel), detected in Spain in 2001, impairs the ecosystem services of the Ebro river. This study explores the socio-environmental impacts of this species during the period 2001-2008. We first organized the available information using the ecosystem services framework. Based on these empirical basis, we evaluated the utility of such framework for management purposes.

Bio-fuels alternatives in Brazil

Talia Waldron

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In the current environmental context, the case study of this article described a community of farmers from the Landless Workers Movement (MST) in Sao Paulo State, who began a intern discussion to modify their own energetic model, taking in consideration: acquisition of raw material and production of agro-fuels for own consumption; along with the adjust of alternative systems of energy production. Using the Land-Time-Budget (LTB) analysis to describe two variables land and time, and realizing how they can be used in monetary terms. To understand how the regional and local level, tailored the community economy and their resource use pattern.

De-coupling and re-coupling trends along economic dynamics

Massimiliano Mazzanti and Giovanni Marin

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This paper provides new empirical evidence on Environmental Kuznets Curves (EKC) for greenhouse gases (GHGs) and air pollutants at sector level. A panel dataset based on the Italian NAMEA over 1990-2005 is analysed, focusing on both emission efficiency (EKC model) and total emissions (IPAT model). Results show that looking at sector evidence, both decoupling and also eventually re-coupling trends could emerge along the path of economic development. CH4 is moderately decreasing in recent years, but being a minor gas compared to CO2, the overall performance on GHGs is not compliant with Kyoto targets. SOx and NOx show decreasing patterns, though the shape is affected by some outlier sectors with regard to joint emission-productivity dynamics, and for SOx exogenous innovation and policy related factors may be the main driving force. Services tend to present stronger delinking patterns across emissions. Trade expansion validates the pollution haven in some cases, but also show negative signs when only EU15 trade is considered: this may due to technology spillovers and a positive ‘race to the top’ rather than the bottom among EU15 trade partners. Finally, general R&D expenditure show weak correlation with emissions efficiency. EKC and IPAT derived models provide similar conclusions overall; the emission-labour elasticity estimated in the latter is generally different from 1. Further research should be directed towards deeper investigation of trade relationship at sector level, increased research into and efforts to produce specific sectoral data on ‘environmental innovations’, and to verifying the value of heterogeneous panel models capturing sector heterogeneity.

Outline of a Framework of Corporate Sustainability

Anselm Schneider

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The discussion of corporate sustainability (CS) is hindered by a lack of definitional clarity of the concept of CS and neighbouring concepts. Therefore in this paper a framework of corporate sustainability is constructed from information derived from guidelines concerning corporate sustainability. Within this framework, a differentiation between sustainability performance and its managerial antecedents is undertaken. This permits a differentiated appraisal of formal as well as informal prerequisites for sustainability performance within companies, enabling to tackle the immense increase of complexity of decision owed to corporate adherence to the goal of sustainability. Furthermore, it enables the analysis of different definitions of the concept of corporate social responsibility as well as of their relation to the concept of CS and sustainable development.

From the transition to market economy to the transition to sustainability in Central Europe - a civic scientist's perspective

Ioan Manuel Ciumasu

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The former socialist countries in Central Europe (referred to in this paper as EU10) appear to undergo a situation where the transition to free society and market economy is now super-imposed on the transition to sustainable developments, in which the EU assumes a leading role in the world, meaning achieving itself this transition in the first place. Current parameters of development and associated environmental impacts have been gathered in this paper to discuss the position of the EU10. It is shown that the current situation of overlapping transitions make EU10 fit to play a major role in the EU endeavour to decisively switch to sustainable patterns of development, provided that EU10 will know to assume this new role.

Policy implications for societal transitions - Lessons from exploring institutional, socio-ecological and socio-technological transitions

Niki Frantzeskaki, Els van Daalen and Wil Thissen

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Transitions are societal phenomena that comprise fundamental changes in the structures (institutions), cultures (perceptions, mindsets) and practices (routines) and unfold in form of dynamics of change. Research on transitions revealed that complex adaptive societal systems respond differently in different times depending on their evolution stage. The different responses and evolution pathways of societal systems are analyzed with system’s approach and with a detecting tool (Forces Framework) so as to deduct different types of societal transitions. For example, a societal system that responds to a trigger of change with a series of institutional changes and institutional pathologies is in the phase of an institutional transition and policy makers need to respond according to the pattern of change for their intervention to be effective. What our paper suggests is that policy interventions need to comply with the different evolution patterns of societal systems (institutional, socio-ecological or socio-technological transitions) and need to take into account inherent and implicit limitations for those interventions. Our approach for governance of societal transitions thus can be summarized as governance that responds to and respects the dynamics of system transitions.

Anti- mining  movements in Latin America: looking for another kind of development

Leire Urkidi

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Sipakapa in Guatemala and Pascua-Lama in Chile are two current ecological conflicts around gold mining. They are studied by the author through an activist ethnographic field-work and analysed attending to concepts as power, values, and types of environmentalism. We can see that mining opposition movements are framed in indigenous, peasant or health demands. And that they use different empowerment strategies as internationalization or local plebiscites. But, anyway, these conflicts suppose a way of social learning and a launch pad to think about other ways of development.

Re-scaling of resource governance as institutional change: the case of water governance in Portugal

Andreas Thiel and Catrin Egerton

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The paper proposes that the scale at which resource use is coordinated and from which coordination mechanisms are enforced is socially constructed. It conceptualises re-scaling as institutional change and derives hypotheses on what drives re-scaling from this theoretical perspective. It tests these hypotheses on water governance in Portugal, which has been re-organised from the level of administrative district to the level of hydrographic regions. The paper presents work in progress. The state and the mindsets of individuals seem to play an important role in the examined process of re-scaling.

Global warming, glaciers and gold mining

Jakub Kronenberg

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Two case studies (Kumtor in the Kyrgyz Republic and Pascua-Lama in Chile-Argentina) are analysed, illustrating how gold mining interferes with glaciers and how this may be affected by changing perceptions on global warming. Although global warming presents new opportunities for the mining industry, increasing the physical accessibility of resources previously covered with glaciers, it may also limit this accessibility in consequence of changing societal preferences towards the preservation of increasingly scarce glaciers. Whether these preferences can affect gold mining, depends on a number of site and time specific factors.

Globalisation and the spillover of environment-efficiency across countries

Eric Neumayer and Richard Perkins

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Arguments about the “positive” influence of globalization have typically focused on its role in diffusing environmentally-superior innovations which help to raise countries’ environment-efficiency. The present article empirically tests these claims by examining whether developing countries’ linkages with more CO2 and SO2-efficient economies contribute to domestic improvements in CO2 and SO2-efficiency. Our large-N, statistical findings caution against some of the efficiency-oriented optimism voiced by supporters of globalization. Although imports ties with more pollution-efficient countries are found to spillover into improved domestic CO2 and SO2-efficiency, neither linkages via exports, inward foreign direct investment (FDI) nor telephone calls appear to have any influence over domestic pollution-efficiency.

Investigating Final Energy Linkages for a Sustainable Economy: An Input-Output Analysis for Turkey

Gul Ipek Tunc, Elif Akbostanci and Serap Turut-Asik

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In recent years, energy consumption has become extremely important for the Turkish economy as well as for the rest of the world. The main objective of this study is to investigate the relationship between economic activity and final energy consumption at the sectoral level. For this purpose an input-output analysis is conducted. Both demand-side and supply-side models are developed to investigate the interdependence among sectors in the context of final energy consumption. This analysis is designed for forty two sectors and covers the years 1998 and 2002. Final energy consumption elasticities with respect to final demand and with respect to value added, backward and forward linkages for each sector are defined and calculated.

The Impact of Lifestyles on Private Households' Energy Demand for Housing and Transport in Austria

Daniela Kletzan-Slamanig and Angela Köppl

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Energy consumption by private households and its continuous increase is one of the main target areas for climate policy and energy efficiency strategies. This paper attempts to provide some empirical evidence on the main drivers of private households' energy demand, analysing data on energy expenditure from National Accounts and the Austrian Consumer Survey. Results show the relevance of various household characteristics (region, size, income, etc.) that can be interpreted as lifestyles for energy demand.

Embodied carbon emissions in a multi-regional input-output model

Joao Rodrigues and Tiago Domingos

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In this paper we report an environmental multi-regional input-output (MRIO) model developed from the GTAP 6 database. Using the input-output (IO) economic model and data on direct CO2 emissions derived from fossil fuel combustion we compute the carbon emissions embodied in economic flows. Our analysis focus on the carbon responsibility of world regions and on the carbon intensity of economic sectors. We also analyze the error resulting from the estimation of international inter-industry transactions, quantities which need to be estimated in a MRIO model.

Effectiveness of Nature Conservation Policy: Is there a Role for the Ecosystem Service Concept?

Györgyi Bela and György Pataki

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The concept of ecosystem services has gained widespread popularity in ecological economics. While the concept is primarily contributed to re-focusing the field of economic valuation, it has gained less attention as potentially renewing the dominant perspective of nature conservation policy. Applying qualitative and quantitative social scientific methods, the present study explored professional stakeholders’ opinions in Europe about the significance of the concept of ecosystem services for enhancing the effectiveness of nature conservation policies. Major findings support the view that ecosystem services might play a bridging role not only between natural and social sciences but between professionals and the public.

Realising Environmental Improvement in the Field: The Role of Street-level Bureaucrats in Environmental Policy-making in Hungary

Norbert Kohlheb, György Pataki and Bálint Balázs

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Environmental policy and its institutional setting, including the capacity for implementing environmental policy, in Hungary have changed to a great extent due to the process of joining the EU. The present research aims to explore what kind of influence these changes exert upon the street-level of environmental policy-making in Hungary. The implementation phase of environmental policy-making and the special role of street-level bureaucrats (SLBs) deserved little attention in ecological economics. The paper reports on the preliminary findings of a four-year long research exploring the different roles and significance of SLBs in a changing policy setting.

Daniel Martin Greenwood

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This paper develops and applies a theoretical approach for addressing normative questions concerning the most effective institutional arrangements for addressing the complex, cross-cutting policy challenge of sustainability. The approach draws on a critical analysis of Austrian economics, which highlights the epistemological challenges facing non-market, political institutions in addressing complex choices and trade-offs. A case study of U.K. sustainable housing policy is undertaken. The focus of the analysis is upon comparing how stakeholders, from different organisations and spheres of governance, frame their objectives and how these framings translate into the planning decisions which shape particular housing developments.

Campania’s conflict: from a waste emergency to a crisis of democracy

Mariana Walter, Giacomo D´Alisa, David Burgalassi and Hali Healy

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In 2008, the Italian Government issued a ruling according to which any blockage or protest in the vicinities of landfills or incinerators becomes a penal felony. Some actors state that Naples’ waste management crisis is basically a technical problem, but a further examination of the case shows a more complex picture. From the analysis of the history of the conflict we identified the emergence of different sensitivities, values and concerns about nature, health and democracy, perspectives that were not taken into consideration by the decision making process, promoting the emergence of increasing social unrest. In this context the repressive laws passed by the current Italian Government are oversimplifying the complexity of the crisis and denying the will of a large number of citizens. This paper was prepared as a final paper for the 2008 THEMES Marie Curie summer school.

Integrated environmental and economic accounts applied at local level. NAMEA-air and NAMEA-waste case studies in Piemonte (Italy)

Alessandra La Notte

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The paper presents the result of an application of the hybrid account NAMEA (National Accounting Matrix including Environmental Accounts) at sub-national level in the Piemonte region, the province of Torino and the municipality of Torino for air emissions and wastes. What is tested is the framework feasibility in terms of data availability and procedural steps, and the effective usefulness of this kind of information. In both cases the application resulted successful as NAMEA is feasible at regional and sub-regional level and the results of its application show, even in a simple descriptive statistical processing, how local action can be better addressed by downscaled integrated economic-environmental analysis.

Readiness and willingness of the public to participate in integrated water management: some insights from the Levant

Philippe Ange Kerrault and Jill Hillary Slinger

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Although public participation aroused much attention in the transition towards integrated water management little is know on the wider public readiness and willingness to participate in environmental governance. A barrier for implementation is the top-down perception that the wider public is not sufficiently well organised with limited knowledge on water management challenges. We illustrate through four medium scale surveys in the Levant that the potential for public participation as explicated in this analysis is not reflected in the human development or governance indexes. Even in countries with limited exercise of democracy the public is willing to participate and knowledgeable about environmental and governance challenges.

Commons as a connecting structure: The movement against water privatization in Naples, Italy and the claim for water as a commons

Giacomo D'Alisa and Giorgos Kallis

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Much attention has been paid to the importance of defending water as a commons, but relatively little reflection exists on the definition of a commons and why is water a commons. Influenced by economics, a commons is often conflated with a public good or a common-pool resource, i.e. defined in terms of rivalry and the (in)ability to exclude users from it. This definition doesn’t say anything on the nature of scarcity, if it social constructed or if it is natural. It also confuses excludability, which is a function of technology and social norms, for an essential property of the object. Inspired by Bateson, in this paper we propose a different conceptualization of commons as connecting structures. We argue that a commons is an endless project of connection, always 2becoming”, i.e. a process of community formation and self-identification. We use a case-study of the social movement that stopped water privatization in Naples, Italy as a case-study of the institution of a commons through struggle.

Richard Filčák

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The paper is about human vulnerability vis-a-vis inequalities in the distribution of environmental benefits (e.g., access to natural resources) and harm (i.e., exposure to adverse environmental impacts). Economic and social factors play decisive role in this. Two interrelated frameworks are used: environmental justice and vulnerability. The former focuses on the inequalities among the people (based on ethnic and/or social characteristics) in the distribution of the environmental benefits and harms. The later evaluates relative strength or weakness of communities and individuals when exposed to the environmental change (as a function of exposure, sensitivity to impacts and the ability, or lack of ability to cope or adapt). The paper is based on data from research of the Roma ethnic group. Roma are in the front line when we analyze inequalities and vulnerability. Because the Roma settlements are often segregated from the dwellings of the majority population (and differ significantly in their social and economic characteristics), it is possible to do comparative evaluation of the social factors in the distribution of the environmental benefits and harms and vulnerability to the environmental change. The paper identifies four main patterns of the vulnerability: (I) exposure to hazardous waste and chemicals; (ii) vulnerability to floods; (iii) limitations on access to potable water; and (iv) waste management practice). Its scope, forms and impacts are then discussed. Paper concludes with recommendations how to address the unequal distribution of environmental benefits and harm and deal with the problem of vulnerability through strengthening the social and economic situation of people.

Multi-criteria Mapping for Market Towns Revitalisation

Ricardo Filipe Chorão da Silva Vieira

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Market towns play a key role for sustainable rural development. However, towns face a decline in retail provision. The aim of this research is to introduce a different approach to the analysis of town development, identifying uncertainties in development and integrating the values from stakeholders. This was made through using multi-criteria mapping (MCM) for appraising Thornbury’s retail development. Thornbury is a town in the West of England. The findings suggest MCM as an important tool for the early stages of the elaboration of development plans, indicating further research areas and potential barriers for the implementation of such options.

Learning with crises: building resilience to secure ecosystem services in Mediterranean natural resource systems

Erik Gómez-Baggethun, Per Olsson and Carlos Montes

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A basic argument of the resilience approach is that after each major environmental or social perturbation the human-environment relationship is altered, environmental knowledge develops, and a new balance results (Berkes and Turner 2006). This study analyzes disturbance and adaptation dynamics in traditional resource management systems in SW Spain. Results shows resource management system in the study area to embed a rich body of knowledge and practices to cope with natural disturbances. Nevertheless many of the adaptive strategies we identified are falling in disuse as traditional resource management declines. Modern technology-based management in the study area aim to stabilize resource flows by eliminating disturbance. We conclude that the vulnerability to environmental change in the study area is likely to be increasing as technology substitutes adaptive practices as main strategy to cope with disturbance.

A framework for the ecosystem services provided by soils

Estelle Jeanne Dominati, Murray Patterson and Alec MacKay

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Various frameworks for ecosystem services exist in the literature but none adequately describe the ecosystems services provided by soils. Soils across the globe are significant and perhaps unheralded category of natural capital, even in modern economies less dependent on agriculture. Soil scientists have a good systematic knowledge of soil properties and how these change with soil type and land use, but little use has been made of soil taxonomy and classification to conceptualise and define the “natural capital” of soils. This knowledge can enable economists and policy makers to better understand the ecosystem services from soils. This paper draws on our understanding of soil forming processes, soil taxonomy and classification and soil processes and builds on current thinking on ecosystem services to develop a draft framework for classifying and measuring soil natural capital and ecosystem services.

Participatory valuation of ecosystem services: a tool for decision-making and conflict management

György Málovics and Eszter Kelemen

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This paper aims at understanding the various conflicts trade-offs between ecosystem services raise. Empirical data stemming from an on-going research suggest that interest-based conflicts often arose if the distribution of ecosystem services and the range of beneficiaries were changed due to ecological restoration. However, if the restoration decision excluded the values and interests of local stakeholders, relationship and information conflicts would also arise and the legitimacy of the decision taken might be questioned. We argue in this paper that the participatory valuation of ecosystem services may serve as an adequate tool of conflict management and building trustful relationship between stakeholders.

Ecosystem Service Values and Land Use Change in Trans-Boundary National Biodiversity Conservation Areas (NBCA): A Case study of Phou Dean Din NBCA, Lao PDR

Yoshida Ayumi and Chanhda Hemmavanh

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Land Use Changes were traced during 10 years from 1992 to 2002 in Phou Dean Din National Biodiversity Conservation Area (NBCA), one of the most important NBCA and rich in biodiversity in Lao PDR, based on satellite image interpretation and field verification in order to identify causes of the changes. The dynamic information of the forest land cover change during 10 years was calculated by the map algebra in ArcGIS 9.2. Based on the theory of ecosystem service function and the service function value of global different ecosystem services values (ESV) provided by Costanza et al, the value of the six forest cover and land use categories in the Study Areas was worked out. Ecological environment effect that the regional land cover change produced in study period was calculated. A principal component analysis (PCA) was used to quantitatively study driving forces of forest land use change. Results showed that forest land cover declined 15463.35 ha about 12.39% from 1992 to 2002, resulted that in a $31050406.80 net decline in ecosystem services of forest category respectively. The economic and population factors were the principal driving forces of forest cover change in the study area. ESV, PCA were a suitable method for investigating driving forces of forest land cover change and finally policy concerning to biodiversity and sustainable use of the natural resources were developed.

Analysis of the use of water and nitrogen in evolving food production systems. A comparison among three French cattle producing regions in 1817, 1906 and 2004

Petros Chatzimpiros and Sabine Barles

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Food production necessarily uses agricultural land and involves water consumption and nutrient mobilization. In the past food producing systems, livestock and crop production were tied together at a local land base for the livestock to receive feed inputs from agriculture and to supply crop production with nutrients through manure deposition. In the modern food production systems, feeds are often exchanged over long distances from primary production to livestock operations resulting in one way nutrient flows that accumulate locally and risk to enrich environments external to the agrosystems. In this study we conduct a parallel comparison of the water consumption, nitrogen circulation, land use and soil cover changes occurring on the nutritional acreage of the beef and dairy cattle among three French food producing systems of the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries. While the water expenses and land requirements per unit of final product have reduced in time, the animal acreage in the 21st system is clustered among regions and countries, the organic nitrogen loads increase up to 6-fold and the modification of the ration composition during this period involves a sharp withdrawal of the permanent vegetal land cover on the agricultural soil.

Virtual Water, Water footprint and other indicators of water sustainability. A necessary conceptual and methodological revision

Esther Velázquez, Cristina Madrid and María Jesús Beltrán

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Recently, many indicators of water sustainability (virtual water, water footprint, water neutrality, among others) and different methodologies have been developed. It is necessary to discuss about them in order to clarify the potential and limitations of each one. On the other hand, water sustainability (and those indicators) is related to trade but water is rarely a consideration in it. In this context, this paper aims at a double objective: 1) a deep review of concepts and methodologies about water indicators and 2) to estimate water trade between Spain-UK.

Elissaios Papyrakis and Jennifer Franz

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Ecological footprints evaluate the sustainability impacts of current consumption, generally by converting them into the amount of land needed to sustain necessary production levels. Although most footprint indices reveal that we in effect exceed the use of ecologically-productive land and marine area from the earth’s biosphere, they do not offer sufficient alternatives that fully mitigate for environmental impacts. We evaluate popular online footprint indices offered for self-assessment of personal consumer impacts and find that even when the most environmentally-friendly options are adopted, one still exceeds the planet’s bio-capacity levels. The absence of options fully offsetting our environmental impacts reduces the credibility of the indices and renders them a doom-saying off-putting instrument for individuals and policy-makers.

Water use and water flows based on a disaggregated Social Accounting Matrix of Spain

Ignacio Cazcarro, Rosa Duarte and Julio Sánchez

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Making use of a Social Accounting Matrix (SAM) of Spain in 2004, the embodied water and water footprint of the inhabitants in the country is estimated, defined as the volume of water needed for the production of the goods and services consumed. We use an open Leontief Model which gives us the water embodied to produce the goods, concerning the agrarian, industrial, service and domestic sectors water use; the embodied water imported from and exported to other countries. Activities where the incoming or outcoming flows of water are remarkable such as the agrarian, textile, energetic or Agri-food are deeply examined.

Transnational Ecological Networks in Central Europe (TransEcoNet)

Tomaž Podobnikar, Romina Rodela, Daniela Ribero, Andraž Čarni, Stanka Dešnik, Romeo Varga and Imelda Somodi

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The TransEcoNet project (Transnational Ecological Networks in Central Europe) aims to investigate transboundary ecological networks across Central Europe. It is an objective of this project to contribute towards awareness rising on the value and role of ecological networks. This poster presents the activities that will be carried out in Slovenia, with the Pomurje region as our case study area. Pomurje borders with Austria in the north, to Hungary in the east, and to Croatia in the south. We will investigate the spread of the invasive species Robinia pseudoacacia and the underlying causes and assess landscape scale ecological dynamics (e.g. Mura River floodplains) in ecological networks. We also plan to carry out research on the concept of place attachment and identification of the people with their landscape. All the themes will be integrated considering various perspectives including time scale context to serve for the purpose of awareness rising activities.

Multifunctional valuation of ecosystem services

Brynhildur Davidsdottir and Halla Johannesdottir

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The trade-off between environmental services, such as access to unspoiled nature vs. industrial development has been the focus of heated debate in Iceland in recent years. To this day evaluation has been built on two pillars, environmental impact assessment and financial profitability, whereas ecosystem services have been largely ignored. The overall purpose of this proposed project is to provide the first comprehensive environmental valuation study in Iceland that applies up to date methods in the identification and valuation of environmental services to a multifunctional and widely used recreational area, Heiðmörk. This poster concentrates on the multifunctional evaluation of the lakes in the area, which provide recreational, supporting, provisional and regulating services.

Adaptive comanagement and its application in the Dee Catchment, Scotland

Luz Maria Lozada Ellison, Alessandro Gimona, Dan van der Horst, Gerald Schwarz and Bill Slee

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The questions addressed in this poster are: what are the limits of using adaptive co-management (AC) and what are its strengths for setting up ecological networks? We present the first results of an investigation using the AC framework to study the potential for development of ecological networks. First, we analyse collaboration between agencies and local resource users that is in place for water quality in the Dee Catchment and to what extent it could be seen as an AC practice; secondly we analyse if the practices we found could be developed for the creation of ecological networks as a means to deliver ecosystem services in the catchment.

Internalising  externalities for activities that cause climate change

Lučka Kajfež Bogataj

Where should the economy and politics look for a path towards solving climate change? One option is to internalise external costs for activities that cause climate change. Practically all business activities have an effect on the environment, most also add to (if not directly) climate change. Subsidies for farming, energy and transport are additional factors that hide true costs. The mixed signals of market prices of natural resources stimulate non-sustainable production and use. The most obvious and well studied of these are energy and traffic, followed by farming, tourism and others. As participants in traffic, we cause many externalities because we do not always have good market values. Examples of this are lateness due to road congestion, health issues due to noise and air pollution, expenditure on police, management of infrastructure, hospital costs and public health expenditures and, lastly, the diminishing quality of life. We pay for all of this through taxes, but not only drivers, also those who go by bike or walk. For every 1,000 kilometres driven in the average Slovenian car we cause about €55 to €75 of external costs, of which the external costs of climate change are between €2 and €19. If we travel by train our total cost is €17 to €22, and of this we contribute €4 to climate change. The production of electrical energy also has a large effect on climate change and public health. Externalities differ depending on the production methods and location of the electrical energy plant. The costs also depend on the amount of CO2 emitted from the plant, and on the amount of damage done to materials, public health and farm crops. In electrical production, the following pollutants are released into the air: nitrogen oxide, sulphur dioxide, small particles, ammonia, and easily volatile organic pieces. Based on an Externe project (Bickel and Friedrich, 2005), the costs due to climate change are €50 per tonne of CO2 for electrical energy that is produced for 4.3 eurocents per kWh (or 73% of 5.9 eurocents per kWh of total external costs). For gas power plants the costs are around 2 eurocents per kWh (or 85% of 2.3 eurocents per kWh of total external costs). Interestingly enough, costs for hydropower are just 0.2 eurocents per kWh (or 61% of 0.3 eurocents of total external costs). Total external costs in Slovenia for 2005 are 3.5 to 10 eurocents for every kilowatt-hour. One-third of electrical energy is produced from coal, and externalities of coal are even larger at about 7.3 to 23 eurocents per kWh. Electricity from renewable resources costs about 0.1 eurocent per kWh. For nuclear energy the costs are about 1.9 eurocents per kWh but, that of course, does not take any big nuclear spills or accidents into account. Politics and business have to begin to understand externalities (or external costs) that cause climate change and charge those responsible. The EU believes internalisation must trigger various measures that will in turn increase the elasticity of demand by: changing customers’ price-sensitivity, increasing the attraction of certain services, and boosting technological innovation. To decrease external costs there must be a strategy that encompasses not only the internalisation concept but other elements too: providing infrastructure, stimulating technological innovation, making competitive policies/laws, and designing standards.

Uncertainty and the Ecological Economics of Climate Change

Richard B. Howarth

Ecological economics studies the nexus between economic and biophysical systems from a problem-oriented, transdisciplinary perspective. The field strongly emphasizes issues of scientific uncertainty and the achievement of justice both between and within generations. This talk will explore how the proper framing of uncertainty affects the analysis of climate stabilization policy within the framework of integrated assessment models. And it will outline the distinctive insights that emerge when one approaches climate change as a key challenge for postnormal science. By embracing pluralism, ecological economists can contribute richly to policy discourse concerning the role of uncertainty in environmental governance.

Quality of life and sustainable development - a great couple?

Felix Rauschmayer, Ines Omann and Johannes Frühmann

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In this paper we argue why a re-focus on needs and quality of life can make sustainable development (SD) more appealing for politicians and citizens. According to our framework, capabilities and well-being are the constituents of quality of life. A high quality of life can be seen as being able to meet one’s needs sufficiently and feel well about it. SD policies imply restrictions with regard to the choice of strategies to meet current needs translating into policies directed at strategies, values, agency, or resources.

A capabilities approach on well-being and sustainable development

Sophie Spillemaeckers and Luc Vanootegem

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In order to develop a capabilities approach on sustainable development, a framework for a capabilities approach on well-being was constructed. This framework considers capabilities in the light of individual aspirations in life and the valuation of achieved functionings. As sustainability has to take into account the well-being of not only current but also future generations worldwide, this framework will have to be adapted. The paper tries to show the similarities, the differences and the consequences, when making the move from a capabilities approach on well-being to a capabilities approach on sustainable development.

Advocating non-welfaristic approaches: “The Missing Motivation In Microeconomics”

Christian Radden

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Sustainable development is a development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. In this respect, Rauschmayer et al. (2008) argue for a multidimensional approach to welfare that incorporates individual emotions and derive three leverage points for SD policies in order to improve their acceptance. This work aims to contribute two aspects to the discussion: First, I provide a fourth leverage point for SD policies, rather located at the earlier stage where SD policies have to win recognition against such policies derived from welfaristic economics. And second, I delineate how a merger of the Capability Approach (CA) and the concept of SD could look like from a CA’s perspective, thereby advocating to incorporate emotional aspects.

Tom Bauler, Paul-Marie Boulanger, Nicolas Prignot and Anne-Laurence Lefin

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The capability approach provides a convenient and flexible bedrock for building a sound and legitimate index of well-being in a SD perspective, However, because it is indeterminate, it needs to be interpreted and enriched. The paper review others conceptions of well-being and happiness that we maintain brings relevant and important information - notably hard facts on the impacts of various social circumstances on health and life expectancy - for a comprehensive conception of well-being. We work out a more dynamical (with the emphasis on “becomings” as well as on “beings”) interpretation of the capability approach in terms of collective and individual productive assets we consider to be consistent with SD and we call also in some more critical approaches - such as Honneth’s analysis of the paradox of individualization in late capitalism - which account for social pathologies of the injunction to be responsible of one’s (happy) life.

Preventing climate change or waiting for others to it? The battle of perspectives revisited

Sylvie Geisendorf

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10 years ago Janssen/De Vries developed a multi-agent climate-economy model. Based on Nordhaus’ macroeconomic model, they implemented adaptive agents, holding different perspectives on the dynamics of climate change and necessary preventive measures. The paper aims to update this model with current data. Rising CO2 emissions suggest that the assumption of agents, optimizing economic output and climate policy, still prevailing in climate-economic modelling, isn’t able to grasp the complexity of human reactions to climate change. The updated battle of perspectives model shall help analysing the importance of human beliefs and the significance of uncertain data for the realisation of climate protection.

Peatland restoration, a cost-effective measure for climate protection?

Jan Philipp Schägner

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Alternative uses or restoration of drained peatland can diminish greenhouse gas emissions substantially. The aim of our study is to identify whether such land use changes can be cost-effective strategies for global climate protection. In this regard we conduct an ecologically extended cost-benefit-analysis on alternative peatland management forms, accounting for economic impacts on the farming sector and alternative forms of land use (e.g. streets and housing), implementation costs of technical measures and impacts on the environment such as GHG emissions, nutrient eluviation and biodiversity. In a second step we complement our findings with participatory multi-criteria-analysis to incorporate preferences, values and beliefs of the local societies which can hardly be valued within a cost-benefit-analysis.

Dirk T. G. Rübbelke and Nathan Rive

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In an impure public good model we analyze the effects of CDM transfers on poverty as well as on the global climate protection level. We construct an analytical model of a developing and an industrialized region, both of which independently seek to maximize their utility – a function of private consumption, domestic air quality, and global climate protection. They do so by distributing their finite expenditures across (1) the aggregate consumption good, (2) end-of-pipe pollution control technologies, and (3) greenhouse gas abatement. Applying this model to empirical data on China and the European Union, we develop two sets of simulations to assess the impact of differing rates of the CDM transfer. The simulations differ by their assumptions regarding China’s domestic air quality policy: the first assumes a technology-standards policy which fixes a level of end-of-pipe SO2 control, whereas the second assumes a flexible technology-neutral policy which simply fixes the level total SO2 emissions.

Barriers to the introduction of market-based instruments in climate policies: an integrated theoretical framework

Pablo Del Rio and Xavier Labandeira

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Although economists have traditionally defended the superiority of market-based instruments, and an increasing use of those measures in OECD countries has taken place, policy makers have been reluctant to use them for climate policy. This paper provides a theoretical framework which allows the explanation of this paradox, in order to draw lessons to facilitate the implementation of these instruments in the future. This framework combines two economic approaches (the institutional path dependence and the public choice perspectives), complemented with insights from political science studies. Ex-post empirical research using the Spanish case illustrates the accuracy and policy-relevance of our approach.

Cc.Alps - Assessing and evaluating climate response measures in the Alps in terms of their sustainability

Simone Gingrich, Bruno Abegg, Veronika Gaube, Helmut Haberl, Wolfgang Pfefferkorn and Martine Rebetez

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Climate change is observed all over the world and is particularly noticeable in the Alps. Measures to adapt to or mitigate climate change are being taken by various actors. In the project cc.alps, the international commission for the protection of the alps, CIPRA, wants to ensure that climate response measures are shaped in a sustainable way. This paper presents preliminary results from an alps-wide competition and an alps-wide evaluation of climate response measures. We identify those areas in which much is being done and those in which measures are lacking or not heading towards sustainability.

After an income increase, will households buy better or more wine?

Bastien Vincent Samuel Girod and Peter Jan de Haan

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In this paper, we present a household model based on both monetary and functional units. This allows (i) to link single consumption categories to corresponding LCA processes, and (ii) to distinguish between increases in expenditure due to consuming more (more functional units at constant unit price) versus consuming better (increased unit price, i.e. increase quality). Based on the analysis of a dataset of 13’500 Swiss households, we identified many consumption categories where marginal consumption towards higher income tends toward higher price level. We conclude that sustainable consumption research and policy should aim at avoiding environmental impact of higher quality level to benefit from increasing quality orientation with raising income.

The Environmental Impact of Household Consumption and its Determinants: Evidence from Turkey

Fikret Adaman, Begum Ozkaynak, Ali Kerem Saysel and Unal Zenginobuz

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Based on a project conducted in urban Turkey, the paper aims first at understanding the extent of environmental pressures of household consumption patterns and the factors conditioning them. The paper then investigates the link between individuals’ environmental impact, their environmental values and willingness to contribute for environmental improvement. Do people with higher environmental values, when other variables are controlled, have less environmental impact, and/or are willing to contribute more for environmental improvement? The answering of these questions will give us the opportunity to see what can be done to develop more sustainable consumption patterns.

Income Distribution, Demand-Driven Innovations, and Sustainable Growth

Francesco Vona and Fabrizio Patriarca

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The transition toward a sustainable economy relies upon the co-evolution of preferences and technology. Consumers and technological learning mutually interact in shaping the trajectories towards a more or less sustainable equilibrium. On the other hand, due to hierarchical needs, consumers' willingness-to-pay for new products also depends on their income (e.g. Pasinetti 1981, 1993). Following the post-Keynesian tradition, we build a model where willingness-to-pay for new green products becomes positive once needs higher in the hierarchy are saturated. As in Predator-Prey models à la Goodwin (1965), it will be shown that there exists an internal range of wages (resp. profits) beyond which the sustainable transition is no longer possible. Within this sustainable range, the shape of the learning curve and the magnitude of network externalities configure alternative growth paths, characterized by different rates of diffusion of the new green products. Finally, the divergence is amplified when technical change is endogeneized. The model provides a new theoretical rationale supporting the empirical evidence at odds with the environmental Kuznets curve (Magnani 2000). What we claim is that, given the income per capita, an unequal society not only invest less in emission abetment, but - in the long run - ends up with a substantial technological gap.

Consumer identity, consumption and time use patterns, and resource use in Australia

Heinz Schandl

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We present a conceptual framework and empirical analysis of Australia’s consumer culture, consumption and time use patterns, resource use, and waste and emission consequences. By employing a social science approach we identify household types that share lifestyle and behavioural characteristics, and consumption and time use characteristics. We discuss how consumption activities and time use patterns have changed since the 1950s and link those trends to patterns and dynamics of natural resource use, waste and emissions. We particularly focus on clusters of services in the areas of food and nutrition, building and housing, transport and mobility, because these are responsible for about 70% of resource use, energy use and land use.

Diffusion of clean technologies: the case of organic waste composting in Italy

Massimiliano Volpi

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The paper investigates the determinants of the diffusion of composting of organic waste in the Italian regions. The analysis is based on panel data for the period 1999-2005. It studies the effects of a legal innovation which shifted attention from disposal of waste to its separate collection and recycling, which sets clear targets for local governments (which have a monopoly on collection of waste) for separate collection. Setting and achieving these targets has played a major role in explaining the diffusion of composting, solving a situation of institutional lock-in. We also provide evidence of the interdependence between previous technological choices and the diffusion of composting. Finally, the paper shows that increasing population has made it difficult to find locations for new plants.

Analysis of agri-environmental measures to organic livestock in Andalusia. An analysis from the farmers participation approach

Sandra Ríos Núñez, Roberto García Trujillo and Daniel Coq Huelva

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Organic livestock is concentrated in Andalusia, Spain. Its participation in national context has increased from 40% in 2004 to 62% in 2007. 1,732 farms are producing organic livestock. The agri-environmental measures directed to organic livestock in Andalusia had an annual growth rate of 74.5% in the period 2001-2007. In 2007 there were 1732 organic farms with livestock handling in Andalusia. 47% had received aids agri-environmental. This research aims to analyse the impact of the financial aids and payments on the economic and environmental management of farms, focusing on the economic viability of livestock production and its integration within the local economy. This research is based on the “farmers participation approach”. It allows analyzing the characteristics of farms which have participated in environmental programs (size, corporate structure, dependence on agricultural income, etc.) and also, the main challenges and objectives which have been achieved during the process of public funding.

Land Reform in Bolivia: a forestry policy?

Lorenzo Pellegrini

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In this paper we analyze the Bolivian land reform within the general context of land reforms and then we look at how the Bolivian case could be better understood as a forest reform. First we discuss the “standard” conditions for a successful land reform. Second we highlight that “special” conditions apply to Bolivia. Next, we provide a synthesis of the discussion of the Bolivian government and show how the focus of the national authorities is centred on the standard conditions of land reform and how the issue of forest management is being neglected.

Modelling land use change in the U.K.'s uplands: Integrating choice models with environmental process-based models

Mette Termansen, Daniel Chapman, Claire Quinn, Evan Fraser, Nanlin Jin, Nesha Beharry and Klaus Hubacek

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We develop a land use choice model for an extensive farming system of grazing and game shooting in the uplands of the UK. We explore the potential for integrating agent based modelling and discrete choice analysis approaches in a land use change simulation model. We show how policy and environmental change scenarios can be modelled using this approach.

Is a Sustainable Land Use Policy in Germany Possible? Insights from an Analysis Using the Perspective of Stocks

Beate Fischer, Frank Jöst, Bernd Klauer and Johannes Schiller

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Land is an essential but limited natural resource. We employ the concept of stocks to analyse drivers for land-use conversion and to assess, whether the German political “30-hectare goal” is feasible given the current institutional setting. The paper identifies major drivers for land-use conversion and investigates underlying stocks and persistent structures. It shows that meeting the 30-hectare goal is unlikely. We further argue that due to persistent physical and institutional structures land-use conversion from agricultural land into urbanised land takes place on smaller time scales than the opposite. We conclude that (demographic and other) change processes lead to further (unfavourable) land-use conversion even with constant population.

Strategies of family farms to strengthen their resilience

Ika Darnhofer

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Resilience thinking offers a framework to emphasize dynamics and interdependencies. Transferring insights from resilience thinking onto farm management would help identifying the factors that allow a farm to respond to change. The results from workshops with family farmers in Austria show that farmers understand change as unpredictable and strategy as unfolding. They implement a variety of strategies to ensure the flexibility and adaptability of their farm, and build extensive networks to diversity information and income sources. The challenge is that these strategies, while ensuring adaptability and transformability, compete for scarce resources.

Application of the index of vectors of degradation (ideg) to the evaluation of agricultural environmental sustainability in the micro-watersheds of the Oricanga e Araras rivers in the state of São Paulo, Brazil

Luciana Ferreira Silva, Ademar Ribeiro Romeiro and João Fernando Marques

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This article presents the results of the application of the Index of Vectors of Degradation (IDEG) to the micro-watersheds of the Oriçanga and Araras rivers in the state of São Paulo, Brazil. This index is one of the components of the Agricultural Environmental Sustainability Index (ISAGRI) and is composed of indicators of the state of pressure, whose objective is to characterize the environmental degradation resulting from use. The micro-watersheds chosen presented degradation differences, and the results show that the IDEG was sensitive to these differences.

On the issue of weight in social Multi-criteria Evaluation

Eneko Garmendia and Gonzalo Gamboa

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From post normal science we have learn that complex environmental problems, characterized by the presence of uncertain outcomes, conflict of values, multiple spatial and temporal scales, and non-equivalent descriptions require the inclusion of some form of public participation in the decision making process, to deal with the existence of multiple legitimate and often confronted perspectives in society. In this context, the combination of multi-criteria evaluation with participatory approaches has emerged as a promising framework for dealing with complex socio-ecological systems. Nevertheless, the inclusion of different standpoints in this framework is still controversial and the issue of weights (i.e. prioritization of criteria) requires further attention. In this paper we analyze the issue of weights in the context of SMCE framework and present a new proposal that permits the search of a sound decision in the presence of incommensurability of values. We apply this approach in a real case study, that assesses alternative manage options for a Biosphere Reserve located in the Basque Country (North of Spain) Finally based in the lessons learned from this experience, we propose and steep forward for incorporating different weights in the designee and evaluation of public policies for sustainability.

Lievens Laurent

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Current environmental degradation and resource depletion challenge our societies in their fundaments. Scientific evidence show that the negative impacts of our economies are growing, while wellbeing doesn’t seem to follow this trend. De-growth theories – i.e. a transitional period to reach global sustainability – tries to solve the ecological and social crisis through a shift in our socio-economic paradigm. To support political and societal decision-making processes, some indicators could be helpful, reason why we propose to create a new set of indicators – focused on this de-growth transition period – to reach sustainable societies. These indicators could next be aggregated in one index, able to launch the debate and its appropriation by the Civil Society. We propose to construct such an index with a pyramidal approach, highlighting a gradation inside the different levels. The current paper represents the beginning of a work in progress. The indicators are submitted to the debate, in a way to underline his abilities to engage the paradigm shift.

De-coupling of economic prosperity and carbon intensity in the US Economy: a state based econometric analysis

Brynhildur Davidsdottir, Dan Basoli and Isabelle Morin

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Three processes can facilitate reductions in carbon intensity of the US economy: (1) structural economic change; (2) increased energy efficiency; and (3) switching towards lower or no-carbon emitting fuels. Each process may have negative or positive economic consequences, but estimates of the aggregate economic consequences of preventing environmental degradation such as reducing greenhouse gas emissions range from a large loss to a net positive gain in economic performance. Using state level historical data we assess the econometric relationship between the three processes and state level economic performance. Results indicate a negative causal relationship between carbon intensity and economic performance.

Measuring Sustainable Energy Development (SED): linking SED indicators to dynamics of change

Brynhildur Davidsdottir and Dan Basoli

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Energy use is central to all three dimensions of Sustainable development (SD) and sustainable energy development (SED) is a necessary component of global sustainability. SED is broadly defined as the provision of adequate energy services at affordable cost in a secure and environmentally benign manner, in conformity with social and economic development needs. If the global community considers SED a priority, indictors should be developed that measure progress towards SED in the three dimensions simultaneously. This paper presents (1) a vector-based indicator measuring movement towards SED (2) the implementation of this indicator for 6 countries (3) preliminary efforts to link the index to dynamic movement.

Using Institutional and Ecological Economics, Landscape Ecology, Vulnerability and Resilience, Demographic, and Complexity Theory to Explain Rising and Falling Waves of Complex Urban Trade-Based Civilizations

Evan Fraser

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Although many of today’s global problems seem unprecedented, similar events have occurred in the past. Western Europe between AD 300 to AD 1400 may be one such analogy since this period witnessed the rise and fall of a complex society where the wide spread trade in agricultural products allowed many citizens to live in cities. The emergence of the “Medieval Civilization” was helped by a relatively benign climate that kept crop yields high despite wide spread environmental degradation, economic turmoil and population growth. However, these problems meant that European society had few buffers against the cooling climate of the 14th century, and this caused poor harvests during a period of high inflation, turbulent politics and new diseases.

Plural Methodologies in Climate Change Research

Jouni Paavola and Andrew Gouldson

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The proposed paper explores plural methodological strategies in climate change. The paper investigates the possibilities and difficulties associated with bridging the gap between model-based approaches in climate change science and climate-change economics, which need validation or ‘ground-truthing’, and qualitative and case-study based approaches of other social sciences, which from an instrumental viewpoint would need to be more generalisable. The paper seeks to shed light on the relative merits and difficulties of integrated and pluralistic methodological approaches in climate change research, asking whether there really is a need to choose one or the other.

The Effectiveness of International Multi-Level Governance Solutions for Climate Change, Desertification and Biodiversity

Emma Tompkins, Lindsay Stringer and Jouni Paavola

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This paper examines how multi-level governance solutions for climate change, desertification and biodiversity mediate the gap between the international and the local, involve affected citizens, and perform in terms of effectiveness. These international environmental conventions established after the Rio conference should have had an impact in more than 13 years after their adoption. Yet, climate change, biodiversity loss and desertification continue largely unabated. In this paper we examine from an institutional viewpoint what accounts for the (in)effectiveness of international environmental governance solutions for biodiversity, desertification and climate change and assess what would enhance their effectiveness. We argue that 1) a clear mandate for action; 2) opportunity, resources and mechanisms for inclusiveness at all scales; 3) ability to include new information, adapt processes and learning from experience; and 4) robustness and redundancy of governance institutions, underpin the effectiveness of multi-level environmental governance solutions.

Claire Helen Quinn, Andrew John Dougill and Evan David Gaviller Fraser

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It is important to identify food systems that may cease functioning due to changing climate or land degradation, however identifying such systems is confounded on conceptual and methodological grounds. Field studies show how local societies respond to drought either on an individual basis or by collective action, but they are context-specific and avoid analysis to discern larger scale patterns. This paper aims to address these challenges by analysing how external pressures affect the vulnerability of dryland farming systems in three African case study settings (in Botswana, Malawi and South Africa) using a consistent conceptual framework and methodological approach. We evaluate how external pressures have changed ecosystem resilience, access to assets and socio-political governance by drawing on the authors’ own research, published material and Government data. We develop narratives on how external drivers have caused farming systems to change their ecological base (affecting agro-ecosystems resilience), their social base (affecting access to assets) and the institutional capacity the system is situated in. We use “causal loop diagrams” and statistical models to express key relationships and establish basic future scenarios. By exploring comparisons between the different socio-environmental settings we are able to guide the value of dynamic systems modelling approaches to improving vulnerability assessments for dryland farming systems.

Global environmental change and food crops: integrating natural and social science approaches

Andrew Juan Challinor, Evan Fraser and Elisabeth Simelton

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Global environmental change presents an enormous challenge to both science and society. Historically, the natural and social sciences have assessed the impacts of environmental change in relative isolation. There is now both the need and the capability for novel methods that can assess combined socio-economic and climatic pressures. Only by taking such a holistic view can realistic adaptation strategies be identified. This paper highlights early progress in developing an innovative series of dynamic socio-economic crop-climate models, in order to allow us to explore the impacts of different climate scenarios on food production in a range of locales.

Transition pathways for a low carbon energy system in the UK: co-evolution of governance processes and technologies

Timothy Foxon, Geoffrey P. Hammond and Peter J. Pearson

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This paper describes the formulation of transition pathways for a low carbon (electrical) energy system in the UK. It uses an approach based on earlier work on understanding transitions, using a multi-level perspective with landscape, regime and niche levels, and its application to the development of ‘socio-technical scenarios’. The paper describes four outline transition pathways for UK energy systems, based on the co-evolution of governance systems and technologies.

In Pursuit of Sustainable Development: A Governance Perspective

Susan Baker

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We begin with a brief examination of the two key concepts of the paper, that of ‘governance’ and of ‘sustainable development’. This is followed by an elaboration of existing governance practices aimed at the promotion of sustainable development. Attention is then turned to the question: are there specific governance requirements that ought to be introduced if society is to more along a more sustainable development trajectory? This brings us to consideration of the normative dimensions of governance for sustainable development. We finish with an exploration of some more recent theorising in relation to reflexive governance for sustainable development. The paper focuses by and large on governance for sustainable development as it relates to the European Union (EU), although issues in relation to developing countries are also explored, in particular as they relate to demands for so-called ‘good governance’ practices.

Climate change impacts, adaptation, and vulnerability in Central and Eastern Europe

Zbigniew W. Kundzewicz

The ongoing warming of the global climate system is unequivocal and most of it has been very likely caused by anthropogenic interference with the climate system. Wide ranging impacts of climate change have been already documented and more pronounced changes are projected. Some impacts are positive, others are negative, but for a stronger climate change, negative impacts are likely to outweigh its benefits, globally and in Europe. Climate change is expected to magnify regional differences in Europe’s natural resources and assets – there will be winners and loosers. In the North, reduced demand for heating, increased crop yields, longer vegetation season, extension of agricultural land areas, increased forest growth, tourism-friendly increase of the Baltic Sea temperature, and increasing water power are projected. However, in Southern Europe, climate change is projected to worsen climatic conditions (higher temperatures and water deficits) and to reduce water availability, hydropower potential, and, in general, crop productivity. While Southern Europe may even become too hot for summer holidays – another threat for tourism in this region is the increasing attractiveness and competition of other European regions, including parts of Central and Eastern Europe. A large part of climate change impacts in Central and Eastern Europe is related to three classes of water-related problems – having too little water, too much water, or polluted water, all three of them are projected to be exacerbated by climate change. In Central and Eastern Europe, summer precipitation is projected to decrease, causing higher water stress. Climate-related extremes are on increase, including more frequent heat waves and wild fires, droughts, intense precipitation and several categories of floods, including river floods and coastal floods, but not snowmelt floods). Adverse health effects include hypertermia related to heat waves and earlier onset and extension of season for allergenic pollen, but also reduced risk of extreme cold events. Shrinking of seasonal snow cover and winter (including ski) tourism are projected. Ecosystems will be adversely affected, with biodiversity loss and shift of ranges. Even under a questionable assumption of a possibility of arriving at an efficient and timely global climate policy, climate change will continue for many decades, so that adaptation to its impacts (adjustment in natural or human systems in response to actual or expected changes, which moderates harm or exploits beneficial opportunities) will be increasingly necessary. However, since there is a considerable uncertainty in future projections of future climate change, its impacts and risks, a non-trivial question: “adapt to what?” arises.

Re-introducing Needs into Sustainable Development

Felix Rauschmayer, Ines Omann and Johannes Frühmann

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In this paper we argue why a re-focus on needs and quality of life can make sustainable development (SD) more appealing for politicians and citizens. According to our framework, capabilities and well-being are the constituents of quality of life. A high quality of life can be seen as being able to meet one’s needs sufficiently and feel well about it. SD policies imply restrictions with regard to the choice of strategies to meet current needs translating into policies directed at strategies, values, agency, or resources.

Need assessment in multi-level governance: A tool for environmental conflict?

Catherine Jolibert

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The goal of this paper is to propose a tool for need assessment to help decision-making on complex environmental issues including multi-level governance in biodiversity. To understand the conflict of interest between economic activity of fish farming and otter protection in the Natural Reserve of Sado estuary, in Portugal, the human need theory specifically sheds light on: (i) the nature of stakeholders’ needs and satisfiers - using the concept of stakeholder in a broader sense including humans and non-human beings; (ii) the role of science in the fulfilment or actualization of these needs, called satisfiers; (iii) the link between local needs and the different scales of governance in biodiversity conservation. Our proposal is to go beyond the human needs theory, as an anthropomorphic view, to a stakeholder needs approach, as a global approach, where the “actants” covering human and non-human are included. This analysis in terms of needs through a participatory process lead by social scientists permits a better adaptation of the satisfiers to the real needs that improve the political process of decision making and the science-policy interfaces in biodiversity governance.

Johannes Frühmann and Ines Omann

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In this paper we argue why a new scientific approach is needed to start a real transition towards sustainable development. Our hypothesis behind is that SD as a concept has been widely used in science and media, but has not been successful, because - among others - it is a technocratic concept not touching the emotional side of humans. By linking SD to quality of life and thus to needs, wellbeing, capabilities, values and culture, it can be operationalised in a way that it is touching humans and making them feel and see how sustainable development and high quality of life can be linked. We call this new form of science mode-3 science and describe this science its methods and possible implementations.

A classical model of social choice between nature conservation and growth

Paola Antonello

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This paper enhances the basic results of my paper on “A classical model of sustainable growth”, presented at the 10th Biennial Conference of ISEE, Nairobi, Kenya. It outlines a possible model of social multi-criteria choice between the economic alternatives of an unsustainable long-run growth, a “classical” stationary state and an “ecological” stationary-state, as suggested by J.S. Mill and H. Daly. The social choice model is unambiguously solved by applying the Condorcet-Kemeny-Young-Levenglick ranking procedure, i.e. by evaluating the 3! possible rankings on the basis of a Condorcet outranking matrix. The Condorcet-winner is the scenario suggested by J.S. Mill and H. Daly. The Condorcet-loser is the orthodox growth model with an exogenous threshold, set by the limited supply of natural resources.

How neuroscience can inform ecological economics

Sigrid Stagl

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The traditional model of “rational economic man” underlying much of economic analysis has been found to be an inadequate description of actual human behaviour and a poor predictor of individual choice. Drawing on findings from psychology, behavioural economics has helped the economics profession to become smarter about behaviour. A recent addition to this field is (social) neuroeconomics, which draws on social psychology, cognitive psychology and neuroscience. However, the diffusion of behavioural economics and even more so of neuroeconomics into environmental and ecological economics has remained sparse. The paper reviews the literatures of neuroeconomics and selected parts of neuroscience and explores how these findings can be used to develop conceptual models of pro-environmental behaviours, behaviours in social dilemma situations and decision-making under risk and uncertainty further.

Nuno Videira, Filipa Tavares, Paula Antunes, Rui Santos and Rita Lopes

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In this paper we start by positioning Integrated Sustainability Assessment (ISA) in relation to other environmental and integrated assessment frameworks. We present a critical review of the tools that may guide and structure ISA processes, especially focusing on the role of participatory modelling. The paper resumes with the presentation and discussion of a new dynamic and participatory modelling framework, comprising five stages: scoping, visioning, model building, simulation/assessment and monitoring. The distinctive features of the framework include the dynamic modelling and analysis of long-term sustainability impacts against sustainability criteria, embedded in broad and continuous participatory processes exploring the integration of assessment methods in a coherent platform.

Decision support for sustainability politics based on the concept of ‘stocks’

Mi-Yong Lee-Peuker, Bernd Klauer and Johannes Schiller

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This paper is an attempt to provide some basic elements of conceptualizing an integrative knowledge base for decision-making in sustainability politics. This is done by the example of the MTBE-decontamination strategy at the major petrochemical industry site Leuna (Germany). It is intended as a case study contribution to the development of a decision-support method which is based on the concept of stocks.

Introductory Economics Textbooks: What do they teach about sustainability?

Tom L. Green

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In response to accelerating ecological deterioration, many universities have made commitments to ensure they graduate ecologically responsible citizens and to integrate sustainability across the curriculum. This study involves a content analysis of how Econ101 textbooks address environment-economy linkages. In North America, introductory economics courses (‘Econ101’) are standardized and rely heavily on textbooks. A small number of textbooks dominate this market. Orthodox Econ101 textbooks in current use in British Columbia, Canada were included in the study as well as three leading US textbooks. These were contrasted against a pair of micro/macro texts explicitly written to address sustainability. The orthodox textbooks are found to largely ignore or misrepresent ecosystem-economy linkages and to include content that is unhelpful in furthering student understanding of sustainability and in providing them with the tools to contribute to its achievement. Universities that have made a commitment to integrate sustainability across the curriculum should examine carefully the textbooks used in their introductory economic courses and consider adopting textbooks that have explicitly integrated sustainability-relevant content throughout the text.

Understanding the environmental implications of further economic growth using coupled biophysical and economic models of the Australian economy

Graham Mark Turner

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Rather than attempting to create an integrated economic-environment model of the Australian economy, this paper presents research on the linking of separate environment and economic models. The environment model is provided by the Australian Stocks and Flows Framework (ASFF), used to identify the significant physical challenges facing Australia in the decades ahead. To address the perceived issue of missing prices in the ASFF this research explores how the link with economic models can be made, and demonstrates several advantages of taking this approach. Preliminary application shows the substantial changes required in behaviour and innovation for any transition to a sustainable economy.

Disentangling Specific Subsets of Innovations: An Empirical Analysis for German Firms

Andreas Ziegler

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Based on a unique firm-level data set from the German manufacturing sector, this paper disentangles environmental and non-environmental product and process innovations. The multivariate probit analysis shows that the various innovation types are determined by different factors. The estimation results suggest a policy mix which comprises the encouragement of R&D activities, certified management systems, and specific management activities referring to environmentally friendly products when the implementation of all innovation types is to be supported.

Rewarding farmers for delivering plant biodiversity using auctioning within a participatory case-study approach (Northeim County, Germany)

Jan Freese, Sebastian Klimek, Anne Richter gen. Kemmermann and Rainer Marggraf

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Due to a lack of appropriate economic incentives and missing markets farmers are poorly rewarded for the provision of ecosystem services. This case-study aims to correct for this by establishing a regionally-scaled market-based payment scheme for ecosystem services. Payments to farmers were linked to ecological goods as proxies for ecological services derived from managed grasslands and arable fields and embedded into a market-based payment scheme that comprised a combination of a payment by results approach with an auction mechanism. Additionally, the preferences of the population, the local stakeholders’ interests and their knowledge were accounted for within the case-study. The results demonstrate that an appropriately designed payment scheme at a regional scale accompanied by a participatory approach could support farming systems that are managed for delivering ecological goods. This article presents the concept of the case study, the results obtained by four auctions for forb species richness in managed grasslands and weed-species richness in arable fields and the additional implementation of participation.

White tigers - theorizing social entrepreneurs as social - ecological actors

Rafael Ziegler

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Social Entrepreneurs are taken to be a new actor for achieving social-ecological goals, and not least due to their recent emergence the theoretical discussion of this actor is still in its exploratory phase. This paper introduces and then draws on two development theories, the Schumpeterian theory of economic development and the capability approach to development as freedom, so as to provide a theoretical perspective on social entrepreneurship that is normatively justifiable and that offers a distinct empirical theory of change. Social entrepreneurship so understood is the promotion of development as freedom through a new combination of functionings and associated technical means.

The “Convention-Check” - an instrument for improving biodiversity governance of large scale conservation areas on the example of the National Park Thayatal/Austria

Volker Mauerhofer

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This paper provides a new method on assessing the contribution of large scale protected areas to the implementation of five international biodiversity related conventions on a practical example. The local regulative acts and practical activities governing the Austrian Thaya Valley National Park were assessed by a new method which newly combines working approaches from social and natural sciences. The data shows an above-average contribution of this National Park to the formal and practical implementation of these conventions, but furthermore identifies for more than half of the norms assessed additional activities recommended for different geographical and administrative levels of biodiversity governance.

Food Prices and Equity as a Social Relationship - Some Remarks

Vasile Dogaru

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Food product prices may have an asymmetrical relationship with other product prices. Nevertheless, it is necessary to set a fixed point reference and purpose for price analysis. By using the Roegenian method (Georgescu-Roegen, 1971), we can identify any possible gaps of an economic analysis. Human finite food consumption, within a limited time-space interval, supports the necessity of an analytic approach. Price – used as a main instrument in competitive nominal monetary economies – has its importance from an equity perspective, since it can both sustain resource consumption optimization, and serve as inter-generational equity norm.

Somewhere between Zero and Infinity: ecological functions, economic worth and tipping points

Katharine Nora Farrell

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In this paper, the various types of ecological economic relationships considered in the THRESHOLDS project will be cross referenced with the various types of economically useful resources and activities that are associated with coastal ecosystems in Denmark, Belgium and Spain. Two typologies will be developed: one oriented from the position of the ecosystems, distinguishing between various types of economically useful coastal ecosystems resources and activities, and one oriented on the human systems, distinguishing between various types of methods (including but not limited to monetary valuation) which may be used to take into account the economic worth of these economically useful coastal ecosystems resources and activities. Finally, the relative usefulness of the various methods of valuation for providing useful policy information about the economic costs associated with losing or retaining access to these resources and activities will be considered.

Sustainable development indicators (SDI) for biodiversity in the context of the precautionary principle. The need for a normative approach

Per Arild Garnaasjordet, Iulie Aslaksen, Erik Framstad and Olav Skarpaas

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Extending the current set of sustainable development indicators (SDI) in order to capture “early warnings” of emerging environmental problems is the focus of this paper. We draw on inspiration from ecological economics, in terms of its focus on strong uncertainty and the precautionary principle. Most international SDI sets are very traditional, and not very critical. This means that they are not used by politicians, not by environmental organisations and not very well known by the public. We want to discuss an approach where the scientists evaluate development and actions needed for the adaptation of a sustainable development policy.

The economic insurance value of ecological resilience

Stefan Baumgärtner and Sebastian Strunz

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Ecological resilience, i.e., an ecosystem’s ability to maintain its basic functions and controls in the face of disturbances, is commonly interpreted as insurance: by decreasing the probability of future degradation of ecosystem services, resilience insures humans against potential welfare losses. But what exactly is the economic insurance value of ecological resilience, and what is its relation with the total economic value of resilience? In this paper, we disentangle both value components and clarify the discussion. We introduce a simple model to discuss how the economic insurance value of ecological resilience depends on ecosystem properties and the risk preferences of the user of ecosystem services.

The process of “sojization” and the deepening of HANPP in the agriculture model in Argentine. A Case Study: The Luján River Basin, Buenos Aires

Federico Zuberman

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The process of agriculturization in Argentina is also called “soybeanization”. This process results in a series of various kinds of environmental impacts that merit to be studied. This work focuses on those linked to understand the loss of natural habitats and the changing land use to a more intensive use. This research uses the Luján river basin as a case study in the argentine pampa region and examines this process from a prospective study of HANPP increasing in agricultural activities on recent decades. In this research we compare the variation in the NPPh between 1988 (before the soybean RR releasing) and 2002 (with the soybean RR released).

Who gets the HANPP? Appropriation and distribution of biomass energy flows in the Tana Delta

Leah Temper and Joan Martinez Alier

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This paper uses the Hanpp (Human appropriation of net primary production) indicator to understand resource use and conflicts among Pokomo farmers and Orma pastoralists in the Tana River Delta in Kenya. This wetland region is among the most important in Kenya and covers 1,300 sq. km. The Delta is currently being targeted by two sugar plantation projects which would see a large swathe of the delta (110,000 ha) transformed into sugar monoculture. We also calculate the NPP and the HANPP under the sugar scenario and discuss how this dramatic change of land use and energy flows would impact the unique biodiversity of the delta and the livelihoods of the inhabitants.

Extraction and recycling of the non-renewable and non-substitutable resource phosphorus

Demet Seyhan, Hans-Peter Weikard and Ekko van Ierland

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Phosphorus (P) resources are extracted from the global reserves to be used as fertilizer in agriculture. We study an extraction model and elaborate on the cost function. Modelling of a single resource allows for realistic assumptions that complicate or simplify the analysis at various parts. We end up with non-monotonous paths as it was also observed by Farzin (1992). Then, we develop the case for recycling and compare it to the benchmark scenario in order to determine the welfare gains. The implications of the resulting efficient paths, in the case of pure extraction and in the case of both extraction and recycling, are discussed along with a critique of the price indicators of scarcity.

Contributing to the design of sustainable crop systems: Using photographs to investigate preferences for arable landscapes and landscape features in Scotland

Clare Hall

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This study investigates peoples’ preferences for arable landscapes in Scotland. Q methodology is used, with photographs collected from residents in Scottish parishes where arable farming predominates. Twenty four photographs were selected to be ranked against a scale from least to most preferred. Results from two workshops where the exercise was completed, have revealed preference differences between groups that are based on the extent of human influence in the landscape, the extent of rurality versus agricultural rurality, the diversity within the image, and the landform underlying the landscape. The next step is to conduct the Q sorting process with Scottish residents.

Land Use, Crop Rotation, Ecosystem Services and Programming: On the Spatial and Dynamic Modelling of Farms in Cultural Landscapes

Ernst-August Nuppenau and Annika Hoeft

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A traditional answer of farmers to address problems of soil fertility, pest control and eco-system services were crop rotations. Labour intensive rotations were linked to diverse and species rich cultural landscapes. Today, in modern agriculture monocultures, anorganic fertilization, big machinery and economies of scale are dominating. However, farmers face the loss of positive externalities of ecosystem services. We address the issues by modelling crop rotations (dynamic optimization models). A newly introduced and included transfer matrix delineates the impact of crop compositions in period “t” to natural fertility of farm land in “t+1”.

Modelling Rural Social, Economic and Environmental Interactions of EU Agricultural Policy

John Bryden, Tom Johnson and

Karen Refsgaard

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The main aim of TOP-MARD was to develop an interdisciplinary-based model using system dynamics, which would encompass the complex inter-relationships between the different public and private 'functions' of farming and farm households, sustainable economic development and quality of life, and public policies. System dynamics was appropriate in this case because of our interest in the interaction and feed back effects among economic, social and environmental systems. A model was developed in common between 11 European research partners within the area of multifunctionality and sustainable rural development to analyse the impacts of different public policies.

Modelling sustainable rural development in the face of ongoing CAP Reforms - The case of a remote rural area Caithness and Sutherland (Scotland)

Holger Bergmann and Kenneth J. Thomson

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With the latest reform of EU Structural Policy (SP), the Highlands and Islands of Scotland have been excluded from further support by Structural Funds beyond 2013. However, with the new Scottish Rural Development Programme (SRDP), expenditures in Scotland financed partly by the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development have been increased. These shifts in EU funding have prompted further analysis of their impacts in Scotland, alongside similar inquiries elsewhere in Europe. A modified version of a system dynamics model (POMMARD) constructed for an EU-wide case-study project (TOP-MARD) was used to simulate the effects of the changes in the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) as well as SP in Caithness and Sutherland (C&S), a remote rural area in Northern Scotland. In this paper, the context of the modelling work in policy and socio-economic terms is first described. On the basis of expert interviews, several alternative modelling scenarios were developed, mostly relating to reconfigurations of Pillar 2 spending within the area. The modelling results are discussed in terms of regional population, Quality of Life (QoL) and economic trends, from 2001 to 2021, and show that depopulation trends in C&S can be avoided by appropriate tailored sustainable rural development policies. Finally, some conclusions are drawn, both about the implications of the results for sustainability in C&S and in general for future Sustainable Rural Development (SRD) policy, and about the usefulness of this type of modelling exercise for policy analysis of rural development measures.

Comparative review of a system modelling approach for analysing impacts of multifunctional agriculture

Luka Juvančič, Tom Johnson, Karen Refsgaard and Holger Bergmann

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The paper briefly describes agricultural multifunctionality in terms of its impact on the design of agricultural and rural policies. and discusses the impacts. As policy commitments, and correspondingly public expenditure for supporting multiple functions of agriculture (MFA) are growing, the need to develop empirical tools for checking accountability of public support is growing. The paper provides a comparative review of various modelling approaches towards analysing policy impacts on multiple functions of agriculture. Comparative review is used to reveal strengths and limitations of the POMMARD modelling framework. Paper discusses compatibility of 'conventional? (sectoral, macroeconomic, spatial) models into the POMMARD framework, and about its applicability to a policy evaluation tool.

Reforming Pillar 2 - Towards Significant and Sustainable Rural Development?

Holger Bergmann, Thomas Dax, Vida Hočevar, Gerhard Hovorka, Luka Juvančič, Melanie Kröger and Kenneth J. Thomson

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With the ongoing “Health Check” and the decisions needed for after 2013, the Common Agricultural Policy is likely to see another major reform and an increase in compulsory modulation. By employing a regional model, this paper compares the long-term impact of spending along the Pillar 2 Axes in NUTS3 areas on selected indicators of sustainability in several peripheral areas across Europe. The four case study areas are: Pinzgau-Pongau (a tourism-dominated alpine area in Austria), the Wetterau (an urbanised industrial area in Germany), Gorenjska (a tourism and manufacturing dominated area in Slovenia) and Caithness-Sutherland (a remote area in Scotland). The results suggest although devolution in European rural development policy has taken over the last 10 years, there is further need to restore place-based stewardship of public goods and services as well as private investments across rural areas in the European Union. Increasing the importance of Axis 2 and Axis 3 measures (part of CAP Pillar 2) therefore seems an obvious choice for the future. Furthermore, it is clear that the effects of wider societal trends such as the decreasing importance of agriculture, commuting and migration, can be weakened or amplified by EU funding but can not be reversed or significantly changed.

 

Towards a New Analysis of CAP Policy Options: Using System Dynamics to Model the Relationships between Agricultural Functions, Territorial Rural Development, and Policies

 

John Marshall Bryden

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This paper describes the development of a dynamic systems model to articulate the inter-relationships between the public and private ‘functions’ of agriculture and farm families and the territorial rural economies, societies and environments in which these functions are performed. It further reports on, and discusses, the results of running a series of EU Policy Reform Scenarios using the model over policy-relevant time horizons in 11 different types of rural region in Europe. On the basis of the analysis of the 11 very different rural regions from North, South, East and West Europe, it suggests that of the Scenarios analysed, a cut in direct payments to farmers (CAP Pillar 1) with transfer of funds saved to ‘rural development’ (CAP Pillar 2) Axes 2 (agri-environment) or 3 (rural development) is likely to be the preferred choice when economic, population, agricultural and environmental objectives are jointly considered in the current political context. The latter includes a continued interest in ‘juste retour’ and a focus on net contributions to the EU budget on the part of the net contributing countries in the run up to the EU budget review starting in 2009.

Do they really think so? Questions on the institutional implications of PES schemes

Matteo Roggero, Sonny Mumbunan and Marcela Munoz

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This paper explores the institutional aspects of a specific form of market-based environmental policy instruments: PES schemes or Payments for Environmental Services. The popularity of similar schemes rests on specific assumptions concerning uniqueness and statics in actor motivation. These assumptions are released through the introduction of plurality and dynamics in actor motivation. Implications of this shift are subsequently analysed for institutions in general and for PES schemes in particular. The latter are hereby understood as a third-party driven process of institutional change. The conclusions lead to question the efficiency rationale for PES schemes as well as their suitability as tools for poverty alleviation; emphasis is put, instead on the deliberative processes underlying resource allocation.

Environmental Governance – The Aspect of Coordination

Arild Vatn

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This paper is asks whether the way we organize our economy makes it possible to solve the increasing environmental challenges humanity is facing. The basic market-firm structure, around which the economy is foremost organized, is well suited to handle independent choices. The vexing environmental problems we are confronted with shows that human action is fundamentally interdependent. The paper argues that to handle the kind of coordination problems implicit in this, demands a change in the relationship between the state and the market or even a more fundamental process of reorganizing the economy. The paper discusses specifically the introduction of ex ante state regulations and changes to other types of property structures of productive activities with high levels of interdependency like expanding state respectively common property. The paper closes with a discussion of the realism of these strategies seen against present trends.

The Role of Market Based Instruments for Biodiversity Protection in Central and Eastern Europe

Ilona Banaszak, Veronika Chobotova and Tatiana Kluvankova-Oravska

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This paper presents the development and the emergence of market incentives for biodiversity protection in Central and Eastern European Countries. Although the development of MBIS for biodiversity protection is receiving an increasing attention as a possible cheaper and more effective alternative to the regulatory approach all around the world, it is in particular challenging in post-socialistic countries, where the state command and control economy disturbed functioning of markets. Our analysis indicates that MBIS can be beneficial for biodiversity conservation, but not always suitable and appropriate. The following preconditions for effective design of MBIS in Central and Eastern European countries have been identified: clear property rights, rules about information dissemination, monitoring responsibilities, and sanctioning. Our results show that successful implementation of MBIS for biodiversity conservation in CEE countries is furthermore influenced by previous institutions and local circumstances which affect the performance of those new mechanisms. However, MBIs should complement rather than substitute regulatory approaches. Thus, in combination with traditional regulation, market based instruments can be seen as a crucial steps and new options towards conservation objectives and sustainability.

Analyzing Ecosystem Services across Changing Institutional Settings: Case Studies on Disruptive Top-down Interventions

Eszter Kelemen and Erik Gómez-Baggethun

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This paper analyzes the way disruptions in local resource regimes driven by agents from larger scales (e.g., the State or supranational organizations) can modify ecosystem services flows and stakeholder accessibility to their benefits. Our study is based on two case studies in Spain and Hungary, in which interventions by the State modified the local resource regimes. The results suggest that top-down interventions tend to erode locally evolved institutions and favour ecosystem services demanded by stakeholders at larger scales. Our study also suggests, nonetheless, that without State intervention critical ecosystem services undervalued at local scales become vulnerable to degradation. We conclude that as multilevel management systems become increasingly necessary for environmental governance in a globalized world, institutional design needs to tackle with power asymmetries between different management levels (e.g., State vs. local communities) if equitable access to ecosystem services across spatial scales is to be achieved.

 

The role of institutions in a fisheries management simulation game

 

Manuel Ruiz Perez, Fatima Franco Mugica, Jose A. Gonzalez Novoa and Miguel A. Alberruche Rico

 

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Marine fisheries have different institutional settings that so far have not prevented a steady decline of fisheries around the world. Because of that, new institutions are being proposed. Management simulation game models have been developed, the most famous of which, Fish Banks, is widely used as a teaching tool. We use Fish Banks to test the effect of introducing a fisheries institution in the biological and economic performance of fisheries. The game was played by 42 groups of around 20 Environmental Science students, under two different time length and institutional scenarios. The results indicate that sessions run under an institutional setting perform better that those who don’t have institutions in terms of fish population, aggregated value of assets, and income distribution among competing companies.

 

Socially embedded emission inventories: a systemic approach to local climate action

 

Maria Heras and Nicolas Kosoy

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Climate change and emissions reduction occupy a central place in the international political agenda. Various frameworks dealing with emissions are widespread and address issues from the international to the local level, from public to the private sectors. This research aims at delivering a methodological improvement of emission inventories by including institutional and organisational variables into emission accounting. Although, biophysical description of societal emissions based on technical and quantitative parameters is needed for establishing deviations from baselines; a more qualitative and social description of the system is essential for the implementation phase and delivery of successful policy recommendations. This paper also presents a case study based on a local municipality on the outskirts of Barcelona which clearly illustrates the importance of establishing emission inventories that account for the institutional dimensions of climate change.

Climate change versus financial crisis: What makes quick action possible?

Janne I. Hukkinen

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According to IPCC, keeping the average global temperature rise below 3 degrees Centigrade – a rise many experts believe will cause extraordinary management challenges worldwide – requires stabilizing the atmospheric greenhouse gas concentration at 450 ppm and zero net emissions by 2060. The most ambitious continental greenhouse gas reduction target is that of the EU, but even it calls for a modest 20% emission reduction of the 1990 level by 2020. Achieving the target looks tenuous at best today. Please join us in a discussion session on rapid climate action. To participate, all you need is an open mind. Here are some questions to launch the discussion: Do we know of policy instruments with quick impact? What constitutes adequate impact? How do the instruments trigger behavioral change? What does historical research on human-environment interaction tell us about effective policy instruments? What does cognitive science tell us about the prerequisites of quick behavioral change? What might the quick impact climate policy instruments look like? What side effects might they have? Can we pilot new instruments right now?

The Curse of Natural Resources: Ethnic Fractionalization vs. Polarization

Elissaios Papyrakis and Jacopo Baggio