| Economic forces are driving drastic changes in the environment of our planet Earth. Future generations may live in a planet radically different from our own. Between our lifetime and theirs, economic activity may lead to irreversible changes in the environment, greater than any since the evolution of human society, with far-reaching consequences for the well-being of our progeny. This poses a challenge to economic analysis, for economists have traditionally taken the economy's material and biological environment as exogenously given and independent of economic activities. This research looks in detail at the major consequences of human domination of global ecological and biogeochemical systems. It argues sustainability is intrinsically a matter of intergenerational equity, and from this notion, focuses on the theory and practice of economic development as viewed from the perspectives of resource exhaustibility, development sustainability and intergenerational equity. It demonstrates that, contrary to current macroeconomic preoccupations, since our Earth is a planet of finite resources, continued growth cannot be physically or economically sustained over time and is morally undesirable. It also examines the problems and prospects of designing a sustainable ecological economic system. This research is aimed at providing the needed information, analysis, projections and theories to facilitate the transition toward a new development paradigm that leads to a more prosperous and more equitable future. |
