2017 Articles

Recasting Economics As If the Climate and Global Ecology Really Mattered

Porter, John R.; Smith, Pete; Howden, Mark; Stokholm, Michaela Schiller

The current paradigm of global economics with exponential and continuous economic growth is unsustainable as far as Earth system ecology is concerned. To support the Earth system and boost sustainable development, a functional and operational linkage between global ecology and economics should be established – which we term ‘carbonomics’. The simple basis of ‘carbonomics’ is that the more fossil and non-fossil carbon one has as stocks, and not flows, of carbon, the richer one is. This opinion piece makes some suggestions about how we might establish such a balanced relationship.