The journal is concerned with extending and integrating the understanding of the interfaces and interplay between ‘nature's household’ (ecosystems) and ‘humanity's household’ (the economy). Ecological economics is an interdisciplinary field defined by a set of concrete problems or challenges related to governing economic activity in a way that promotes human well-being, sustainability, and justice.
This page collects all citations from this journal, providing an ‘open’ link to access that research paper where possible. The citation for each paper also lists the content of the FRAW site which references that work, with links directly to the paragraph citing the paper. This listing uses the same format as the FRAW Subject Index – and a complete table of the abbreviations used in the listing can be found on the main index page. Note, paywalled links are shown in red, and ‘open’ links are shown in blue.
William E. Rees, Journal of Ecological Economics, vol.169 art.106519, 2020.
Ecological economics for humanity’s plague phase
The human enterprise is in potentially disastrous ‘overshoot’, exploiting the ecosphere beyond ecosystems’ regenerative capacity and filling natural waste sinks to overflowing. Economic behavior that was once ‘rational’ has become maladaptive… This paper briefly considers some of the missing pieces that are particularly relevant to humanity’s econoecological predicament: competitive displacement of non-human species through habitat and resource appropriation; humans as exemplars of the maximum power principle; the implications of ‘far-from-equilibrium’ thermodynamics; and evidence that H. sapiens is in the plague phase of a global population cycle.
N.J. Hagens, Journal of Ecological Economics, vol.169 art.106520, March 2020.
Economics for the Future – Beyond the Super-organism
Our environment and economy are at a crossroads. This paper attempts a cohesive narrative on how human evolved behavior, money, energy, economy and the environment fit together. Humans strive for the same emotional state of our successful ancestors. In a resource rich environment, we coordinate in groups, corporations and nations, to maximize financial surplus, tethered to energy, tethered to carbon. At global scales, the emergent result of this combination is a mindless, energy hungry, CO2 emitting Superorganism. Under this dynamic we are now behaviorally ‘growth constrained’ and will use any means possible to avoid facing this reality. The farther we kick the can, the larger the disconnect between our financial and physical reality becomes. The moment of this recalibration will be a watershed time for our culture, but could also be the birth of a new ‘systems economics’. and resultant different ways of living. The next 30 years are the time to apply all we’ve learned during the past 30 years. We’ve arrived at a species level conversation.
