Prosperity, Sustainability and the Measurement of Wealth

Sustainability and the Measurement of Wealth

We develop and apply a consistent and comprehensive theoretical framework for assessing whether economic growth is compatible with sustaining wellbeing over time. Our approach differs from earlier approaches by concentrating on wealth rather than income. Sustainability is demonstrated by showing that a properly defined comprehensive measure of wealth is maintained through time. Our wealth measu...

Sustainability and the measurement of wealth: further reflections

The June 2012 issue of Environment and Development Economics published a symposium with considerable focus on our paper, ‘Sustainability and the measurement of wealth’. The Symposium also contained five articles in which other researchers offered valuable comments on our paper. The present note replies to those comments. It clarifies important issues and reveals how important questions relating...

Sustainability and the Measurement of Wealth by Kenneth

Welfare, Wealth and Sustainability

Growing concerns over climate change and the potential for large damages due to non-linear processes underscore the need for meaningful sustainability assessment of an economy. Economists have developed rigorous approaches to conceptualizing sustainability based on the paradigm of weak sustainability, which assumes infinite substitution between manufactured and natural capital stocks. In contra...

Sustainable intensification of agriculture for human prosperity and global sustainability

There is an ongoing debate on what constitutes sustainable intensification of agriculture (SIA). In this paper, we propose that a paradigm for sustainable intensification can be defined and translated into an operational framework for agricultural development. We argue that this paradigm must now be defined-at all scales-in the context of rapidly rising global environmental changes in the Anthr...